You can't Go Home Bk. 01

I smiled. You were unfazed and told me. "Hell, no, you sinner, get off my lawn."

If she only knew my true story, it would have some truth in it and in close enough to be the truth. It was getting nearly dark as I walked to the second Laundromat, but there were no listings, there was work for hire, and I called. They wanted me to demo an old outdoor brick grill for fifty bucks. So I called they let me do it at nine am. It's only blocks away. I see a few sandwiches, water bottles, and fifty bucks in my backpack.

I walked to the third Laundromat, and it was full of collage age kids, lots of nice-looking folks. I called the first place, and the guy rented it, and the same with the next two. I was sitting there packing my things thinking about getting a park bench to sleep on and save my money for clothes and a place to clean up in. As I was getting ready to leave, a woman came in, looked mid-fifty, put a card on the board, and it read for rent.

I walked over, read it, I said. "Rents fair, can you interview me over coffee? I got a sad story, a home I can never go home to, but I have a job Monday, so it's not all bad yet."

I told you my story about getting caught with my uncle's mistress and not finishing high school getting shot; I figured that sounded better than my affair with my Mom or my uncle's wife.

You listened, and you asked. "Anything, anything? My husband has been gone now for ten years. Anything? Dear, are you sure? I need to re-pipe the house. I need a man to do thousands of odd jobs, including my bedroom thirty days, then you pay rent. But here is a big thing you need to get an SS card and an ID. If you agree to get your GED, you can stay now. You eaten today?"

I say. "I had breakfast and dinner, thank you. I'm tired. I walked from the bus station downtown."

Ginger Grander was her name. She was fifty-one, standing five foot nine, maybe a hundred and twenty pounds, with green eyes and salt and pepper black hair. She was tall and slender with a great butt, but her breast wasn't a cup size. So you did not need a bra. As we get in your Chevy Bronco, It's older than I am. It runs great. Your house was a modest teacher's home from the 1920s, a craftsman home a thousand square feet, and a two-car garage with a large apartment in the back.

She takes me up there and says. "You need towels and sheets in the closet outside the bathroom."

An old TV was there. It was pointed at the couch. There was a table and a bookshelf. I see you stop in the mirror. You don't like how your hair looks; you pull a brush out of your purse and start to brush your hair.

I walk behind you taking your brush from your hand, and I brush your hair; I say. "I wanted to do this for my Mom it did not work out that way."

I finished. You looked at me. You saw tears in my eyes. Then, you shook your nipples had beceme the pointed end of spears, a good inch of nipple pointing proudly through your top.

I kiss your neck. You suck in the air, and you say. "Too soon, Dan, it's too soon. I'm not a slut, but damn, who taught you that?"

I say. "It felt right. It's all I wanted to do with my aunt, or my Mom; I never shared this with Ginger. She wanted to be held. Her husband did not touch her."

You blush, and you say. "Good night."

The next day before breakfast, I asked to use your PC; I went online and checked the Doctor's name was Hobart or something. I find his info, and I'll send an email from the coffee shop. It was set up with a fake phone number from a shipping place, all dead ends.

I sent an email it read. "My joint hurts to move. The Doctor is out of pain, but there is hope; medical insurance goes into effect in ninety days; I forgot, I still need to pay my bill of two hundred, right? I wonder if there is a way to tell me if our friends are safe. Marco here any chance of getting my birth certificate?"

On my first paycheck, I would return the hat with four hundred bucks and a note that read Thanks.

A good hour passed before I received a return email from the Doctor it read. "You Mom was in the Hospital for a week. She's home now. I was able to let her know you got away, at least. We had to wire her jaw, which will come off in the next few days. I let her know you are OK and safe. Your Dad is bad news; she was sure the police would have him in jail by now. He's got them too. Your Dad left town for the Union your Mom told me one time she had the books of his evil deeds and had them recorded all the work calls. He has hundreds of folks he can or could or does blackmail them with. I work on getting your papers to you."

Shit, those floppy disks. I ran, got my hoodie, and pulled the discs, wondering what was on them. I loaded the floppy disk into the PC opened it, There were hundreds of phone calls, recorded payoffs listed to the numbers linked to the audio records, and Dad was dirty as hell. I glanced at the second disc. It looked like more of the same. But there were a few Judges listed on his payroll, local police, and maybe an FBI guy a name is listed with dollar amounts.

