In Violet's Wake. Robin Devereaux-Nelson
but distant and unhappy. She says her decision to leave him is “difficult” but “necessary” due to her “emotional and spiritual growth” and “realizations” about herself and her needs. Our time concluded at this juncture.
TREATMENT RECOMMENDATIONS:
Therapy sessions will be set for twice per month, unless circumstances require more (or less) time. Violet has been referred to her medical doctor for prescriptions of anti-anxiety medication and to make a recommendation of whether any other medications are needed to assist her with sleeplessness.
Yolanda H. Malik, LCSW
Champoor and Associates
Marshall’s cell phone rang at 8:00 AM on Sunday morning, jarring him out of a hard sleep. Truth was, he’d slept most of Saturday, nursing his raging hangover. Thank God he’d picked a Friday night to be an asshole. Gave him the weekend to get straight. He pulled the phone off the coffee table and looked at the caller ID. He didn’t recognize the number, so he let it go to voicemail and settled back on the sofa, where he’d been sleeping since Violet had left. He just couldn’t bring himself to lie in the bed they’d shared.
The phone went off again. Marshall snatched it up and flipped it open.
“What?” he barked.
“Sonny boy, it’s Costa.”
Marshall ran a hand through his hair. “Jesus, do you know what time it is? What the hell do you want?”
“I let you sleep in my place and feed you and drink with you and you godda be an asshole?”
Marshall swung his legs off the sofa and sat up, disliking the slightly dizzy feeling in his head. “Okay, man,” he said, taking a deep breath. “What’s up? Is that better?”
“Sure.”
“So, what do you want?”
“I have something you godda see.”
Marshall looked at the mess around him, at his wrinkled clothes, the empties on the coffee table. “I’m . . . busy.”
“Right.” Marshall heard Costa take a slurp of something. “Look,” the man continued, “I lied to Angelina about why I’m not at church, so don’t bullshit a bullshitter, all right?” Marshall sighed. “I know what you’re going through,” Costa continued. “So, put your fucking coat on and come outside. I’m sitting in your driveway.”
Marshall was off the sofa like a shot. He pulled the front door open. “What the fuck, man?” he said into the phone. Costa was looking at him through the windshield of his Ford Ranger.
“I told you. I’m in your driveway.”
Marshall sputtered. “How did you know where I lived, you fat fuck?”
Marshall stood shuddering on the front stoop in his stocking feet, glaring at Costa through the windshield. He watched the big man reach down on the seat, then hold up a small rectangle-shaped object so Marshall could see it.
“Where’s your wallet, huh, sonny boy?” Costa was grinning.
“Son of a bitch,” Marshall muttered.
“You’re gonna freeze,” Costa said. “Now, go put on your goddamned coat and shoes and go for a ride with me.”
“Whatever,” Marshall mumbled. He turned to go in.
“And, sonny boy?” Costa said into the phone. Marshall turned back and looked at the older man from the doorway. “Comb your hair. You look like shit.”
When Marshall climbed in the truck a few minutes later, Costa handed him a Styrofoam container of coffee. “Cream. Sugar,” he said.
“How’d you know?”
“You look like cream and sugar.”
“What the fuck does that mean?”
Costa chuckled. “Don’t get your underpants in a twist, sonny boy. Wasn’t an insult. I been workin’ in the restaurant business since I was old enough to hold my own dick over the edge of the pot. You get to learn what people are gonna order, how they like things.”
“Really.” Marshall’s head throbbed, and the smell of the coffee wafting from the container was inviting.
“Do you like cream and sugar in your coffee, sonny boy?”
“Yeah,” Marshall mumbled. He popped the lid off the cup and took a long drink of the coffee, which, he had to admit, was prepared just the way he liked it. Costa tossed a white, waxed bag in his lap.
“Doughnut?”
Marshall made a move to open the bag, then stopped, looking intently at Costa. “Don’t tell me,” he said.
“Sour cream with cinnamon and sugar.” They said it at the same time. Costa grinned.
“How do you do that?”
Costa shrugged, turning the key in the ignition and throwing the truck into gear. “Don’t know. My pop used to do it too.” The big man pulled onto the street and headed north.
“Where the hell we going?” Marshall bit into the doughnut, sugar and cinnamon spilling onto his jacket. He brushed it away.
“Omer,” said Costa.
“Omer? What the hell is that?”
“Little town on 23,” said Costa. “We’re going to see Hubcap.”
“Hubcap?”
“Brian Jankowicz. He was Violet’s third husband. After me. The locals call him Hubcap.”
“Do I want to know why?”
Costa began to chuckle again. “Oh, sonny boy, you’ll see.”
Marshall popped the last of the doughnut in his mouth and washed it down with the coffee. He watched the neighborhood slide by. “Look,” said Marshall, “can you stop calling me that?”
“Okay,” Costa said, his grin wide and white. “Sonny boy.”
When Brian Jankowicz met Violet Benjamin-Montgomery-Pavlos in Beanies, a little bar on the Au Sable River on a rainy April night, the thing he noticed was that she looked totally out of place. Girls that walked into Beanies generally wore tight jeans and tighter T-shirts, tennis shoes or boots, and hairdos straight out of 1985. Violet sat shivering at the end of the bar, nursing a cup of Beanie’s nasty coffee, wearing a wrap-around knit dress and low heels. She had a hat on, which Brian thought looked pretty classy. It was one of those wool hats, like a man’s, but it was a pearly gray color and had a paisley hatband. Her dark hair was damp, her fingers raw and red.
The other thing that struck Brian as strange was how the woman had gotten there. He knew everyone’s car in Omer—he was the only mechanic in the small village—and the only cars in the parking lot were Jessa’s, the bartender, and old man Weaver’s 1962 Chevy pickup. Brian figured right quick the woman must have had some car trouble. And from the looks of her, other trouble as well. He’d seen that same sad look on his own mother’s face plenty of times. Definitely some man problems.
Brian sidled up to the bar, and Jessa slid him a draught of Miller. He tipped his head at her and laid two dollars on the bar. As he sat down, he caught the woman’s eye and nodded to her.
“How ya’ doin’?” he said.
“I’ve been better,” said Violet, glancing around nervously.
“Had some car trouble, did you?” Brian took a drink of his