The Renfield Syndrome Ch. 02

CHAPTER 2

Doing the Old Man's booze shopping was the least favorite of David's many jobs as dutiful son. First, last, and foremost, it wasn't easy on his own sobriety which was already iffy on the best of days. As he gathered the usual order of a bottle of American whiskey and as much Budweiser as he could carry, David could never stop himself from casting a wary glance at the vodka shelf, his own personal poison. It would be extremely easy to add some to his load, but it had been five months and the last thing he wanted to do was go back to zero so close to a sobriety milestone. He reminded himself that were he to indulge, he might get that beloved hour or two of brain fog, but then everything would rebel against him as it always did. It got worse every time he relapsed, and this was far from David's first attempt at recovery.

His wet shoes squeaked on the grungy tile as he filled his nightly shopping list. The Old Man wasn't supposed to be drinking any more than David was, but that was a conversation the two of them had countless times already, going forever in circles around the immovable object that was the bastard's sheer mule headedness. And if David didn't show up bearing the requisite supplies, the fucker had multiple ways of ensuring that his night would be even more miserable than it already was. It was either supply his addictions or spend yet another evening being verbally assaulted until he was ready to crack. And a small and extremely guilty part of him secretly thought the Old Man finally drinking himself to death wouldn't be nearly as tragic as some might purport to think.

The cashier was a younger guy, probably not thirty yet with shaggy hair and a stocking cap. David imagined that he might be another college student earning whatever he could in the evenings in a dire, dire economy. He had seen him before often enough that when he approached the counter with his alcoholic loot, the man grinned warmly. They didn't know each other's names, but their roles were well rehearsed. "Grabbing the usual." It was a statement, not a question.

"Yeah, I spend too much money on this shit." David had never mentioned to the young man that the small ocean of liquor and beer wasn't for himself. It was easier to let him assume he was a world-class boozehound than explain. And not that long ago he would have been right anyway.

The rest of the transaction was accomplished along with the usual small talk. The weather was always a popular subject among Seattleites, even though one would think they must have exhausted the subject by now. It was nicknamed "Rain City" for a very good reason, and tonight it was coming down notably hard even for this gloomy little corner of the country. A distant clap of thunder rumbled, and the cashier remarked, "Dude, you need to get an umbrella or something," acknowledging David's dripping hair and already soaked clothing.

"My dumb ass left it at home, you'd think I would have learned by now." He ran his debit card as the young man bagged the whiskey and set it beside the case of beer. The transaction was completed like clockwork, just as it was nearly every night, and David grabbed the groceries with the requisite but heartfelt, "Have a good one." If he lived by one rule in his life, it was no matter his own mood, he tried never to make anyone else's day worse than it already was.

It was precipitating harder than it was even a few minutes ago, and his feet splattered in the water gathering on the sidewalk. He wasn't especially concerned about getting wet, rather he was quite used to it. More than used to it. Whether it was misting, drizzling, showering, storming, or torrenting, the people who dwelt here spent their days in a near perpetual state of damp. It was about a four on the ol' Rain-O-Meter right now, but the signs were there that tonight might hit a seven at least.

David's used gray Toyota was parked around the corner of the city street, as unremarkable in appearance as its owner was, and old enough to have manual locks. He loaded the Old Man's booze into the back seat and settled himself behind the wheel, his somewhat shaggy sandy hair already plastered to his skull from his brief venture into the open. It crossed his mind to leave the alcohol on the sidewalk for whoever wanted it and just go the hell home. But his duty as a son called, and it wasn't like anyone else was going to do the miserable job.

It was well past rush hour, and the heavy clouds were beginning to darken, heralding nightfall. The city had gotten its brief spurt of summer weather out of the way and the days were growing shorter again. Aside from the temperature of the rain, Seattle didn't enjoy a lot of variation in the seasons. David found an opportunity and pulled smoothly out into the thinning traffic, settling in for the longish drive to the Old Man's house. Once upon a century or two ago it had been David's house as well, and the demands that he make it so again were becoming more frequent as time went by. It was a standard subject of argument as the Old Man really wanted a live-in caretaker, while David preferred to spend his time doing something more fun. Like bashing his own testicles with a claw hammer, for one example.

