Chapter 40

Indiana proved to be a good place for me to start and end my journey. I ended up spending only three days in South Bend, before deciding it was time to head back home again. I spent a day driving back to Uncle Bunny's house. As soon as I got back, I called Mama.

"Hello?"

"Hey, Hans, it's Kenny. How are you guys doing?"

"All good here. You want to talk with your Mama?"

"Sure. Say hi to Gerta for me. See you, Hans."

"Kenny!"

"Hi Mama. You still taking good care of all my girl friends?"

"When are you coming home?"

"I'm home already, Mama. I got back about an hour ago."

"This is your home, Kenny."

"No, Mama. It's your home. I need to have my own home now."

"Are you enjoying yourself doing this to me, Kenny?"

"I didn't start this, you did. I was trying to do what I thought I needed to do, and you decided to interfere again."

"You were about to make a big mistake. I was just trying to save you from making it."

"I need to go, Mama. I didn't call you just so I'd end up getting mad at you again. I don't know why you decided to do what you did, but I'm sure I won't be coming to see you again until I find that out."

"I think you need to seek some professional help, Kenny. You're starting to sound paranoid."

"I did seek professional help, Mama, while I was in Indiana. Did you know they won't perform vasectomy's on any unmarried male under the age of eighteen? Silly law, I think. I'll wait to call you again, until right before my birthday. I want you to think about how far you want the two of us to take this, Mama."

"Don't you dare threaten me. Knowing what you know of our family history, that's a terrible threat to make."

"I already have plenty of children, Mama. The group homes are more than enough for me. Any more would just be a bother and a distraction to me. I'd need to have a very good reason to change my mind about that."

"You're making an expensive misjudgment, Kenny. I can still make changes to my will."

"I can afford to take that chance, can't I, Mama? Uncle Bunny already made sure of that. I've often wondered why he did that? Have you ever wondered why he changed everything around like he did?"

"Very well. I can see there is no reasoning with you. You have nothing to justify these suspicions of yours."

"I'll call you again on the fifteenth of July, unless I happen upon a state with more liberal laws concerning sterilization. I wonder what the law is down in Old Mexico?"

After I hung up the phone, I wondered if I could follow through with my threat. I was still only operating on my own hunch about this bloodline thing. I knew I could easily be wrong about all of this.

I was out in the back yard, trying to repair a loose hinge on the tool shed, where Uncle Bunny had kept all his gardening equipment. I needed to get a screwdriver from the garage, and doing this made me thing of Shirley, and I began wondering if she had given birth to her baby yet. Since I didn't know her new number, I phoned Emily instead.

"Hi, it's Kenny."

"Kenny, are you back?"

"Just got back today. I was doing something and it made me start thinking about Shirley, and I wondered if she had her baby yet?"

"Not yet, She's not due until the first week of July. Why did you start thinking of her?"

"Mama and I are still engaged in our battle to see whether or not she'll let me run my own affairs. So far, neither of us is budging. I've decided to live at my Uncle Bunny's house until it is decided. I was outside looking at the door to the gardening shed, and I just started thinking of Shirley."

"Joyce told us that you were going to start up another group, without including any of us in it. Have you started doing that yet? Is that why you're asking about Shirley?"

"No, not yet. I'm planning on going to Minnesota, to try to find myself some of those farmer's daughters."

"Have you been doing any fucking since you went away?"

"No, and I don't even miss it. It's the strangest thing too. I was sure I'd be all horny after a few days on the road, but I haven't been."

"You didn't ask me if I have."

"That's right, I didn't."

"Is that because you don't care about what I do?"

"I've got to go. You take care of yourself, Emily."

I called my dad at work a few days later, but he was out. I left a message asking him to call me. Mama called me later that day.

"Did you do anything?"

"How are you, Mama?"

"I got pregnant when I was fifteen. He made me get an abortion. My father always suspected it was Bunny."

"Was he right to suspect him?"

"No."

"Was it Hans?"

"Who it was isn't important."

"Does Gerta know?"

"Bunny and I used to always talk about how he and I would have turned out differently, better than we did, if he hadn't been such a force in our lives, or if my mother had only left him when we were still young. That's what you represented to both of us, Kenny. You're just like us, but without having had him be there to spoil it all for you."

"You think I had it better than you did?"

"Not better, but different. In spite of everything, you grew up more intact, whole. You're able to do so much more than Bunny or I ever could. You never lived under the type of domination we constantly lived under."

"I won't go into all my reasons for knowing it, but you have no way of knowing just how wrong your statement is. All three of us were just dominated for different reasons, and by different people. All three of us were crippled by it. Uncle Bunny was just able to hide his better. Are you ready yet to tell me what you want from me?"