Doing lots of research with the phone book, I looked up the local guy in charge in town, and it's a she and I know two things about my Dad. First, he would not work with a woman and abuse any woman he worked with. Two of his assistant complained and were not heard from again; no clue if they left or were helped to leave.

I looked up and found a home phone number for the agent who called it. "Your, the FBI. Do you want an early Xmas gift? I am doing this for my Mom, Samantha."

You say. "I'm recording this. I tell you to stop this second you take your records to work?"

You answered. "Alright, I turned it off. Why?"

I say. "The agent's name and said he's on tape asking for a hit of a state judge."

It was just blocks away, I say. "Can we meet for coffee? You know the coffee shop on the eleventh street?"

Getting there, I had sunglasses on, my hair hot rod red, and spiked it. My five o'clock shadow with added dirt from cleaning up the outdoor kitchen, looking more like a homeless guy but without the smell skipping the cowboy hat for a baseball truckers hat. I bring my copies printed out of the list of dirty guys. I hand it two you.

You say. "Shit, sir, you're not kidding. Can I take these with me? You might have to testify where you got the disks from. I try to keep you out of these, shit, you bastard. I only have three people that I know for sure are clean that I can trust."

I say. "I start with if you know who my Dad answers to? My Dad is a bad man, but no way is he the top guy of top guys; he is not too smart. I watched him have trouble reading one of my comic books. He beat my Mom. He shot me, and as I was leaving, my Mom's friend slipped me a disk of recordings, phone calls, times, dates, stills, and judges. One of you guys, my Dad, is Johnny Lee Bogart. You see why I did not call your work. I saw your number and address are on the web, by the way. I found it by looking at your husband's information."

I gave you my info and the discs, and we said goodbye. I went back to Gingers climbing under the house. I see leaks in several places I measure up to the water heater. I looked at what tools were needed. Measured up the piping in the attic, made a part list, and, with Ginger's help, rented a power hacksaw and a pipe threader. I went to the plumbing supply and priced out the parts. I told Ginger we needed to go to a builder's supply for better prices, and it was thirty percent less than the plumbing company. Three days later, with the water on, I started the repairs.

I had the plumbing changed out in the house from the meter digging a ditch for a new supply line. I sent Ginger to pull building permits if needed and schedule an inspection I found at the library all the info I needed and one summer, I helped my granddad re-plumb his house.

The water heater needed to be in better shape. We went to the building supply store and bought a bigger water heater. We had water in just four days. I worked at the office till five pm doing training and until almost two am working on the plumbing. You belong to a gym. You use it to clean up. The city turned the water back on but not till after I had to go to work; I ran a garden hose in through the window and took a cold shower. You held the hose as you sprayed me. You laughed. You had not laughed much since your husband died ten years ago.

Getting home from work about a week later to a house full of fabulous food, smells of pot roast, and roasted vegetables. Ginger had set the table. You changed into a lovely dress. I ran cleaned up. We had fun eating and talking and drinking cheap wine. It was fun eating like kings and queens. My Mom was not a cook. We hired one. She was a snitch. I got whipped for peaking on the cook taking a bath. She was hot.

We ate good food and watched a classic old movie with a guy named Humphrey Bogart in it. He was my Mom Samantha's favorite actor. She said I looked a little like him, and his ultra-hot lady Lauren Bacall looked like my Mom. It was called Key Largo. Ginger looked sleepy. I picked you up and took you to your room. I pull your covers down. We have been watching movies in our PJs.

I tuck you in, kiss your forehead, I whispered to you. "Need a small come to help you sleep, sexy?"

You answer. "OK."

My hand teases your nipples. You arch your back as a moan slips out of you. I kiss you as my fingers trail down your tummy as pull up, slipping your nightgown until I find your short hairs. I rub you slowly as my kisses fight you for your mouth. You moan as you grab my hand and move it in the direction you want to be massaged. Mom liked up and down; Susan liked it in circles. Ginger wants my fingers to drag from side to side. It's a bit of beating up your clit, you scream. You build steam till the kettle pops, and you lose a little pee as you come.