There were other siblings of course, but they were spread far and wide across the country, preoccupied with their own big families. David and the Old Man were the only two Martins still in the Pacific northwest. He had two brothers in front, a sister and a brother in back, and about a gazillion nieces and nephews in other cities. As David was the only adult member of the clan unmarried and childless, tending to the Old Man's needs in his decrepitude had fallen to him. A hefty percentage of David's income was spent on a part-time nurse just so he got some time away, but he couldn't afford a 24/7 live-in along with the family mortgage and property taxes. And so evenings and weekends were entirely his problem, and the Old Man dearly loved to make himself a problem.

David found the freeway on ramp and turned on to it, suddenly grumpy when he saw the traffic ahead. For a city that got so much rain, the citizenry somehow did not know how to drive on wet roads. Combine that with the fact that there were very few routes north-to-south and whoever built the freeway system thought bottlenecks were just dandy, short trips could be excruciatingly long in this town. With an inward groan, David resigned himself to a lousy commute just to make his evening complete. Finally merging into traffic, he set his phone to playing some music that was at least relaxing. He had something for every mood, and while it was tempting to listen to something angry right now, David needed all the mellow he could find for the evening ahead. One could say that David and the Old Man had their share of differences. For that matter, there were at least sixteen father-son pairs out there that had no differences at all because of the two of them.

His fingers drummed on the steering wheel as the traffic briefly sped up and then slowed right back down again. He was well used to these roads and this drive, so his mind wandered as the cars ahead of him sporadically crept forward and stopped dead still. One song ended and another began, and then another, and then another. David's playlists were as meticulously crafted as everything else he did, and his long-practiced patience held as what should have been a ten-minute drive turned into nearly an hour. At last, he reached the exit he needed and got a satisfying burst of speed coming down the off-ramp at least.

The old family homestead was still a fair distance away, but now that he was out of traffic David made good time and shortly was pulling into the driveway of the painfully middle-class two-story house in South Seattle that had been his childhood home. It was difficult to find much nostalgia for the place and it seemed especially oppressive viewed through the increasing downpour. The place was in fine repair, the very image of white suburbia, as David took care of most of the basic maintenance himself. At least once a month he carefully pulled up the Old Man's large collection of political yard signs and just as carefully replaced them after mowing the lawn, and only a few weeks ago he had replaced a window the drunken bastard had broken in a rage.

David parked in the driveway leading to the garage and climbed out, retrieving his familiar bounty of booze from the back seat. Then he splashed up the walk to the front door, located his key, and let himself inside.

The interior of the home was heavily decorated in what David (very) privately thought of as white trash kitsch. Guns were a theme, as were American flags and various patriotic knickknacks, saturated throughout with heavy tones of religion. Crosses and artist's renditions of the crucifixion adorned nearly every wall, forever reminding one of Jesus' eternally guilt-tripping sacrifice. David was well used to these and supposed he was still a believer, but about all that was left of his own faith these days was a lingering sense of fear. He set the booze down on the carpeted floor to hang his dripping jacket up on the wall rack adorned with praying hands and a proud, "Welcome to the Martins".

"Hey Dale, you up?" David called as he grabbed his delivery and carried it into the kitchen, an all-too familiar smell of stale urine invading his nose. He hadn't called the Old Man "dad" or "father" or anything similar in many years and he sure as hell didn't plan on starting now.

"I wish I wasn't," came the whining reply, and David allowed himself a silent eyeroll. He wasn't an unsympathetic person, but Dale Martin had long practiced methods of testing the patience of a saint, which David profoundly was not. The fat old man sat in his wheelchair at the kitchen table, his ruddy face a carefully prepared and balanced mixture of anger and misery. He glared at David through runny, heavily bloodshot eyes, his expression one of disgust. "I've been sitting here for an hour, I couldn't hold it."

"Oh, for fuck's sake," David groused as he set down his load and confirmed the front of the Old Man's pants were soaked through. "Why didn't you use your goddamn jug? It's sitting right there!" He gestured toward the plastic urinal on the floor nearby, already half full. Proof that it had been successfully used before.

