For the first 17 years of my life, my father was Big Joey and I was Little Joey. All I ever wanted was to be just like him. When he was shot and killed outside a strip joint in Chicago my mother and I didn't only have to deal with the trauma of his loss, but also with the stigma attached to the manner in which he died.
What the wagging tongues didn't know was that my father was only there with clients representing a multi-million dollar national account, who had insisted he take them to a strip bar. Or that the altercation that happened inside was with a guy who was harassing the dancers, and my father stood up and called him out on it, telling him to shut up or get out. All they knew was that after the man was kicked out for taking a swing at Big Joey, he waited outside until my father and his clients left the club and gunned him down in cold blood. Dad was a good man, a good husband, a good father, and a good provider. He was taken far too early.
When it happened, I had just started college at Baylor University in Houston, where I was born. My father, already with a wife and baby, had gotten a job in the energy business in Houston after graduating from college in his and Mom's home state of Nebraska. We moved to Denver when I was in the third grade, when my Dad got the job he always wanted, brokering energy to large corporations all over the Midwest. We grew up comfortably in Denver, and my mother received a large insurance settlement, so she had no financial worries.
Her emotional well-being, however, was a different matter. The trial was traumatic in itself, with the defense painting my father as a degenerate who hung out in strip clubs. The distance from home didn't make it any easier on my mother, who stayed in hotels in Chicago while attending the trial, listening to every lurid detail of my father's death, and the attempted murder of his good reputation as well. She was terrified, for some reason, about having to testify at the trial. Luckily, though, she was never called until the penalty phase.
I dropped out of Baylor and stayed with her, giving up my own dream of graduating from Baylor and attended University of Colorado instead, so I could be closer to my mother while she grieved and put her life back together. Boulder was close enough that I spent most weekends at home with her in Denver, and we became very close. Both of us had loved Big Joey very much, and missing him became as much a bond between us as being a mother and son was.
By the time I graduated, Mom was doing better. She had moved to a luxury condo complex and started a small marketing business from home. She was active in charity work, joined the golf club, and even worked her handicap down to an 11. Though she had dated a few times, the relationships never really went anywhere. I think she never found anyone who could fill Big Joey's shoes, so nothing ever got past the courting stage. She was a beautiful woman of 39, with large breasts and a small waist. I was her only child; she had delivered me at the age of 17, five months after she and my Dad were married, which was less than a week after their high school graduation. They had both worked while my father went to college, trading off taking care of me, so they could build a good and stable life together. I was their only child and we were as close a family unit as any I've ever known. Time had been very easy on my mother and she looked years younger than she was. Blondeand fit with large breasts. How can you beat that?
She was doing well enough when I graduated from CU that I decided I wanted to follow in my father's footsteps, so I found a job in the energy business in Houston and began working on my Masters Degree at night at Baylor. Mom seemed to do fine without me, although we talked daily and Skyped every weekend. We still remained very close. She supported my decision to move to Houston in every way.
In every outcome, there is a cause and a pivot-point. The cause is usually easy to see and to understand. The pivot-point, the moment at which one decides to go one way or the other and that decision determines the eventual outcome of the situation, often is not so easily recognized.
The cause of what eventually happened between us was that my mother was assaulted in the parking garage of her condo. She pulled into the underground garage at about 9:00 at night and before she could make it to the elevator she was hit on the side of her head and dragged into the shadows. Her only saving grace was that she regained consciousness as the man was pulling her panties down and began screaming for help. He had his pants down and was ready to rape her when neighbors pulled into the garage and heard her screams The man fled, and was never captured. Had my mother still been unconscious he would only have had to wait silently while they got into the elevator, and my mother would have had the additional stigma of being a rape victim to deal with.
She really fell apart after her assault. She didn't go out, she didn't respond to clients, she barely even would talk to me. With no regrets, I quit my job in Houston and moved back to Denver and into her condo with her. She was as bad as I feared, and I had no problem putting my career on hold and being there to comfort and protect her. Other than my job and school, I had very little time left to have any kind of social life in Houston. While I longed for female companionship, I had no time for that in my life, so didn't pursue it. I found it easier to just "hook up" than to have a real relationship. I had never been really successful in the relationship department anyway. I knew I was a good-looking guy, and women often flirted with me, but over the years I had only had two girlfriends, and those didn't last that long. I just had never found the right one. The one who I thought measured up to my Mom and my Dad. I wanted what my Mom and Dad had, what Big Joey had, and I wasn't going to compromise. At 22 I felt I was no closer to a meaningful relationship than I had been at 14. I didn't dwell on it, and figured eventually I would meet "the one".
For the first month or so, we didn't leave the condo much. I shopped a couple of times a week for food, and we stayed in talking, reading, and watching TV. After that first month, Mom was starting to do better, and we started taking occasional walks and going to the movies. Every time we returned home though, no matter day or night, I had to park on the street and walk Mom into the house. Then I would search each room and lock her in the secure apartment while returning downstairs to garage the car. When I got back, she was often locked in the bathroom and would only unlock the door when I identified myself.
The first small pivot-point happened one evening while we were watching television. I was in a pair of flannel pajama bottoms and a white T-shirt and Mom was in a full length cotton nightie, our usual evening attire for watching TV. I at one end of the couch, she at the other. We were watching the entire run of the Dexter on Netflix, and during a particularly emotional scene, I heard her sniffle and looked over to see a tear running down her cheek. Not thinking much about it, I was surprised that as the show went on with other story lines, she continued to cry. Her crying intensified until I couldn't ignore it any more. When I looked over at her, she was weeping uncontrollably.
I paused the show and moving closer to her on the couch asked her what was wrong.
