The Crossing

The game was every ‪Sunday at the country club from 4:00 PM until Midnight‬ and there were no acceptable excuses. If it was your wife’s birthday, you’d better take her out Saturday. Afternoon baptism? You needed to find a new church or convince the preacher to move it up. If you missed a Sunday, there was always someone who was waiting to take your place. It was a juicy game and that attracted the attention of the sharks, looking for consistent profit, and the fish, looking for that lucky streak with big money on the line.

Christmas Eve was no exception and the table was full. The room had been decorated with a tree with golf ball ornaments and pin lights and Tina was wearing a Santa hat while she brought in drinks. The group had been playing for four hours and it had gotten dark outside: a peaceful winter’s night for most, and another chance to lose faith in your fellow man for the rest.
“It’s not his money.” The speaker was sixty-five or so and still kept the haircut from his army days. Ever since the club had banned smoking inside, he had kept a cigar clenched in his teeth all night, chewing it down and leaving bits and pieces all over the table and floor, making a mess poor Tina had to clean up at the end of the game. Ellis wondered if they had been better off when smoking was allowed in the room. The smell was better, but the optics were worse.

“Well, he did win last week, Dan,” Ellis responded.

The older man slammed his hand against the table, “Goddamn, he was into the table almost $8000.00. Twenty-three-hundred of that is mine and I want my damn money.”

Ellis looked down to avoid eye contact because he knew he couldn’t make it without a sneer. Patrick had owed the game; that much was true, but most of it was owed on Ellis’s side of the table: $3100.00 to him and $2500.00 or so to Jim, who he always sat beside and almost always avoiding getting into hands with. When Jim played, he usually showed the nuts and the rest of the table was too soft to make it profitable to screw with that on a regular basis.

“We let him keep it so he could buy Christmas for his boys. We’ve let him keep a night’s winnings now and then and he always brought it back and more within a few weeks,” Ellis said. “You want to shear a sheep or slaughter a pig?”

Patrick had hit it big the week before, running face first into a run of cards that seemed almost magical. He had taken an $800.00 pot from Ellis when his kings full sunk Ellis’s under-boat. Later, he had spiked the three of clubs on the river, the only card in the deck that helped him, to hit quads and take over $1000.00 from Dan. Ellis had not been able to hide a quick, gleeful sneer that time. He hated showing true emotion at the table as giving away free information was a no-no, but Dan’s face falling and then rising in a red rage had amused him. So much in fact, that he betrayed with a slight upturn of the right side of his mouth.

“It’s not his money,” Dan said again.

“Well, he’s dead, so you’re right. It’s not his money. It’s Katie’s” Ellis said in a low, firm voice.

The room fell silent as the men thought about Patrick’s wife and their twin boys who had just turned eight. The peace didn’t last long

“Fuck her,” said Dan. “She’s going to get the insurance money. She needs to give everything he owed to us, and she needs to do it now. No bullshit waiting around because it’s Christmas. He shouldn’t have been driving drunk anyway. Stupid fucker.”

Another player spoke up, “Those boys just lost their daddy. They need to have a Christmas at least, Dan.”

“You’re just saying that because he didn’t owe you any money. If he did, you’d be over their getting it yourself,” Dan said.

“Well, I still don’t think it’s right to ask for that money back right now.”

“I don’t give a flying fuck what you think. Somebody needs to go over there and get that money.”

Ellis felt the glances coming his direction until they turned into flat-out stares. Jim was the first to speak. “You know Katie pretty well, don’t you, Ellis.”

Ellis nodded his head. “We all went to school together. I took her to junior prom in fact.”

“Well, you need to go our money then,” Dan jumped in.

Jim cut eyes at him and Dan winced backwards in his seat. Jim wasn’t a big man, but he was dead serious and nobody thought it a good idea to test him in almost anything. He turned his head back to Ellis. “It is a lot of money and she is going to get the insurance. The boys are going to have a big Christmas no matter what. My wife has already got the whole church together and they damn near bought out Walmart today, so they’re good. There’s no harm in getting our money back. Patrick would’ve given it back and more if he hadn’t gone and killed himself.”