"I couldn't reach it," the Old Man sniveled. "Where have you been, I've been sitting here in pain."

"This is when I always get here Dale. I can't get here any sooner."

"Fuck yes you can. You just don't want to." His tone was as if accusing David of an unspeakable offense.

"Well, you pissed yourself to teach me a fucking lesson, so you can sit in it for a couple minutes longer." It wasn't an idle accusation. The Old Man was never left alone without his piss jug, but he liked to force David to change him as punishment if he was feeling ignored. At least he hadn't shit himself this time, but the night was still young.

"Get me my fuckin' pain pills and one of those beers," was the command as he clutched at his own head with a meaty hand, grasping what he could of his thinning military flattop. "I feel like I've been stabbed." This was another extremely common complaint and had been since the mild stroke the Old Man had suffered. The doctor assured them that poststroke headaches usually went away within seventy-two hours, but the Old Man had been complaining of them for coming up on ten years now. "Hurry up, that fuckin' Linda won't give them to me."

"She's afraid you're going to overdose, Dale, how many of these have you had today?" Rather than wait for an answer, David retrieved the bottle and spilled the white pills onto his hand to balance the number against yesterday's count. It looked reasonable.

"I want to overdose, gimme the damn bottle. I can't live like this anymore, I wish I could die." This last was delivered in an all-too-familiar pitiful whine that set David's teeth on edge.

"Here, take one and be happy with it, you're already a one-man opioid crisis." David placed it on the table before the Old Man and pulled one of the Buds free of the case. Suddenly spry, the Old Man grabbed the beer and drained half in one go. He paused for breath and to pop the OxyContin, and then polished off the can and graced David with a satisfied, thick and blubbery belch.

"I wish you'd fire that fuckin' Linda, she just lets me sit in pain all day. You're always sniveling about money, if you'd just move back in here, we could get rid of that cunt and you could quit bitching." The Old Man groped for a second beer on his own, pulling it free and cracking it open.

"Forget it, I'm not waiting on you all damn day, Dale. I have work to do to earn that money I keep bitching about. Linda's fine, she's a sweet old lady and she cares about you, and you've already driven the first two off with your bullshit."

"She lets me sit in pain while she's got her nose in a book!"

"Uh huh, sure she does. Well, I'm here now and you've got your shit, so get out of those goddamn wet pants and I'll throw in a load of laundry before I go home." The Old Man made a great show of rising out of his wheelchair and falling back with a pained whine. David absently moved to his side and helped him stand, which was mostly for show. Give the Old Man a good enough reason, like a chance to get his withered old dick to half mast, and he could nigh-bounce right out of his beloved wheelchair. He got the Old Man standing and yanked his pants down, roughly scrubbing at his damp legs and sagging undercarriage with a kitchen towel. Then he scored a dirty bathrobe from a hook on the door, got him into it and then lowered him into his seat again. The Old Man immediately reached for the Jack Daniel's bottle, all pain suddenly forgotten. His favorite medicines tended to work instantaneously. David left him to it and set about the evening chores, hoping he might call it an early night. But the Old Man wasn't even getting warmed up yet.

"See, you're almost as good as a wife," he sneered as David put a frying pan on the stove. "That long ass hair makes you almost purty as a wife, too. And we both know you suck dick good as a wife, wanna show me? I got my pants off." He winked grotesquely and cranked the top off the whiskey bottle to take a pull straight from it, wincing at the taste even as he relished it.

"You're fucking revolting, Dale, will you shut up?" David said absently, barely paying attention. He checked the fridge and saw a couple of pork chops. Those would make as good a dinner as any, and he set about frying them up by themselves, no fancy stuff, no frills. As a bachelor, David was a decent cook. Nothing extravagant, but the basics were easy.

