Onward Steps: Raefon Keeps Vigil

Someone was pounding my door in. I grabbed a chipped baseball bat from beside the desk and headed out to the hall – which is a grandiose term for two foot of dirty matting; dumping ground for take-away menus, fliers and my shoes when I kicked them off each night.
Switched the light on. Stupid, if the pounding signified someone wanting to kill me, but it was 2:00 a.m. and I’m not brave in the dark. I waited in silence, knowing that light and possibly my silhouette would be jutting out of the gap under the door – a gap that terrorises the house in the Winter, reducing me to three pairs of socks and a set of chattering teeth – so whoever it is would know I was there.
No way was I calling out. Not even skinny blonde stars get away with a “Hello?” in teen horror flicks.
“Raefon, it’s me. Let us in, will you?”
“Who the fuck’s ‘me’?”
“Spud, your dad’s mate. I’ve got him with me, he aint very well. Needs to kip on your couch, yeah?”
“What’s wrong with your couch?”
Stupid question. Spud wasn’t my dad’s mate, he was just a dickhead. And Spud lived with Tom; I wouldn’t let an ex-junkie onto Tom’s drive, never mind sleeping on the couch.
I guess it was the relief of hearing human voices on the other side, as opposed to ghostly silence or worse, that had me give in so easily. I’d been propped up at the desk in a half-trance, pen long abandoned, bin full of blood-soaked wet wipes, for hours…the noise had been the ultimate freak-out, arriving on the heels of a visit from my foes upstairs and the subsequent morbid contemplations.
“Alright. He can stay, you can’t.”
“Did I ask to stay? Did I? Don’t think so, you uppity bitch.”
“You can’t come in either. If I open the door, you stay on your side of the frame, ok?”
“Why? What’s your problem with the Spudster?”
“I haven’t had a chance to get my TV or stereo nailed down, that’s what.”
“Yeah, funny.”
I unlatched the door and pulled it open with caution. My father was propped up against the wall, lager in hand, muttering incoherencies to the floor tiles.
“Dad? Dad. You’re staying the night on my couch, ok? Give Spud the beer and take my arm.”
“Piss off,” he told the tiles, “I’m alright, I’m alright.” Spud went to take the can from his hand, and he lashed out like a fish in spasm. “Fuck yourself! Gerroff ‘cause I’m all light…right.”
“Fine, dad, bring the beer, but come inside ok?” I wasn’t going to step out into the hall and risk either the door locking behind me, or Spud stepping inside for a ‘nosey’.
After some insistent prodding, Dad jumpstarted himself and shuffled into the house, rebounding off the walls as he headed for the living room.
“Thanks Spud, you’re the best…I always think a house just isn’t a home without the smell of vomit.”
“Have a heart, he’s just had a few too many.”
“Aye, right, a few…and ‘Spudster’ is a lovely name for a forty-year old granddad. Good night.”
“The Irish comes out in you when you’re angry, Raef!” I heard him laughing as he backed away into the street. I flipped my middle finger at the door.

Ladies and gentlemen, fresh out of prison and rehab…my father.

I don’t like Spud. Or Tom.
I don’t like Dave or Baz or Les or Shirley or Johnson – or any of the other people that my father calls ‘friends’ when he gets bored of being dry. They know how he is, they know what a struggle it is for him to keep clean, yet they invite him out to pubs and clubs and parties, and before long, he’s back to cuddling up with a litre of Diamond White on some park bench.
I’d rather he came to mine than go anywhere near Tom. Tom doesn’t give him drink, oh no…Tom has something much better than booze. Stashed around his house, in little baggies or wrapped in foil…

Plasters pulled at my skin as I heaved my dad up onto the couch, my sleeves causing friction in a few awkward places. I emptied cutlery out of the washing up bowl and plonked it down beside him. Then I took a seat opposite, to watch him sleep and make sure he didn’t choke to death on his own weakness.

My dad.
The man who didn’t raise me.
The man who stuck around for my first few developmental years, then fucked off, to make a few special guest appearances throughout my life.
The man who left behind him a bitter and violent ex-wife, to take care of a five-year old Raefon.
The man who chose chemical slavery over family.
The man who I could easily blame for a lot of things, and try hard not to.

“Remember, Raef, blood’s thicker than water,” he’d always say on his visits.

Yeah, dad.
So is bullshit.