Tighten: Rex

Rex pulled the covers over his head. Underneath his Dallas Cowboys comforter, the world was his own little cave, like the one Golem lived in in the movie Lord of the Rings. Rex closed his eyes and imagined he was Aragorn, defeating enemies with his fairy sword and saving all of the weaker little hobbits and elves from the scary dark invaders on the road at night. His mom had promised him that as soon as she was settled in, he could come to her new house and watch the Lord of the Rings movies again. She’d even make his favorite tiny, square toasted ham and cheese sandwiches to eat while he was watching it. Rex had promised her that her new family would love the Lord of the Rings movies if they just watched them, and she had said that even if they didn’t love the movies, she would sit on the couch and watch them with him. She would pretend to be a fairy and he could pretend to be Aragorn.

The door to Rex’s bedroom swung open. “Up and at’’em, Rex,” his father boomed. “We need to be at the field in two hours. Time for breakfast. You got all of your equipment packed up and ready to go?”

Rex reluctantly burrowed out from under the comforter. “Yes, sir. It’s all in the bag.”

“Well, get going then, son. Hit the showers. I’ll get your breakfast started. Can’t stay under the covers all day, ‘specially if you’re gonna be Texas’ next Troy Aikmen.”

Rex climbed out of his bed and sleepily trudged passed the hulking figure of his father. “Dad, I don’t even like Troy Aikmen. I wanna be like Tom Brady.”

“Son! What have I done told you about that? We don’t wanna be like no pansy boy California boy who done ended up playing for some Yankee team full of other pretty boys. Someday you’ll understand.”

“They’ve won three Super Bowls, dad.”

“Cause of that hard ass coach of theirs. Now get your butt down there to that shower. You want bacon or sausage this morning?”

“Bacon, sir.”

Rex’s dad watched his seven-year-old trudge down the hallway like he was a little old man getting ready to head off to the office. He thought about going down to stand in the doorway and watch Rex climb up on his little stool to brush his teeth. Watching his son do that, for some reason, just warmed his heart. This little thing up on a stool brushing his teeth with so much seriousness that you had to imagine he’d never have a cavity in his life. Brushing his teeth with a kind of focus that his dad had never had. That kid, that kid was going to take life like it was a climb up a mountain. But Rex’s dad knew if he opened that door to watch Rex brush his teeth Rex would just pout and get embarrassed and shut the door while giving his dad the look Rex’s dad referred to as the ‘Daaaaad, plleeeeease,” look. So Rex Sr. pulled the Cowboys comforter up over Rex Jr.’s pillow so that the bed was half-made and went downstairs to start breakfast.

Making bacon wasn’t something Rex Sr. had ever known how to do before his wife had left him. Left both of them, really, because she had made it clear that there would not be room for Rex Jr. in her new life with the CFO from the company where she had been temping while Rex. Sr. recovered from his accident. He hadn’t wanted her to have to go to work, but after he fell on the construction site and hurt his leg, his disability check wasn’t enough to keep her and him and Rex Jr. in frozen pizzas and pee wee league fees. So Lynda had gotten a job temping as a receptionist, and the rest was history.

Rex Sr. hated her, but he also really didn’t blame her. He knew he was a tough man to deal with even in the best of circumstances. He had a temper and a heavy fist, and that was putting it politely. He and she had thought really different things about the best way to raise Rex Jr. He felt like you needed to push little boys. It was rough to be a little boy. If you ended up at the bottom of the pile as a little boy, that’s where you’d stay for the rest of your life. But if you learned to be the bully instead of the bullied, you could end up a powerful man, just like the man Lynda had ended up leaving Rex Sr. for. He knew she’d wanted to take Rex Jr. with her, but there were already three teenage kids in that house, even though the house was big enough to hold twice that many, and her new boyfriend didn’t want to raise another little kid. For the better, Rex Sr. thought. Lynda always treated Rex Jr. like he was a little wimp. She was probably scared that if she didn’t, he’d turn out rough on the edges like his dad, but Rex Sr. would rather have that than some kid who grew up to take it in the ass from everybody.

