Love and Obsession

February 15, 1941 [10:45am]


Morning already? Those were the first words that sailed through George’s mind that day. The aurora had awakened him but he kept his eyes shut and rolled over still trying to hold on to his precious slumber. He was still partially asleep when he did somewhat open his eyes and he noticed a hazy figure stand in the sunlight shining in through the window like the headlights of a car in the depths of the mist. He blinked several times, but his morning eyes wouldn’t allow him to make clear of the figure that stood beside him as he lay beneath the cool sheets. He closed his eyes once more when he felt a small hand grasp his fingers but he was unalarmed from the slight delusion of sleep. Partially opening them again, he barely saw the face of a boy no older than the age of four. The boy smiled, and the innocence on the child’s face brought a sense of joy to George’s heart planting a grin on his face as well.
“Hello, little boy,” he silently said baffled because the child was unfamiliar to him, but with ease because he had not yet recovered from dreaming. “What are you doing here in my room and at this time of the morning? Isn’t there a family you belong to?”
The boy responded with a tiny chuckle.
“Oh, George, don’t be silly,” he heard the oddly familiar voice of a woman kindly say in the corner.
Her voice snapped him out of his slumberous trance, and he blinked his eyes again trying to make the woman, who appeared to be holding something, more visible, but her face would not become clear as she stood behind the rays of the sun. “What! Who said that?!”
“Why it’s me.” She stepped forward, her face becoming evident. She had a baby about nine months old in her arms.
George got a glance of her and shrieked. This can’t be! He thought to himself, but it was really her. The woman with whom he was for certain he had dispatched from his from his life for good. And now, she was standing in his bedroom, on what seemed to be an average morning, with a small boy sitting next to her in his bed and a baby in her arms.
“But what are you doin’ here?” He said in hysteria and confusion, “And in my room?!”
The woman just let out a chuckle. “Oh, George, I’m your wife, silly.”
The little boy sprung up and hugged him, “Daddy!” His small voice cried with cheer.
The woman smiled, “And these are your boys Donny.” She pointed at the four year old, “And Bobby.” She held the baby as if he were some kind of doll and he just hung there drooling and heedless of the world surrounding him.
George’s heart raced. He couldn’t comprehend what was happening. He goes to sleep one night as a young, single, lively guy, and then he wakes up the next morning as a husband and father of two kids.
He clinched his chest inhaling and exhaling repeatedly like he were afraid to he’d come to his last breath.
“Is everything alright, dear?” The woman asked apprehensively.
“No! Where am I right now?! Where do I live?”
“Right here, darling, on 1202 Sterling road. You know that.”
“Judy…! If this is one of your crazy schemes...”
“Calm down, honey. You’re getting over-heated.”
“Judy, I’m giving you five minutes to explain to me what is going on!”
“What do you mean, George?!”
“Who are these kids?! What are they doing here?!”
“This is our family!”
“Okay, I’m counting down from three. Three…”
“George…!”
“Two…”
“George...”
“One…!”
“GEORGE…!”
“JUDY…!!!”
“George, I don’t know why you’re acting this way!”
“BECAUSE JUST YESTERDAY I WAS A TWENTY- FIVE YEAR OLD BACHELOR AND A POPULAR FELLA WITH GOOD LOOKS AND GIRLS AND …AND ….ANYTHING I WANTED…AND NOW…I’M…I’M…AH…WHAT IS GOING ON HERE?!”
“Okay…okay, you remember that last night we saw each other? That night in 35’ and …and the band music was playing, and the couples were dancing,” she began to slowly fade off topic, “Oh, it was so romantic.” An amorous smile grew on her face.
“Judy!” Cried George.
“Oh, sorry, honey.” She nervously chuckled. “Well, anyway, you were being a little…er…uneasy that night, so I thought that maybe it would be alright if I added a little bit of chemicals in your drink.” Again, she chuckled timidly, only now showing off a cheesing smile.
George sighed, “So you put drugs in my drink?”
