The end of the road for a desperate man

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His body began to slump and he had to push himself up to a sitting position once again. "One more taste of vodka. For courage. Ah, the French use this same word for having the balls to do what you have to do. Valor, in Spanish. Mut, if you are German," he mused as he dropped the bottle.

His thoughts drifted to that summer day in the French Alps and the fields of blue and white wildflowers surrounded by snowcapped peaks. So long ago…when was it? Maybe, in '83 or '84, when he and that young woman took a bus across the border from Geneva… The old red bus groaned as it climbed the steep mountain pass, spewing thick, acrid plumes of diesel smoke every time the driver shifted gears. What was the girl's name? He searched his memory through the vodka haze. “Noelle,” he muttered. She was willowy and very sexy with her red hair and freckles and her short skirt and hiking boots. They planned to drink wine and make love in a meadow. They left the blanket on the bus by mistake and he ended up with mud on his trousers and her knees were grass-green afterwards. The ugly gold-and-red blanket was still on the seat when they boarded the bus for their return trip in the afternoon. They had a good laugh and wrapped the blanket around their knees and dosed off holding hands during the hour-long ride. Later, they shared a bubble bath and made love again before falling asleep in the bed with crisp, clean sheets. “Where is Noelle now, and what does she look like after all those years,” he wondered.

"I'm beginning to drift again," he thought. "Gotta stay focused." The pills and the alcohol were starting to overwhelm him. "Can't fall asleep," he reminded himself. "I have to finish this. I'm not going back to prison. People think that just because you are in a minimum security place, you have it made; TV, exercise yard, gym, three meals a day…They don't understand what it means not to be able to go where you want, when you want. When you are told what you're gonna eat and when they are going to turn out the damned lights."

He especially missed sex in prison. Being under watch by the guards and living with a cell mate, he couldn't even satisfy himself. His wife always brought the kids on visiting days, so there was no chance for a conjugal visit. She wouldn't have wanted to, anyway. Not for a long time. Once they had kids, she lost all interest in sex and, on the rare occasions when she agreed, he got the feeling that she just wanted it to be over as quickly as possible. Not him.

A psychologist once told him that he was addicted to sex. He thought that the therapist had no clue about what she was saying. He did not think of himself a sex addict… he just always liked the aroma, taste and texture of a woman more than anything else in the world. Even in the all-boys boarding school, there were women working in the laundry and the kitchen who were available and willing and eager. He remembered the assistant cook, Beverly. He wasn't yet 16. She was 30something. The loveliest nipples he ever saw. They had sex in her big Pontiac when he could sneak out of the school, and she came to get him when her husband worked the night shift. She was insatiable, and he was a limitless fountain.

"I'm losing focus again," he thought. He leaned back against the maple tree and watched winged samaras spiral down from the branches. "Yea, it's easy to say 'you do the crime, you do the time' when you are sitting comfortably in your armchair. You can go get a beer, watch TV, fuck your woman." Five years he spent in the federal prison at Allentown. The money he embezzled from his company went for girls and resort getaways and booze and coke, and expensive gifts for his wife to assuage his guilty conscience.

Now, they wanted to send him back for a parole violation. Another three years, but this time in a maximum security prison somewhere in Illinois. Who knew that that hooker would turn out to be an undercover cop? Is it his fault that he can't keep his pants zipped?

No, that wasn't even the right question. It wasn't about "fault." The Jesuits in that school taught him about "right" and "wrong" and he should have known better. Did know better. Long ago he realized that he just didn't have the discipline to stay a faithful husband and a decent father. He wasn't strong enough to rein in his cravings that caused all the heartaches, the fights with his wife, the affairs, and the mendacity that spiraled him toward the crime. He knew this. It wasn't anyone else's problem or responsibility or fault. "Maybe, that psychologist was right…maybe, I am addicted to sex," he thought.

"Can't go back to prison. Can't do it. I will die a slow death in there, anyway." He didn't feel courageous or brave or any of those things. He didn't feel sorry for himself. And he had already rationalized that his children would be better off without him, what with the life insurance policy to take care of them. He felt bad for whoever was going to find him but, then again, he chose these woods so he wouldn't make a big mess in the house. Maybe, his wife and kids can still live there without having to think about the place where he ended it all, or look at stains on a carpet that couldn't quite be cleaned, or remember walls splattered with blood.

It was time to get on with it. He shoved the bottle out of reach and made sure that the envelope with his note wouldn't blow away in the breeze. "I apologize to all people I have wronged." He slowly lifted the .41 Remington and as he put the barrel into his mouth, the last thing he saw were the shafts of late afternoon sunlight stabbing through the nervous flutter of leaves of an aspen tree.

By Steven Jakobi

From: United States

Website: http://www.stevenjakobi.com