I was nine and Derek eight when our father was killed in a car crash. They said he was drunk, and I can believe it. He was drunk a lot of times. He didn’t have any insurance, and we’d never had much money anyway, so we were in kind of a tight place. In the following years we lived in a lot of rundown motel rooms. Once we slept in our car, until it was repossessed.
Sometimes we went to shelters, but we never stayed long because our mom was afraid some social worker would decide to take Derek and me from her. She wasn’t about to let that happen. She was always very protective of us. She often said we were all she had.
She worked, but usually at jobs that didn’t last too long, and none that paid very well. So it was tough, but I’m sure tougher on her than on us. We were kids and we’d never had much, so we didn’t miss much. If we weren’t hungry we were fine, and we laughed a lot.
By the time I was fourteen I had worked too, although not legally. Mostly I’d done things like shine shoes, deliver newspapers, run errands. I think I was fifteen when Mom got a job in an office for the first time. I don’t even know why she applied for it – she'd never done that kind of work. Desperation, I guess.
Anyway, this guy had a business selling boats – big expensive boats. Yachts, almost. Mom’s job was sort of ill-defined. She wasn’t really a secretary or accountant, or even a salesperson. He called her his assistant. Anyway, he probably hired her because he liked her – and she was so pretty.
His name was Mr. Mathers, but he told Derek and me it was okay to call him Cody. He was nice to us from the beginning, and would give us really nice gifts for special occasions, take us to really good restaurants. On weekends we’d go to the beach or the zoo and he’d slip us a couple of dollars when Mom wasn’t looking.
I said our mom was pretty, and she really was. Cody was okay looking, I guess. His hair was turning grey around the sides and his hairline had receded a couple of inches. I never thought about how old he was, but now I’d guess about forty. The thing I remember most about him was that for his age he had a really nice body. He worked out every day, but he wasn’t muscular. I mean, he wasn’t like Arnold Schwarzenegger. He was thin and I guess what you’d call sinewy, I think.
Derek looks a lot like our mom, whereas I don’t. She says I look like my dad, but I have to take her word for it. I don’t much remember what he looked like, and for some reason, she doesn’t have any pictures, she says.
Anyway, back to my story. When about two years later he asked Mom to marry him, we were all for it. He’d set her up in a nice small apartment long before, but when they married, we of course moved into his house – and what a house it was.
It was only one story, but it was spread out with a large living room and sliding glass doors that looked out on a really beautiful swimming pool. He and mom had a big bedroom with monster closets and a huge bathroom at one end of the house, and there were four bedrooms at the other end, each with its own bathroom. Whereas many times in the past, Mom, Derek and me had all slept in the same bed, now Derek and me had our own private bedrooms.
Everything was super. I mean, it was like a dream come true. It was like if we had moved to Disneyland, I guess. I’ve never been to Disneyland, but it was great. Derek and me both started doing better in school, and Mom and Cody were talking about me going to a university.
Oh, I forgot to tell you I have a girlfriend. She’s real nice and super-looking. Her name’s Cheryl. We’ve been going steady for almost two years. Mom and Cody really like her, but Derek says she’s stuck up, but that’s just his opinion. She isn’t really.
Anyway, one Thursday night we had gone to the movie. We were supposed to go out only on weekends, but this was a sneak preview of a big new blockbuster, and we talked our folks into letting us go.
After the movie, I took her home and we sat on her front porch talking about the film, and necking. We kind of had to do that under the radar so her dad wouldn’t catch us. We’d kiss but had to keep an eye out for him at the same time. Eventually her mom called and said it was past time for her to come in. That meant I had stayed out past my curfew.
When I got home, the house was dark. I was surprised Mom had forgotten to leave a light on, but then guessed that maybe she had thought I had come in and gone to bed. I hoped that was the case.
I went in as quietly as I could and locked the door. I didn’t dare turn on a light, but the lights from the swimming pool coming in the glass doors gave me enough light I could get through the living room without bumping into any furniture.