"I don't want anything."

"I want to know. I think you know you're going to have to tell me. If you don't tell me now, it might not matter to you anymore, the next time we speak. I've made an appointment for the nineteenth."

"It was his. My father's. He never believed me when I told him there was no one else."

"I'm sorry. That must have been terrible. It still doesn't tell me what you want though."

"Bunny knew why I tried so hard to put you and Brenda together, but that was when we still thought Brenda was his. Bunny wanted me to stop, after he found out that Brenda wasn't his. He encouraged me to change my will when he changed his. He wanted to leave you to find your own future, without interference from us."

"Did you think I'd just turn over a baby of mine to you?"

"I did at first, when you were so young. Not now. Now it would be enough to just know there was a baby, one that could grow up with all of our resources, and none of our emotional baggage."

"There's still something you're hiding from me."

"I'm not. What more could there possibly be?"

"I don't know. I just know there's something else. I feel it. I need to hang up now, Mama, I'm almost out of patience."

When the line went dead, I knew that whatever it was, Mama couldn't tell me. What I didn't know was if I could accept not knowing. If she could tell me about what her father did to her, what could there be that she wouldn't or couldn't tell me? It had to be something about Uncle Bunny. Perhaps a secret she'd promised him she'd never divulge?

I called Joyce at work the next day. We spoke for only a few minutes, but long enough for both of us to know that things between us were very changed.

"Hi, Joyce."

"Kenny? Mama said she called you yesterday."

"She called, and we had a long talk. I didn't ask her about you, because I wanted to wait and talk to you myself. Have you grown any since I left?"

"I stopped measuring. Have you grown?"

"I don't think so. Did you think about what I told you, about only having one primary loyalty?"

"Yes. I decided I was going to be to be loyal primarily to myself."

"I decided the same thing for myself. So, did you form your own group yet?" Joyce laughed.

"You might call it that. The four X's. We've all decided, we're going to let Shirley join us too. We plan to meet once a week, at Emily's house. We're going to let Brenda cook dinner for us, and then we'll all sit around after, talking about you. Someday, we might decide we want to do things together again, but, for right now, we just decided to talk."

"So, you're keeping my harem together, then?"

"I wouldn't say that. It's more like a therapy group. Brenda is showing us how they used to do group therapy at that school she went to."

"I treated you all so badly that now you think you need some therapy?"

"No, don't take it like that. You treated us just fine. We just wanted to talk about how things with you turned out for all of us."

"Mama told me I should seek professional help. Do you think I'm paranoid?"

"No, not paranoid, but I do think you have some emotional problems. I think all of us do. What's this I heard about college? Are you still going to Notre Dame?"

"No. I already sent them a letter, when I was in Indiana."

"What about the group homes?"

"They seem to all be running pretty well. I've got Frank looking after some things for me, but I still take care of most of what I used to. There's plenty of money in all the group home accounts now. The trading program is still doing very well for me."

"You're changing so many things about your future, Kenny. Did you decide yet on what you're going to do to punish me?"

"No, I've decided I need to do something to punish me instead. Somewhere along the way, I stopped being thankful for what I already had. What I wanted, suddenly started to seem more important to me than it was before. I started confusing my wanting things, with my needing them."

"Mama is going to be hurt by you deciding not to go to college. She's been counting on you going off to school, and then coming back home, for weekends, and vacations."

"I've got to go, Joyce. Give my love to all those other X's."

I spoke to people on the phone. I had specifically told everyone I knew, that I didn't want to have any visitors for awhile. Phone conversations had become the only personal indulgence that I allowed myself. My seclusion in Uncle Bunny's house lasted over the entire summer.

My only visitors, during this time period, were the maids that Gerta sent over, and the delivery people that brought me my food, usually twice a day. I sat at home, serving my penance, waiting for that expected call from Mama.

I had decided not to shave myself. or even to get my hair cut. Since I had nowhere I wanted to go, and no one I really needed to see, it wouldn't matter that much to anyone how I looked.

I had these startling moments of perfect clarity, periodically, over that summer. Moments when I realized that my erratic behavior had already passed from being merely strange, to the point where it had drifted into the completely bizarre category. I knew my behavior was lodged somewhere firmly inside the category of serious mental illness. I recognized all this, during my rational periods, but I seemed strangely powerless to prevent it

Each morning I'd get up and take care of all the group home business. I was able to concentrate, and to do what I needed to, even at the worst point of this troubled period.

