It started when our entire family went on a fishing trip to the Colorado River in the middle of summer, 1999. Mom and Dad were trying something new to save their marriage. Mom was trying monogamy, while Dad was trying constant attention and excitement. My sister tells me, she felt like she was just along for the ride, but I feel like it was more than that. A lot more.
It was to be the vacation of a lifetime. Kayaking, camping, fishing, hunting, campfires, and all sorts of fun which neither my sister nor I were particularly fond of. I think maybe it was just the time frame or the fact that I had just graduated high school and was supposed to be attending college in the fall. My sister was in her senior year, and we'd all just celebrated her eighteenth birthday a couple of weeks ago, and this trip was supposed to act as a partial birthday present, and graduation gift for the both of us. Oh, yay.
It started off innocent enough. My sister and I were in the back seat of the minivan, rocking out to the greatest 80's hits, stuff we both grew up listening to and becoming thoroughly addicted to. Dad did most of the driving, and while Mom didn't offer to take the wheel, at any point in time, she did give Dad a handy somewhere along the Mason/Dixon line... and a BJ as we were entering the great mid-west.
I remember nudging my sister once our mother was horizontal, splayed across the great divide, separating the front seats. The center console on the minivan was huge and sported ten thousand gadgets at least six jumbo cup holders, and a change tray... like anyone in their right mind would carry an entire roll of each coin the us minted.
When my sister saw what was happening, our mother's head bobbing up and down in our father's lap, she gave this grossed-out look, but I could tell she was intrigued. Our mother did her best to keep the noise down, quietly slurping away, but she couldn't resist moaning when he let loose with his cannon, and both my sister and I watched with rapt attention as Mother's cheeks sucked inward and her throat swallowed again and again. Daddy was doing something in Mommy's mouth, and we both knew exactly what it was.
When we stopped at a gas station for a snack and a fill-up on gas, our mother hurried into the women's room to "freshen up", which I assumed meant she was either going to go throw up or wash her mouth out. Or maybe both. My sister and I asked if we could go in the store and grab sodas and chips and our dad said yes, but he also said, stick together, and don't get in any trouble.
I remember scoffing at him and thinking, We're both eighteen. We're not little kids anymore. We can take care of ourselves.
My attitude changed once we got inside the store and almost immediately some creepy dude grabbed my sister's ass and we both ran outside to tell Daddy what had happened.
Now our Daddy is a no-nonsense kinda dad. He asked Heather who had grabbed her, and when she pointed the guy out and asked her if she was one hundred percent sure. She said yes, and so did I. Our Dad walked right up to the guy and asked him, "Did you enjoy grabbing my daughter's ass?" When the guy sneered and pulled his glasses off, our Dad smashed him in the face with his forehead and then proceeded to beat the living shit outta the guy, hammer-handing him in the face until she fell to the ground, and then he pulled the man's hand out to the side and stomped on it.
Anyone who saw what happened did not lift a finger to stop our Daddy, and when we left him on the ground, bleeding, nobody offered to help him up.
Mom asked what had happened when she got back in the car, why our Dad had blood on his hand, and why the two of us looked like we'd just seen a ghost. Neither I nor my sister said a word. The sound of the man's wrist crunching under our father's foot was still echoing in my ears, and from the look on my sister's face, she was hearing the same thing.
We stayed silent almost all the way to the Colorado state line, and only once we'd passed into the National Forest, did either of us say anything.
"So, what do you girls want to do first?" Daddy asks as he pulls the minivan into a gravel top parking space, outlined with long brown wooden poles.
"I wanna go hiking!" Heather says excitedly.
"I want to go swimming," I say, not really feeling walking for any extended period of time.
"I want to find a nice spot to just relax, and have a drink," Mommy says and I smirk.
I know then, that Mom is planning on doing quite a bit of drinking this vacation. At the same time, I can tell getting drunk isn't on our father's agenda. I watch as our Mother and father exchange weird looks, and then they both get out.
"Jessica," I hear my dad say as he heads toward the back of the car. "Come help me unload the camping equipment."
"Alright Daddy," I say, putting my MP3 player down, and hurrying to the back of the car to help.
"I'm sorry if you didn't want to come," Daddy says to me as he pulls a bundle of tent poles and a huge duffel bag from the rear end of the minivan.
"No. It's fine. I think... it'll be fun," I say, reaching in and grabbing a bag.
"Have Heather give you a hand," Daddy says, and I know he just put me in charge of my sister. I nod and then hurry to instruct Heather to come help me. When she finally shows up, I heap her arms full of bags and camping supplies and then tell her to follow Daddy. I grab a few bags myself and follow.
The forest is bright and green, and the ground is brown and smells like our backyard after a heavy rain. Daddy leads us down a well-trodden path, taking the right fork, then the left, and soon enough we come to a clearing. Daddy sets the items he's carrying down and instructs Heather and me where to put our stuff.
"We need to get the area prepped, and the tents up."
Heather gives a blank stare while I ask if there's anything we can do to help. Daddy tells me he needs us to unpack the tent poles and start putting them together. He'll prep the ground and put down the tarps. Everything sounds foreign but I'm figuring it out. We've never gone camping before. Fishing, yes. We've even gone on nature walks before. But camping? Never.
I can tell by the way she's acting, that Heather does not want anything to do with camping or prepping, but she helps me only because she'll get in trouble if she doesn't. We put together the tent poles while I silently watch our father begin to dig a gigantic trench around the clearing, and lay out two enormous plastic tarps we brought with us, close by.
Sweat pours off Daddy's forehead when he's three-quarters of the way around. He grabs his shirt in a fit, yanks it up over his head, and tosses it to me, asking me if I can hang it somewhere. I nod. I turn around and the smell hits me, raw and unadulterated. I look around, confused, and Daddy tells me to just hang it on a branch of something. He doesn't know I can barely think straight. The smell of him, his cologne, his sweat, his body... it's intoxicating.
Daddy ignores my plight and continues prepping. I find a branch to hang the shirt on and look to see what Heather is doing. She's still messing around with her second tent pole. I look for Mother, but she's probably still up in the minivan if I know her. I lift the shirt to my mouth and suck in a chest full of Daddy's scent, letting it fill my lungs and overwhelm me, and then I hang the shirt, dutifully, and turn around.
I watch Daddy as he finishes the trench, his muscles working the shovel with expert precision. The way the lines in his back tighten and release, the way his sides and stomach ripple when he pulls the earth from the ground... it's almost too much to watch, but I force myself to keep focus.