Chapter Three
The next morning Luke awoke in a flash and with a big smile. “How about a party! I’ve kept away from all my friends the last seven weeks. It’s time to be social again and stop this hermit routine.”
He took a slow hot shower and a slow careful shave. His breakfast was ham, eggs, toast and juice; a good way to start the day.
The dishes were left to fend for themselves in the sink while he sat on the living room floor with paper, pencil and a cellphone. Now, for a list of people. Once that was done he checked off those he really wanted to see. This was the “old Luke” back in action. He loved to organize parties and outings as a way to surround himself against that eternal loneliness.
“God, when should this be? It’s so close to Christmas. I bet everyone is planned out to New Year’s."
A long list of unanswered phone calls confirmed that. He slumped into the soft, deep piled upholstery. Get hold of yourself old boy. Darn! That sounds like dad’s advice every time I became upset when he cancelled a date we had, due to an emergency business trip out of town. He tapped his forehead as something forgotten suddenly came back to him.
Oh well. I did burn all my bridges telling everyone of my two week trip to the Caribbean over the holidays. And there I was at work staring at that travel poster knowing I had forgotten to do something for how many weeks? I had forgotten to make reservations. Ugh!
He sank further into the couch with that old sense of struggling to accomplish something and not getting anywhere, when all was said and done. Well, just another case of fighting through the “molasses” of low spirits.
His eyes fell onto the blank television screen as he peered through droopy eyelids. This time I’m going to sit here and not struggle to feel better. It’s only morning and I am worn out. Brother, that old ‘wilderness' again.
He listened to the wind and felt unable to move. Luke’s eyes began to relax and wander over the screen surface while playing with little bits of reflection, like some kid lost in play with no purpose, no goal. He let the scene before him be all right, playing with the images for a long time until he realized they were reflections of the tree lights.
“That tree”, he smiled
A sense of whimsy spread inside him and he roared in laughter. Oops , these paper-thin walls. But, he laughed again. I have this incredible thing in my home and I am sitting here spacing out. For two days I have not taken this all in.
Luke arose, walked to the tree and stood in front of it.
“Why are you here? Why are you like this?"
The tree shook and the star light went off for a second before resuming its usual rhythm.
“Sorry, I just got this into my head. I could feel graced, maybe like being in a Spielberg movie”
He repeated those words hoping it all would transform into an understanding. I have blocked out the next two weeks from friends and family. Are there possibilities here? Those ‘alternatives’ she said in the cafeteria?
“What is the plan, oh great tree?”
The tree ornaments clanged together. Luke felt embarrassed and humbled like a student in the presence of a wise teacher. The thought of not seeing anyone for two weeks felt all right. Maybe have an adventure I cannot avoid, like I did many times in the past. What the heck. A leaden coat seemed to fall away from his shoulders and onto the floor.
The tree lights were modulating to his heartbeat. I have not felt this relaxed, when alone, before. Maybe something to remember when struggling that is better than just advice from books; an actual experience of calm that is a real teacher.
Luke let himself down onto the floor and sat beneath the tree. For an hour the tree starlight and his heart were like two kids skipping down a path to the same beat. A deluge of memories came through let loose by the crumbling of some upstream dam built up from years of fear. His dulled eyes lit up like a movie screen.
His father’s stare would cut short any urge Luke had to express his feelings during any misunderstandings, as when, kidding his mother in the loving way a young boy can do. That brought his father’s hand across Luke’s face. Always those times and he had no chance to respond or explain. That stare came with “don’t you say a thing Luke.”
Sunday evenings before school were depressing. What did he fear? Seventh grade was a shock to him. All the kids seemed to have grown up during the previous summer. They ran for a student council that had never existed in Grammar school, boys and girls paired up and he suddenly seemed so stupid in classes that had been all right the year before. His mother was lost in her own world and not accessible to discuss this difficult time. He and his brother were worlds apart, separated by a gulf of eight years and they never were able to form an alliance that could have helped them both. In those years he became introverted and had no one to commiserate with about ‘parents’, school and that eternal longing for a girl.
He slept that afternoon. The room was quiet and only the tree showed any signs of life,
“Hi honey, it’s mom. You there?” came out of the phone recorder and cracked through the quiet and swirled about his ears insisting to be heard. An eye opened,
“Huh? Mom?” said with some regret. He dragged himself across the floor to the phone and picked it up before he could make a clear decision otherwise.
“Hi mom. How are you?” as his throat tightened.
“Fine dear. And, why are you still at home? I bet you and Angie are back together and you never really did sign those divorce papers. Right?”
“Mom, you needn’t worry. We are divorced and I am leaving tomorrow for my adventure.
Those last words, said so quickly, without thought, put a smile on his face.
“Well, I don’t have anything to say dear. Just called.”
“Thanks mom and tell dad Happy Holidays for me and to you, also.”
He put down the phone. His nerves were a bit tight,
"Why do I answer that damn thing like some slave. There is such a thing as voicemail. Always so afraid to miss a call and an invitation and then end up alone with no place to go."
Luke sank down onto the floor again and slid over to his tree. He reclined beneath its branches. I came into the marriage with that lonely feeling despite my social life and broke out of that with Angie’s help. Now I am right back to being lonely. He felt tensed seeing himself that way. What ‘adventure’ is that tomorrow? He smiled. This feels good. By myself, really by myself, in a wilderness, but one outside my mind. Like the time out skiing, but this time it will be of my own choosing. The pine needles quivered and the tree trunk bumped the floor.
“You are right, tree. This is my adventure. I’ve got to do this alone. Never been able to travel alone or do anything like an adventure vacation. No wonder I never made those reservations for that Caribbean trip. I could not find anyone to go with me. Tree! You seem like a friend somehow.” He paused and with a far off look rolled his eyes upward and slowly asked,
"Boy, am I so lonely that I have befriended a tree?”
Then more bumping until Luke proclaimed,
“Sorry. I need any kind of friend and you are a real help. As a human, it is a bit difficult to go along with this tree friend thing.”
A small knot entered his gut,
“I miss you Angie. You were not what they expected for a daughter-in-law, being a “racial stew’ as they put it. Big deal! So, our kids would be mixed. I should not have let them influence me.
The little red lights were slowly blinking in a random fashion, like the flow of his thoughts.
“You got an abortion, saying you could not raise a kid without a father. Angie! You could have gone ahead and had it anyway. At least there would have been a kid for you. I would have been a father for it in my own ways. I know I would.”
The tree came closer and bent toward him. The crooked trunk, misshapen branches and ornaments below where poised in anticipation of an answer to an important question. Something quivered inside his gut like the two sides of a geological faul
t line, now pushing after a lifetime of bucking against one another, finally giving way and resigned to what would erupt. He sobbed underneath the tree.