(this started on April 8)
Bernie rose, cocking his arm back to swing at the man in the suit
“Bernie, let’s go,” said his wife, her voice almost a whisper.
Tonight, of all nights – tonight he wasn’t going to be stopped.
“Bernie. Please.”
A lifetime passed as his muscle flooded with blood. Then the dealer began shutting down the table, the other players drifted off, and Bernie stood alone with his wife.
On the long drive home, neither spoke. Mary wondered why she felt so terrible for doing the right thing. Bernie didn’t feel anything at all.
Bernie felt his heart pumping. Finally, tonight, he was doing what he’d dreamed of so long ago, cutting loose.
It was the long moment before the wall.
He turned his cards over to double up. But as the dealer reached to deal, a hand came across the table and stopped him.
“You’re done tonight, Champ,” said the tall man in the pinstriped suit who’d grabbed the dealer’s arm. “Good night.”
“What?” said Bernie.
“Good night.”
The man put his hands on his hips. He was big – far bigger than Bernie. His neck was thick and his nose pushed off to the left.
“No,” said Bernie.
“Give him five,” the man told the dealer, pointing to the hundred dollar chips. “Then he’s gone.”
Two other men appeared behind him. They were even bigger than he was.
(more to come)
Bernie went to work as usual the next day. Just before lunch, a building inspector gave him a hard time about the vent work on one of his houses. The inspector was full of it, just throwing his weight around, but Bernie didn’t say anything, just nodded and shrugged.
He was home by four-thirty. The kids were already at Mary’s sister’s.
Bernie shaved, put on a clean pair of jeans and a button-down shirt he hadn’t worn in years.
“You’re wearing aftershave,” said his wife when he came down.
“You ready?” he asked.
“Where we going?”
“
“We need a sitter tomorrow,” Bernie told his wife Mary when he got home.
She looked at him funny. It had been quite a while since they’d gone out on anything resembling a date – and even longer, years and years, since Bernie had initiated it.
“Great,” she said.
“Great,” he said, and got a beer from the fridge.
(more to come)
Bernie had been a plumber since he was a kid, lugging toolboxes for his dad. Now he had his own truck, own company, own helper. But lately, copper and black pipe weren’t thrilling him. Some days he’d be on a job and forget what he was doing in the middle of it. He’d wander off, go sit in the truck while his helper finished up.
Things drifted on until one morning he got in the truck and drove. Not to the worksite, just drove. He did the same thing the next day, and the day after that.
When Bernie finally made it to work three or four afternoons later, his helper gave him notice. Bernie said he was sorry to lose him, paid him off with a bonus, and took him to lunch at Burger King.
For a few weeks, Bernie was back to his old self, up early, working late, on top of his job. But then one day on his way back home Bernie put on the radio and heard a song he’d listened to when he was sixteen or seventeen, a Bruce Springsteen song, something from Darkness on the Edge of Town.
He remembered hearing it for the first time. He thought of that the whole way home, how it had felt like it had changed his life, had set him on a different course from his father.
He thought of how that hadn’t come true.
He thought of what he should have done, would have done, could have done.
It was a long drive home.
(more to come)