I say. "Next time I clean up, you wet with my tongue, but I want you nasty and wet because you're my slut."

Ginger says. "Thank you for letting me move slowly. You're a delight. Good night, Dan. Would it be rude to ask you to sleep with me tonight?"

I say. "I can. I want to hold you. I see how you look at the photos of your husband on the dresser. You earned your come."

We were lovers and roommates for eight beautiful years till Ginger got sick with Cancer. The company I worked at got sold to a man who was a good deal like my Dad, without any real skill at it. Ginger started not feeling up to going out. I noticed you had blood in your panties and, for a few seconds, wondering if you were raped like my Mom was. Your breath smelled terrible. It was after mouthwash. I got you to see the Doctor, but you refused to let me go with you.

Something held back between us always kept me from asking you to be my wife even though I am thirty-four years younger than you. Again we have yet to talk or make long-term plans, and a few times over the years, you asked me to leave then you changed your mind. Finally, you came home from the Doctor's office and told me. "I had ten days to find a new place to live and your sleeping in my apartment."

I sat in a room where I spent two or three nights at most in a year when her kids would come to see her for the holidays. Then, finally, I hear a car drive up. I feel bad that she is pushing me away. Is this like my Moms sacrifice? She does not want me to care for her in her last days. You don't live twenty-six years without knowing someone with Cancer. You would not open the door.

I would not use my keys. I sat outside the door and told you. "I felt cheated and wanted to tell you how mad I was, and I would not abandon you. I did love you. Life taught me one thing do it now cause you can't go home."

I heard the front door open I was planning on a long hug and a deep kiss, but it's your daughter, your forty-year-old baby. She has a man and three kids of her own. Because of her family, my things stay in the apartment in the back. I used it to get dressed; her family was never happy about our age difference.

Your daughter opens the door and says. "Mom told me everything. I thought you earn it the right to be here, but she refuses to budge an inch, Dan. She does not want her death to be as big a guilt trip as your past has been. So Ginger asked me to give you this. It's a check for all your hard work on the house. It's twenty thousand dollars and the title on her new 1996 Volvo 240 wagon with the keys. I took my house keys off my key ring and gave them back. I packed my new Volvo Ginger for the first time. It took my backseat up because I needed to buy a camping topper storage for the top of the car. I worked for the new guy at the insurance company for another couple of years or until my Mom died, and I was fired; shit, that was yesterday.

It's been fourteen years since that day I left home. It's 1999, mid-summer of my Thirty-fourth year, and my Mom's death hit me hard last month. I can't seem to ask for time off from work to go home to pack up her house. I guess it's my guilt returning to haunt me after all these years. Hell, it's affected me in every aspect of my dating life. I need to have an appraisal made to check out the town. Maybe moving back to a small village might help my outlook on life. One more blind date might kill me. It's cost me two credit cards on two dates. I was sure one of my dates sent people to my house to rip me off as we were on our date. My landlord shot at them. My date got a phone call at the restaurant and split as I paid the dinner bill. The police came and asked me questions for hours about this crew.

I went to my boss to schedule time off from work, which turned into a performance review. It looked like I would be out of work soon, a first for me. I asked. "For time off in the next twenty-eight days, I planned to clean my Mom Samantha Lee Bogart's house to see if it's fixable, livable, or even saleable. Taxes are due soon; I needed to know as it would take most of my savings to keep it a week tops to clean getting the numbers on what to do with it. That was a good reason to take time off. I'm still due three weeks off from work.

He smiled says. "Sure, Mr. Bogart, take the time off. Nobody's getting rich working a nine-to-five job. Yours is a dime a dozen. So you need the time off; Fine, take it and see what happens, you prick."

In hind site, I should have asked him what would happen to be a prick with a GED and his number one telephone insurance adjuster. I know what he meant, not that I'll care. My filter for giving a shit was broken; I did not give a damn. Closing out my PC workstation for what I thought was lunch was something else.

I feel an arm on my shoulder turning. It's the rent-a-cop, the Russian building security guard, he says. "Put things in the box Mr. Bogart. I watch. I see you be the funny guy. I mace you. Always wanted to make you less pretty boy."