It had been bad before she left. He couldn’t stand sitting around the house all day while she was gone at work. There were only so many days a man could watch ESPN and sit on the back patio listening to the radio before he started to get itchy. And Rex Sr. didn’t like the changes he was seeing in Lynda when she would come home from work every day. New clothes in bags with paper handles. The kind of bags Rex Sr. knew came from expensive stores. Not the plastic bags from Wal-Mart or K-Mart or any of the places he usually sent her to shop. More makeup. She got her hair colored to get rid of the blond highlights and make it all one shade of brown. When he asked her why, she told him that nobody in the big office buildings downtown dyed their hair blond like that. He told her she didn’t need to worry about the people in those office buildings. Those weren’t their kind of people anyway, and as soon as his leg was better, she could stop working. She just smiled and said she might want to keep working anyway when he was better. She liked getting out of the house and feeling like she had a purpose. Then she’d turn around and head into the kitchen to make dinner before he could start yelling at her.

The night played out the same after that. He’d already had a couple of beers before she got home, and her new ways and new look infuriated him. Why should she be out having all the fun while he was stuck here watching TV and listening to Rex Jr. run around the house with his fake, plastic sword and one of his mom’s skirts on. What was wrong with that kid? Rex Sr. would get up and hobble into the kitchen. The yelling would go on for an hour or more. Things would get thrown. Both of them would hit each other. It was fair game in the kitchen. By the time they called Rex Jr. down from his room for family dinner, Lynda would be crying and Rex Sr. would be too exhausted to eat. He would pass out on the couch and Lynda would put Rex Jr. to bed. He never knew what she told junior on those nights to make him stop crying and go to sleep.

***

Rex Jr. loved his parents. He loved his mom, and even though his dad was mean, he loved him too. Rex’s dad hadn’t been as mean, in some ways, since his mom moved in with Mr. Nellis and Mr. Nellis’ kids, who were all older than Rex Jr. His dad didn’t yell as much anymore, and he spent more time with Rex Jr. He made him breakfast and took him to Blockbuster to rent movies and video games. One day he had even let Rex Jr. sit on his lap and steer the truck when nobody else was on the road.

But when it came to football, his dad was still mean. On days when there weren’t games, Rex Jr. had to get out of bed at nine in the morning (in the summer!) and go out into the back yard to do football drills while his dad sat on the green and white striped lounge chair on the patio. Rex’s dad claimed that his leg was still too weak and he was still in too much pain to go back to work, but Rex Jr. thought it seemed like it had been a really, really long time since his dad had worked. Rex Jr. had broken his leg once when he was five and his cousin Matty had taken him out on his moped during a Fourth of July picnic. It had only taken the same time as from when school started until Thanksgiving for Rex Jr.’s leg to be okay, and it seemed to Rex Jr. that it had been a lot longer than that since his dad hurt his leg. But when Rex Jr. asked his dad about it, his dad just said that it was easier for little boys to get better than old men.

Rex Jr.’s cousin had taken a serious beating from Rex Sr. after junior’s leg got broken. Because it was at the start of school, Rex Jr. couldn’t play football with his pee wee team that fall, and in Rex Sr.’s mind there wasn’t much that was worse for his boy than being sidelined and picked on by the other boys while they all won the pee wee division. Since then, Rex Sr. had made his son work twice as hard to make up for the lost season, and Rex’s cousin, the one with the moped, didn’t come to family picnics anymore.

Rex Jr. could understand why his mom wanted to go to live with Mr. Nellis. Mr. Nellis never yelled and he let his kids do whatever they wanted. His house had a big swimming pool, and his mom had her own bathroom with a hot tub right in it. Rex Jr. loved visiting her there. He never asked why she didn’t want him there with her, even though he wanted to live there with her. Just every time he tried to ask her, it was like she knew what he was going to ask and offered him a cookie from the good bakery or a chance to go swimming or an hour to play video games on Mr. Nellis’ huge TV in the den. And then he didn’t remember to ask again.

