Komatke Gold. Benjamin Vance
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couldn’t fully understand why, but had my own healing to do and I didn’t want to impose on her. I thought I knew how uncomfortable Indians were with death, but then again I was wrong!
Chapter 2.
After four days in Parker feverishly arranging to burying my father, applying for death certificates, completing other paperwork and travel preparations one accomplishes after a death in Arizona, I dropped by the hospital to see Myra, ostensibly to thank her and say goodbye … I thought. I was completely unprepared for what happened next.
When I walked in, the entire ward went eerily quiet. I saw Myra’s unmistakable little backside at the nurse’s station, and she must have sensed I was there, because she wheeled around abruptly, slammed down her clip board which immediately fell metallically to the floor, and started my way at a fast walk and then almost at a run.
She needed no makeup, but usually wore just a touch of lip-gloss and always, always that perfume. That night she had on no makeup; her eyes were already red and were quickly filling with tears as she sped toward me without decorum. She started to say my name, but nothing more came out, save a stream of some Indian words mixed with sobs. She hit me like a train and clung like a demon.
Of course I started crying too. Everyone in the area politely averted their eyes and left us with a mutual pain which seconds earlier I thought was mine alone. Between sobs and some snotty unintelligible mumbles she said she thought I was gone and she’d never, ever see me again. Also snuffing a bit, I told her it would never have happened that way.
Since I was then staying at a motel in Parker rather than at MCAS, the Indian grapevine didn’t work well and she didn’t know what happened to me. As she settled down some, she told me my father had asked her for a couple of things for his funeral, but she could only find a death blanket. So, I silently established where that blanket on his feet came from. She said she was trying to find the other item for his casket, but couldn’t tell me what it was, for fear of getting me in trouble, and she would not take payment for the blanket.
Luckily, her kind supervisor could do without her for a while so we sat in the coffee shop and I was fully briefed, partially enlightened, wiped her nose for her and fell completely and utterly in love. I quickly realized there were many things she hadn’t told me over the past weeks, thinking she was protecting me somehow. She even knew about my father’s ex-wife and kids. Parker was a smaller town then. I wondered why she didn’t come to the funeral since she obviously knew when it was. I asked her, was told a half-truth, but found out the real reason much later. Myra was the niece of my father’s best friend!
Chapter 3.
As an aside, we all know people make many mistakes in their lives, some big, some small. My biggest was Myra. I should be enjoying our children today, but they were never born. You can’t do it over because you only get one chance … don’t you?
I still hang my father’s death blanket on my wall, when I have a wall to hang it on. I only hope my fathers’ spirit is somehow connected to it, because it wasn’t until the day of his funeral I found out what a good man he really was, and how many genuine friends he had.
During his dying ordeal he’d favored Myra’s attention and asked her for a death blanket and an eagle feather to be buried with. Myra managed to get both, thanks to her grandmother. She got the real deals and not some tourist wool and dyed turkey feather. Her grandmother hid the feather in his casket and said she wished he could have held it. At the time it was illegal and the mortician would surely have objected to anything else “Indian.” I think it was what the dying man needed though; right or wrong, and he knew Myra and her grandmother would do it correctly. He trusted her more than he trusted me. Now, I understand why. From time to time I think about what a nice funeral it was, despite the barren, dusty graveyard. We can’t all push up pretty daisies I guess! I’ve thought about it almost every day over the years, but I’d never physically gone back to Parker and its small, bleak cemetery.
After the emotional hospital episode, I felt a bit chagrined and guilty, but certainly loved. What was I to do? I was married and had no business being with another woman. Somehow I had to grow up and stop this foolishness. So … within and over the next five emotionally misty days Myra and I made love about ten times in a motel room in Parker, at MCAS, and twice while recklessly negotiating certain sections of U.S. 95. I’d never given myself to a woman so willingly, completely, thoroughly, madly and happily. It wasn’t long before reality began to rear its ugly head though. We hardly ate, but we talked a lot during that quick lover’s eternity spent together. I learned her grandmother was the crying lady at my fathers’ funeral. The “little bird” was Myra of course and Myra could not go to the funeral for fear of the appearance of being involved with me. However, once she realized she was in love, she threw caution out the panaptsa. We both did … greedily.
I had no real reason to stay in Yuma any longer. Myra had family and career responsibilities; I had family and Army responsibilities. Late one night she was lying entirely on my body, softly rocking with sleep breathing and covering me with fragrant hair and those warm tickle spots, when my wife called my motel room. I have no idea how she got the number, but there weren’t that many motels in Parker at the time and I wasn’t at MCAS, so you figure it out.
Women know! I don’t know how, but they do. It had been several days since my father’s funeral, and I honestly was waiting on death certificates and other final papers. I had three days of leave left and I must have sounded too happy during my previous calls from Yuma, because I thought she knew. Guilt cut in at my dance. Myra would normally have left before sunrise, but she left after the call, with teary eyes. We talked freely and loved each other more intensely, for two more wonderful days, and then I left for MCAS, Yuma and the East Coast, a world away from my spiritual “Home”.
Chapter 4.
My wife and I never talked about the call, but it came between us in my mind. I guess I let it. When we had sex I found myself trying to visualize Myra and always felt guiltier. It’s hard to take the Southern Baptist out of the boy. I called Myra a few times from the office and always got caught by a secretary or subordinate. Of course I took this as a sign that I was a true sinner, beyond any redemption. Our minds continue to play such dirty tricks when conditioned early! Finally, I stopped calling and my heart hardened and began to corrode.
I found solace in acquaintances with the hardest soldiers, toughened by combat or personal loss or both. I took the most difficult and most distant jobs in Korea, the Philippines, Germany and finally the most distant place on earth, the Pentagon. As I neared retirement, I must have feared it; dreading free time most of my life. I also found myself forever exposed to women who for a kind word or gesture would have given themselves, but I was always true to Myra. Punishment for what I’d done? Who knows? Who cared? After a while I was just a content android, going about my tasks making rank and honors, and no lasting friends.
Although my two sons are alienated from me thanks to their mother, I did have them then and I used them to justify staying with my wife. I hadn’t had a real father, but by God I was going to make sure they had one. By most standards, I had a good career. Since I was older when I joined the Active Army, I got passed over for colonel and that stroke of luck finally changed my life. I could have stayed for another nine years, but why travel a dead-end street? I needed a break anyway. Of course, my wife didn’t see it that way.
My youngest son was entering college, and she argued he needed our constant help with his tuition. Actually, she loved the Army even more than I. She didn’t have a good education; she’d hardly made it through high school. The Army gave her the “rank” and status she craved, but could not have gotten otherwise. When she couldn’t talk me out of retiring, she tried to get the most out of active duty and scheduled herself for a couple of helpful surgeries, including the correction of a deviated nasal septum. Although it should have been a routine surgery, she was never the same after recovery. She giggled for no reason for about three days, and seemed to drift in and out of reality. I talked to the doctors, but they threw up a stone wall and I got nowhere.
I learned much later that she must have