Yes, he threatens to spray me with mace in Russian-broken English. He let me take my coffee cup with my empty briefcase. After looking inside, he made me leave the office pens. He took the folders out with the company name. It was the papers on my 401K. He kept the folders, giving me the papers. As I leave, I'm handed a folder with what I thought would be my last paycheck. It was, in fact, a bill for over payment of commissions. They are suing me for it back. It comes to almost what my 401k is valued at within a few bucks. I call my friend from the boxing gym. He's a lawyer.

He says. "He would look into it for me."

By then, I got home to my lovely two-bedroom garage apartment to an angry, slightly paranoid landlord yelling. "Pack. You shit, Leave now. The police came by and searched your place. They said they took your computer."

There was a note showing the place had been searched. There was a card to call if they had questions. The suits cleaned out my home office desk. Nothing was left but my kitchen stuff and toolbox. I tossed my TV in the trash. It was over fifteen years old and not worth moving. What was worth saving was my 1968 tube stereo with badass speakers, a few hundred albums of my life's playlist, clothes, and a box of books worth taking. I boxed up my books, having kept the boxes flattened under my bed. It was a trick I found from my last sudden move. Trying to find containers at ten pm at night and needing to be gone was just too hard.

It took a few hours to pack, load my 1996 Volvo 240 wagon Ginger, and lock on a top cargo dry carrier packed almost to the gills. The car is loaded, but the backseat is empty. A testament to how little I care to own or how roomy my Volvo is.

I return the house keys and say. "I was working on trying to get to the bank first thing. I can pay him out of my savings. You want to walk through the place and give me my deposit back?"

The landlord says. "He charged my credit card already. You're gone. He did not want the man coming by looking here a third time. Yeah, he looked after the police left. So he handed my two hundred back in cash."

I gassed up my car and stopped at a box store to get a few things. A sleeping bag, a cook stove, a small ice chest, a camp light, a newer cheap laptop with internet time, and snacks for the ride. I called the number the police gave me, and they wanted to see me now to answer questions.

I drove to the substation. One officer says, getting there, the guy lets me sign for my gear. "The FEDs dropped the charges on you. We don't even need to talk with you; they left here happy looks like they are going to ream the company you worked for."

Another officer had me sign papers for my stuff, says. "The men in suits from the Feds mirrored your hard drive and took it, the suits did not say they were looking at you, but your company was on the Fed's radar big time."

It's six pm. I've been up since five am; I'm dead on my feet, knowing I won't find an empty safe place to camp this late for a two to three hours drive. Being hungover and tired is not a good look to start a fourteen-hour drive. I call my ex-lady friend and fill her in on everything my day has been like.

I asked. "Can I please use your shower and park in the garage and maybe a couch? I will be on the road after eight hours of sleep?"

Jackie says. "Sure, Hon, if you show me a good time, I will feed you breakfast and send you on your way."

I say. "Yes, how do you turn down a fair offer like that."

I get there, Jackie hands me an ice-cold beer and says. "I ordered pizza Thirty Minutes, or it's free. You got fired, and the police got you kicked out of your place. So what the fuck is next?"

I answered. "I've got to go home to Midland and see if my Mom's old place is worth a go. This big city is eating my ass up."

I smell the sweet smell of your arousal. You are in a nice bathrobe, tossing it open as I go to my knees and begin my appetizers. You grab my ears as you arch your back as my fingers pull your lips apart; as my finger finds your wet pussy, the wet noises are coming fast as your moans begin. Getting you to come with my lips and tongue was not hard. My nose played with your clit like it was a cat toy. Finally, you start to come grabbing my ears as you lift me off your pussy and scream. The doorbell rang. I answered the door paying for it, still wearing my pants. The pizza, damn it, just my luck, twenty-nine minutes.

We talked as we ate about the small town I am going back to. We go online looking at the town's info. So tiny that it was once a town of under twenty thousand, now five times that. I see a message board on the city site with a few folks asking to share the gas driving to Midland. I sent off a message on one as I was pulled back to the bedroom. I was handed a massive box of condoms, and Jackie said. "It's your going away gift."

I say. "Thanks, dear, It's a box of two dozen. No way we need that many tonight."