Rex Jr. wasn’t sure where he belonged. It really was that simple. He must not belong with his mom at Mr. Nellis’ house. If he did belong there, she would have taken him with her. But he must not belong at this house with his dad, either. If he did belong there, his dad wouldn’t make him work so hard, like it was punishment for being there. Rex Jr. didn’t mind football. But it was just punishment to have to get up at nine in the morning to do football drills while his dad yelled at him. And then they’d practice again in the afternoon. And then there was summer pee week practice in the evenings. And on some days, like today, there was a summer pee wee game. Those were the worst days because his mom and dad were both always at the games. And no matter what, they always fought.

Rex Jr. didn’t really want to be like Tom Brady or like Troy Aikman. He wanted to be like Aragorn. He wanted to be able to take care of people like Aragorn did. Everybody knew they could count on Aragorn. Rex Jr. knew if he worked hard he could be like Aragorn. Maybe not in some magical kingdom, but he’d seen his friends’ parents, and they weren’t anything like his parents. His friends parents never forgot to pick their kids up from school, and when he ate dinner at their houses hands were checked to make sure they were washed and food was served at a table instead of out of pots on the stove. Even before his mom moved in with her new family, his family had never been like that. Someday, he figured, when he was older, he might understand why that was. For now, what he knew was that he was going to be more like his friends’ families than his family. But he loved his parents.

Rex Jr. grabbed his mesh bag of football gear and dragged it down the stairs behind him. The bag full of shoulder pads and knee pads and helmets and towels was almost as tall as he was, but he pulled it behind him stair-by-stair like he was used to it. In the kitchen, his dad handed him a paper plate with a frozen egg sandwich and some microwaved bacon on it. They had started using paper plates after his mom left. His dad said it hurt his leg too much to have to stand and wash dishes, and Rex Jr. wasn’t tall enough to reach the sink.

“Is you inhaler in that bag?” his dad asked, cocking his head toward the big bag of gear by the door.

“Dad, I haven’t had an asthma attack since I was five years old,” Rex Jr. said as he ate his food, including the five vitamins his dad has handed him in a paper cup.

“Better to be safe than sorry,” said his dad. “If I’d had that attitude, I’d be at work right now instead of sitting home like a girl all day. You hear me son?”

“Yes, sir,” answered Rex, “My inhaler’s in the bag, dad.”

Rex Jr. had only had about a dozen asthma attacks in his life, and almost all of them had happened when he was five years old. After he’d gotten the inhaler and they’d gotten rid of the dog his mom used to have, he hadn’t had an attack except for once. Once, about a year ago maybe, it was in the summer too, his dad was had just stopped working and his mom hadn’t started her job yet. They were spending all all day in the house together every day and they were yelling all the time, about everything. Rex Jr. didn’t even understand what they were yelling about most of the time. He would just go upstairs into his room when the yelling started and climb into his Golem cave and stay there until somebody came and told him that dinner was ready or that it was time for football drills. One day, though, the yelling had gone on and on and on. It had gotten dark outside, and still nobody had come and told him it was time for dinner, and Rex Jr. was hungry. He knew that in the cabinet underneath the microwave there was a bag of crispy potato chips, and it was all he could think about. So he opened the door to his room and crawled to the top of the stairs. When he peeked down, he could see his parents arguing in front of the television. His mom was saying something about too much beer and too little working, but that was all he could understand. They were using a lot of big adult words that he didn’t know yet. It looked like if he just crawled down the steps and behind the couch into the kitchen, they’d never notice him and he could just get the chips and sit underneath the kitchen table eating them.