"No seriously, all you're missing's a cunt. And you don't have one of those, right, or do ya? You got yer little wiener chopped off yet?" He chortled as if finding this hilarious and chased the shot of Jack with most of his third can of Bud. He was going to get drunk fast at this rate, which was a good thing. His beloved male role model passing out cold was the only peace and quiet in David's foreseeable future. He didn't dignify the question with a response, it had been asked before. The bastard never missed a chance to make a disgusting joke or nasty comment or dish out some sneering mockery. There were a lot of things about David that he refused to accept, his hair, his physical build, his friends, his line of work, his choice of hobbies. But above all else he would never ever in a million years accept that David was queer.

Fortunately, David at least knew how to get the Old Man off the subject of his son's sexuality fast. Ask about his fragile health. "You're in a strangely good mood, you feeling better today?"

"Fuck no. I'm so sick I wish I could die. I almost choked to death on my own spit today, I can't even fuckin' breathe right anymore. I got so much shit gobbed up in my eyes that..." What followed was an impressive parade of ailments, all devastating no matter how inane. But David had already stopped paying attention and busied himself with cleaning the kitchen. The Old Man's endless complaints were mostly white noise. He could barely remember ever not hearing them, they were the soundtrack of his entire life on this rotten planet.

By the time the chops were adequate to eat, the Old Man was drunk as a skunk and high off his tits. This didn't make his company any more enjoyable, but as soon as he ate, David planned to park him in front of the TV with one of his beloved action movies. Generally, he would be snoring in his wheelchair before it was half over, and David could muscle him into bed and go the hell home. Linda would be here in the morning to wait on him during the day, and David didn't envy her a bit.

"Fuckin' meat is grisly as hell," came the inevitable gripe. "I can't chew this shit, we got anything else?"

"Not unless you want a peanut butter sandwich, I can't get you groceries until tomorrow."

"Jesus, you're so fuckin' useless," he snarled in sudden anger. He cracked yet another beer, David didn't know what the count was. He rarely paid attention anymore.

"Yeah, I'm useless." David busied himself washing the greasy frying pan. "One of these days I'm going to let you sit in your own piss and shit all night and then you can tell me how useless I am."

"You would. After everything I've done for you, after I fed ya' and housed ya' and educated ya' and tried to teach ya' God's way, you would do that to your father. You always were an ungrateful little faggot."

"Ungrateful too, yep. You about done, want me to put on a movie for you?"

"No, I want you to fuckin' CARE about me!" The Old Man's fork bounced off the linoleum floor, but David managed to grab the plate before it followed suit. "I need someone to fuckin' take CARE of me, and you're too busy gettin' buttfucked all the time to take care of your poor dad!" He groped for the whiskey and took a hefty shot from the bottle. Wheezing, he chased it with most of one of his beloved Budweisers and regarded his son balefully.

Possibly what bothered David the most was that he couldn't even find the energy to get angry anymore. Repeated exposure had numbed his temper if not his nerves. Maybe that was a sign of defeat, he didn't know. "That's right, I don't give a shit about you. That's why I'm here every motherfucking night cooking your dinner and bringing you booze and cleaning your goddamn house, and that's why I pay the mortgage, and your day nurse, and..."

"Fuck you, money money money. It's all about money with you."

"Well, grownups have to exchange it for goods and services. And I don't make that much of it, Dale." David's tone was one of an adult mollifying a tantrummy child.

"Well, if you'd ever had a real fuckin' job..."

"I have a real job."

"My ass, you sit around and look at fag porn all day. You've never done a day of real work in your life. Look at your brothers. Hell, just look at Danny. He's gonna make a real diff'rence someday, and he doesn't hold out on me!"

Naturally, the Old Man had been the sort to insist that all his male children share his initials. Daniel Martin was the second oldest sibling and had a remarkable flair for gutter politics. He had an eye for higher office, and David fully expected he'd carpetbag his way in somewhere one day, but so far was still playing advisor or chief of staff to this politician or that one. "Bullshit he doesn't hold out on you," David retorted. "He gets so many bribes and kickbacks that he could pay off this whole house for you and not crack a sweat. He just tells you he's a poorly paid public servant."

"Don't you fuckin' badmouth your older brother! Hees' a good Christian, and someday he's going to make the kind of leader this country fuckin' needs. AND he's a real man, not a fuckin' pussy little faggot!"