Ellis sat in the sudden silence. He didn’t want to see Katie right now, much less ask her for money, but Jim and the table continued to look at him. Finally, he drained his beer and stood up. “Fuck it. I’ll be back in an hour.”

“Don’t let her give you a sob story,” Dan called out to his back as he left the room. Ellis replied with his right middle finger over his left shoulder as the table laughed and Dan sank further into his seat and turned redder.

It took less than ten minutes to drive to their house. Patrick and Katie had built it before the twins were born and had kept it in almost immaculate condition in the nine years since. She was home most of the day and was efficient as a mother and general contractor around the house. It could be sold tomorrow if need be. Patrick was gone most of the time feeding his addictions: work, money, and gambling. Katie let him stay gone without too much complaint. She had the boys and she had the house. Patrick was not really needed that much.

He knocked gently and she soon opened the door. Away from the lights of the club, the sky was almost completely dark and the Christmas lights she had strung tastefully around the house gave a beatific glow. It was growing colder and the wind had picked up.

“Hey. Come in,” she said.

She looked tired. More tired than he had ever seen her. He followed her to the kitchen and stood mutely as she fussed with the coffee machine. She put in the capsule and hit the button. For a minute the only sounds were the heating water and then the steaming liquid falling into the cup. When it was done, she pulled the cup from under the spout and poured a small dollop of half-and-half in and turned towards him. “Sit down,” she said as she moved to the bar. He sat down beside her and looked at her profile as she stared at the window. She slid the cup to him without looking. He took a drink before placing the cup back down in front of her.

“Are the boys asleep,” he said after a beat.

“I don’t know. I doubt it.” She continued to stare straight ahead. “They’re at Patrick’s Mom’s. I don’t want them waking up Christmas morning in their dead daddy’s house.” Her voice was flat. She took a drink and slid it back.

He didn’t know what to say. He had known both of them for more than twenty years and this was only the second time he had been at a loss for words. Suddenly, he remembered the first. “Do you remember when you kissed me at prom?” he asked.

She looked at him “Really? That’s what you’re thinking about?” She turned her head back to the window. “Yes.” With that word, she snorted a little. “I remember. Somebody had to make the first move. You certainly weren’t going to do it.”

“I wanted to. I didn’t know if you wanted it.”

She reached over and took the cup back. “Ellis, if a girl lets her knee touch yours and she leaves it there for more than thirty seconds, she wants you to kiss her.”

He smiled in return. “I’ve figured that out since then. It’s my go-to move now. “The touching of the knees.’”

She half turned her head and raised one eyebrow. “Well, it still works, doesn’t it?”

“Like a charm,” he replied and she went back to staring at the window. The house was quiet like houses can get on Christmas, either in peaceful contentment or in crippling loneliness. They sat for a few minutes, sliding the cup back and forth.

She broke the silence. “Those fuckers sent you for the money, didn’t they?” Her tone was still flat, but he could detect a note of anger now.

“You know them. They’re all assholes.”

She took another drink and kept the cup this time. “And you’re kind of an asshole for being their errand boy, aren’t you?”
She turned and stared at him now. “You walked away after I kissed you,” she said after a moment.

“I had to,” he replied

Her face opened. “What? Why did you have to walk away?” She put the emphasis on “have.”

He reached and took the cup from her and drained it, but continued to roll it between his hands. “Because I would have fainted if hadn’t. You were the very first girl I kissed and I didn’t know how to handle it. The blood left my head so fast and I went numb. I was barely able to stand up and when I did, I felt drunk. I didn’t even know what drunk felt like back then, but that was it.”

She continued to look at him, now with a slight smile. “You were trembling when you came back. I remember thinking ‘Why is he shaking? It isn’t cold out here.’”

He smiled “And then you kissed me again and it felt like I was going to explode.”

She turned back to the window. “Well, I wanted to see what it was like to kiss you. I always felt a little bad about that after. I thought you didn’t like me.”

He shook his head. “You knew I had a crush on you since sixth grade.”