“Well… yeah… but you were very happy for the five to seven years that you were asleep. And we had a loving family and a great marriage. Everything was wonderful.”
“Judy, out of the things you’ve done, I always knew that you were mad, BUT FOR PETE’S SAKE, JUDY…! This is by far the craziest thing you ever committed!”
Dejected, Judy looked down.
“And if I was asleep the entire time, how did we manage to..to…?” He looked over pointing at both kids.
Antsy and like a child afraid of punishment, Judy restlessly stuttered, “Well, there were a couple of nights where you would partially wake up for just a little while. And on those nights you’d wake up you’d be a tad bit delusional and…well…uh…in a good mood and I’d be in…a good mood and since we were both…er…in a good mood I’d…”
“Stop…stop...I don’t need to hear the rest.”
Vexed and with a deep sigh, George bolted from the bed and ripped a suit out of his closet.
“Wait…!Wait! Where are you going?!” Judy cried.
George struggled to get his pants on. “I’m leaving.”
“Leaving?! Where?!”
He threw on his shirt. “I don’t know, but as long as I am far away from here.”
“Oh, but George, you can’t go! After all we’ve been through together!”
With his shirt still ripped opened and his pants not yet buckled up, George slowly walked up to Judy saying, “Let’s get something straight. I don’t know you, and you don’t know me. You kidnapped me… You ***** me… Oh, I’m leaving, alright.” He stumbled back over to the closet grasping his pants then continued to put his cloths on.
“But George!”
Nevertheless, George disregarded Judy as he flung on the rest of his cloths and proceeded towards the door.
Judy tossed the baby on the bed and scurried behind him. “George!” She cried.
But George continued to ignore her clamoring as he stormed toward the front door.
Judy panicked trying to connect the wires of an idea in her mind. She knew that within five steps George would open the door and departure from her life forever. She paced searching for a solution, but with each step that George took, the build up of fear and frustration became the flowing tears from her eyes, and by the time George’s hand had reached the doorknob she was wailing like the infant in the other room. George tried to overlook her sobs, but his irrevocable compassion for a woman’s tears weakened his ambition. He rolled his eyes and turned away from the door.
“Oh, come on, Judy. You don’t have to cry,” he said provoked by his plaguing vulnerability.
But Judy’s whimpering didn’t end. It had only gotten louder and more acute until it was disturbing every wall in the house, for with each tear that she weep she anticipated to keep George closer to her and further from the door.
Again, George let out deep sigh. “I’m leaving, Judy and that’s final.”
She vented a high pitched whimper similar to an injured puppy’s. “But George, I’m only a helpless woman,” she sung with heavy tears, “I need a man to take care of me…and the kids. I can’t do this by myself.”
George put on his hat, “Well, your gunna’ have to get someone else.”
“Someone else?! But the kids need their father. They love you, George. If not for me do it for them.”
Little Donny ran up to his father and embraced him, his glittering eyes having the uppermost aspiration in them as he glared sincerely into George’s. “Don’t go, Daddy,” his small voice uttered, “I want you to stay. Please.”
Now George’s options had become a balanced scale. He had no desire to remain at 1202 Sterling Road, but he could not deny the pleading of an innocent child. That and the tears of a woman created a dilemma that was powerful enough to make him walk away from the door and into the living room in which he sat down on the couch and contemplated.
Judy’s frown suddenly became a conniving smile as she placed her hand on George’s shoulder and bended down to speak silently in his ear. “Think about it George. You don’t have anything to go back to. This is your home now. You might as well make the best of it. And besides, I think you’ll learn to like being here with me and the boys.”
With a sigh, George looked up at Judy. The grin on her elegant face had no more than sheer persuasion. George had determined his decision. He took off his hat and gave it to Judy.
“Go put this on the coat rack,” she said handing the hat to Donny, and then she massaged George’s shoulders, “See, I knew we’d come to an understanding.”
But George just sat there vaguely pondering the life that he would have
…and the life that he had no more.