He was about halfway down the stairs when it happened. His dad picked his mom up by the shoulders and slammed her against the wall so hard that it looked like her eyes were going to bulge out of her head. As soon as he did it, Rex Jr.’s mom screamed just like women do in movies. Rex had seen his parents fight before, but this terrified him, and before he knew what was happening his chest started to tighten up and he felt like he couldn’t breath. He tried to call out for his parents, but all he could make come out what a wheezing sound, and his mom and dad couldn’t hear them over the sound of their own screaming.

That was all he remembered. The next time he woke up, he was in a hospital room. But he could still hear his parents. They were standing outside of the door to his room. And they were arguing about how to pay for the trip to the hospital.

His mom went to work about a month after that. She moved in with Mr. Nellis about six months after that. Rex knew time because when he left the hospital that time, one of the nurses had given him a calendar with pictures of dogs on it since he had told the nurse that he was sad that he couldn’t have a puppy because of his asthma. Rex Jr. had started marking days and months off on that calendar after that. He liked doing that. The idea that time was moving forward in days and weeks and months felt good to him.

***

Rex Sr. was one of those good men who didn’t really know who to be good. Sociologists would be able to point to his being bullied as a little kid until he became a bully himself. Psychiatrists would be able to point to his dad being a hard ass and his mom being over-involved. Liberal leftists would point to lack of funding for early education and conservatives would point to a lack of religiously imposed structure on kids. Everybody would be able to point to something, but sources were less important than outcomes. Rex Sr. wanted what was best for everybody. He loved his wife and his son. But he was only able to think in very small boxes. There was a right way and a wrong way. A safe way where the outcome was known, and a risky way where you couldn’t guarantee what was next. And when anything got outside of those little pockets of how life was, Rex Sr. didn’t have much of a capacity to deal with it. He got scared easily of situations or paths or ideas that he didn’t understand. Some people hide when they are scared. Some people ignore what they are scared of. Some people try to understand what they are scared of, and some people react in anger and lash out when they are scared. Rex Sr. was the last kind of person.

And in the end, it didn’t matter what made Rex Sr. into a difficult man. It was what it was. He was what he was. And it was fine. And in some ways it was hard on people, but it was the life they were all leading. Except for Lynda. She had chosen a new life. And years from now when sociologists and psychiatrists and leftists and conservatives would all be debating what it was that had made Rex Jr. into whatever it was that Rex Jr. would eventually turn into, the fact that Rex Jr.’s dad was a hardass and his mother had abandoned him would surely be pointed to. But so would the lack of funding for early childhood education and the lack of religious structure imposed on him. And in the end, would any of those things really matter? He was going to be whomever he was going to be, and that was the life he would lead.

***

It was too hot out to be geared up in football gear. Rex Jr. was uncomfortable and fidgety and bored. His team was ahead by two touchdowns in the last quarter and the defense was on the field. Rex turned around from the sideline and waved at his dad. His dad had been cheering him on all game, and when Rex Jr. caught the ball for the big fifteen yard gain, his dad when crazy. Then Rex Jr. turned in the other direction and waved at his mom who was sitting at the other end of the bleachers with one of her friends from her new neighborhood. His mom had lots of new friends now. He hadn’t been able to hear his mom cheering for him, but he knew she had been.

Rex Jr. looked back out on the field. It was so hot, and the air felt so heavy. When he’d said that to his dad in the truck on the way over here, his dad had said it just felt heavy because of those rain storms that had happened the other day. He said Rex Jr. just wasn’t used to humidity and that maybe next summer they should go visit his grandparents in Houston so Rex could learn to be strong in heavy, humid air, too.