“And then you started dating that whore, Aubrey Miller.”

“And you started dating that drunk, Patrick Jones.”

She smiled wistfully now. “Well played. You’re right, I should have known in school, but I stuck with it. Hell, I did know. He was a drunk from the moment I met him in tenth grade up to until the day before he died.”

Ellis looked at her. “He wasn’t drunk when he got in the wreck?”

She shook her head, “No. He didn’t drink at all that day and I would have known it. I always knew. He played Jenga with the boys for hours, then made dinner and ate with me. I can’t remember the last time we did that. He fixed a couple of things around the house I hadn’t had a chance to get to yet, even. It was the best day we’d had in a long time.”

She went silent and her eyes drifted away. Ellis sat and waited as she continued to stare. “He left a note,” she said quietly as she dropped her head slightly.

“What kind of note,” Ellis asked, his heart beginning to race.

“You know what kind of note. He didn’t come right out and say he was going to kill himself, but you can tell by what he did say.”

He narrowed his eyes. “Is that going to mess up the insurance coverage?”

She laughed then: loudly, “Ha! Like I’m going to show them that note. I’m going to get every penny I can from the insurance and then sue the railroad. He did that on purpose, I know it. We always talked about that crossing and how dangerous it is without a gate. We were already worried about the boys driving through there. He did it there on purpose, I’m sure.”

Ellis sat in stunned silence. Everyone was sure Patrick had been drunk when he pulled into the path of the train. It was a bad crossing. A high school couple had been killed there the year before and they still hadn’t put gates up. His mind started to turn at the potential collection there for Katie and the boys from the railroad’s deep pockets.

She brought him back to the conversation. “He knew about us.”

It hung in the air and both of them were scared to look at it. “What did he know?” he asked slowly.

“That we were fucking, what else? That you would come over while the boys were at school. That I went to your place while he was out gambling. He knew it all.” She looked at him now and examined his face. “You know, I don’t think he minded that much because it was you. He always talked about Ellis, about how good a poker player you were, how you were always in control when you played. He admired your brain and said you always talked about interesting things at the table while the rest of them talked bullshit. Hell, I don’t even think he minded losing money to you and I know he would have rather won money than have a faithful wife.” She stopped and he could see her eyes start to glisten. “And he died a loser on both counts.”

Ellis shook his head slowly. Patrick had never let on that he knew anything. Except for the quiet respect and distance he showed Jim, Patrick was the only one at the table he would have considered anything close to a friend. “Wow,” he said. “I had no idea.”

Smoothly, she leaned into him and her feet hit the floor as her arms went around his neck. Her lips found his and she kissed him deeply. He returned the pressure and they kissed in the dark kitchen of the dead man’s house. He moved to her neck and she emitted the moans he had heard so often as she laid her head back to expose herself more. His hands began to climb her body and hers moved to his belt buckle. Then, just as suddenly as it started, she stopped and pulled away. She looked up in to his eyes with her hands laying softly on his chest. “It’s not the same now, is it?” she said. “Now that we can.”

He watched her as she turned and walked out of the room without another word. She returned thirty seconds later with an envelope. “Here. He knew one of you would be by to get it. He said so in the note. He said not to give it to anybody but you, because any of the other ones who were ballsy enough to ask wouldn’t split it right back at the game. That man trusted you for some damn reason even though he knew what was going on with us.”

He took it and opened it. “Eight thousand three hundred and fifty dollars,” she said slowly. It’s all on the note. He kept track of how much you fuckers took from him.”

Ellis thumbed through and took out $3100.00 and handed it to her. “I don’t need this. I’m going to be rich,” she said without an ounce of joy in her eyes.

“It appears so, but you can use this until then.” She took it and stepped into his chest, her head resting so that he could breathe in the scent of her hair. He held her tighter than he ever had and he remembered that night in the park so long ago, when she had kissed him and his world shook. They stood motionless for a long time as the house continued to absorb the sound around them After a while, her face shifted slightly and then burrowed in a little further, her mouth against him so he barely heard her as she spoke into his body. “Merry fucking Christmas to me.”