Rex Jr. fidgeted and looked behind him again. His mom and her friend were still sitting in the same spot drinking bottled water and talking while the defense was on the field (Rex was sure when he was on the field his mom was only watching him), but his dad must have gotten up to go to the bathroom or something because he wasn’t in his seat any more. Rex Jr. looked up into the sky. The sun was super, super bright. Rex Jr. wondered if somewhere in another parallel universe goblins and dwarfs and fighters and fairies were looking at a big yellow sun too. He wondered what games, like football, people might play in places like that. Right after the game, he was going to ask him mom when he could come over to Mr. Nellis’ house and watch the Lord of the Rings movies with her. She’d been promising for a long time, now. And pretty soon school would start and then it would be hard for him to go and visit her. He’d have school all day and then football practice and then homework and bed, and on the weekends he had to go to football practice with his dad, so that meant no sleeping over at Mr. Nellis’ house.

He wondered if Mr. Nellis even liked football. He never came to Rex Jr.’s games. But Mr. Nellis seemed to like Rex Jr. enough. He had even bought Rex Jr. a Lord of the Rings backpack once. Even Rex’s dad didn’t think to do that. Mr. Nellis wouldn’t have done that if he didn’t like Rex Jr. Right?

Rex Jr. heard the sound before anybody else on the sideline heard the sound. Maybe it was because he’d never really gotten the sound of his mother screaming out of his head since the day he saw his father push her up against the wall. Maybe it was just because he hadn’t been paying that much attention to the football game in front of him. But as soon as he heard the noise, he knew it was his mother screaming. He knew she was afraid. Somehow though, he never thought that it was his dad she might be afraid of. After all, his dad was supposed to be sitting in the bleachers on the other side waiting for Rex Jr. to go back on the field. But when Rex Jr. turned around to see his mom, his dad was right there. He was hitting her. Rex Jr. could see his arms and fists and hands flying at her. And men in the bleachers were trying to pull him off of her. And his mom just kept screaming and screaming and screaming. His mom’s friend had pulled out her cell phone and was dialing numbers while she yelled at everybody to get a police officer.

For a moment, Rex Jr. just stood there. He wondered if this is actually what happened every night when his mom lived with them and he would spend all evening in his Golem cave. He wished he had been big like Aragorn so that he could have rushed at his father with his sword right at that moment, but he was just a little kid who wished he were home underneath his comforter.

Rex wasn’t sure what he was supposed to do. The game had stopped, and all of the adults were rushing towards his parents. He could see a policeman running in from the parking lot, too. And the noise, the sound, it wouldn’t stop.

Maybe if he were older, it would have made sense to do something. But he wasn’t older. He was seven. And he had no idea why he did what he did next, but he picked up a football from the sideline and started running as fast as his legs would carry him towards the end zone. At first nobody noticed him. They were dealing with the blood coming out of his mother’s mouth and the handcuffs the police officer was putting on his dad. But after about fifteen yards, one of the coaches noticed and yelled and started running after him.

Years and years later, Rex Jr. wouldn’t remember what in his brain had told him to pick up the football and run with it. He wouldn’t even remember whether he felt scared or not at that moment.

Sociologists would say it was a contextual reaction of fight or flight.

Psychiatrists would say he was desperately trying to give a touchdown to his parents in hopes that if he were good at something they would stop fighting and be a family.

Leftists would say it was a horrible example of how conservative values teach children to prioritize winning over anything else that may be going on.

Conservatives would say the whole thing was an example of the breakdown of the American family because of the lack of morals preached by the liberals.

And in the end, whether any of them were right or wrong didn’t matter. Rex Jr. crossed into the end zone at full speed with the football. He turned around to see one of the coaches running at him. Behind the coach, his mother was running down the field, blood still dripping from her lip. He couldn’t quite make out what she was saying to him. He could only feel his chest tightening up and his breath getting shorter and shorter. He’d always gotten scared when he had an asthma attack before. But something about this one, in the hot sun, with the heavy air, it felt like maybe he was traveling through a warp between universes. Like maybe he was going somewhere where he wouldn’t need to breathe at all because the whole land would be magical. He felt heavy and blurry. And then he felt the cool fresh feel of the grass on the football field beneath his head.