I also got increasingly more active and involved in my grain trading, often initiating and liquidating positions over the phone with a pit trader. I used every advantage I could find, to take the best possible advantage of the ebb and flow I sensed from the active market. My trading results were constantly improving all through this period, as I had started to understand the pulse of the trading pits. If I started out each morning, holding few, if any, positions, I could trade in a more aggressive manner, until I reached a sold or bought threshhold that I'd set for myself. Once I reached that point, I'd wait, either unwinding when the price movement became favorable, or brokering the grain to my Dad's company.

As my confidence grew, I started raising my threshholds, and putting a larger percentage of my available capital into the trading account. I didn't start exceeding my set limits, it was more a case of having proven the system worked, then increasing my positions, to take full advantage of the profitable opportunities I could now see. Most of my trading took place well within the capacity of our company's immediate need for those grains. Those few times it became necessary for me to actually deliver, I always made sure the company suffered no financial loss from the delivery prices I set.

In August, both our new group home extensions opened, and they were quickly filled to full operating capacity. Word of our group homes had spread throughout the State social services community. For long term placements, we had become, far and away, the preferred provider.

As we had with Sandy, it became necessary to compel our two new executive directors to stay within the placement guidelines that had been agreed to and set out.

It seemed like all our placement people were always anxious to make just one or two exceptions for this special child or that other one who just couldn't quite be made to fit.

This was especially true for the director of the girl's extension. In the first month, she signed intake papers for three girls that didn't even begin to qualify with our home's placement criteria.

Joyce made her return the three children, warning her, in no uncertain terms that if there was ever a fourth placement deviation, that the replacement director would be the one taking that child back to social services.

Joyce, Mama, and Emily had decided on selecting only orphaned girls, between the ages of eight and ten for initial placement in our first girl's extension. Emily was correct, there were plenty of orphaned girls to choose from.

When I didn't show up for either of the group home openings, Mama decided to call me once again. Gerta must have been getting reports about my long hair and scruffy beard. My appearance had started suffering by then.

"Kenny, we're all getting worried about you. Staying locked inside that house isn't healthy for you. You need to get out more. You'll make yourself ill if you don't."

"I'm still waiting for you to tell me what you want from me, Mama. I'm not coming out until you do."

"I've told you all I can. I have nothing more to add to what I've already said. I promise not to ask anything more of you, if you'll just come out of that house, and start living normally again."

"What about all your meddling and interfering? Do you promise not to intervene in my affairs again?" I waited. Mama was searching for a way to deny she'd make further interference, without actually having to commit to it. "You can comment, to me, in private, Mama, and tell me your opinions, but you may not take any action to change any course of personal events that I've chosen to set in motion."

"You wouldn't listen."

"I'd listen. I might not change what I'm doing, but I would listen to you."

"What of Joyce?"

"Tell me what you think, and I'll listen to what you say."

"Marry her."

"I'm not ready to marry anyone. I have problems with Joyce being wife material. Her siding with you that time, has created even more new issues for me. I'd need to have absolute faith and trust in any woman I'd ever marry."

"If you allow her to get away from you, Kenny, you'll both suffer for your having done so. She is almost the perfect girl for you."

"See, I did listen? Now, I want your solemn promise that you are through interfering in any facet of my personal life."

"If I refuse to promise you that?"

"Then I won't be coming over for one of Gerta's dinners tonight, and I won't be trying to seduce Joyce after dinner either. I'm not sure how much longer I can withstand the forces that I've arrayed against myself."

"Very well, but I have another condition to impose on you first."

"I'll listen."

"Your father and I both want you to go to college. A good education is crucial for gaining a sound understanding of economics, or for having any meaningful success in business."

"I listened. It might be something I'll choose to do in the future. For right now though, I have other matters that are more immediate to me. It will take me at least three years to open up and absorb the next six modular extensions. I also need to find a more stable and viable personal life for myself. That will take a lot of my time and attention. I will promise, after I have accomplished those two goals, I will consider going to college."

"You want to know what I want? I want another Bunny."

"Funny you should mention that. I've thought about that also. Malcolm Chalmers Parsons, Bunny Parsons, it has a certain flair that appeals to me. It almost has to follow then, that Roberta Chalmers Parsons, 'Little Bertie', is a name that wouldn't find too much disfavor with you? I see a definite current running through this discussion."

"Only if you should have twins, Kenny, and only if they happen to be a boy and a girl."

"No twins, means no Bunny and Bertie?"

"Yes, it would have to be twins."

"I can agree to doing that for you, should the opportunity present itself."

"Under those circumstances, and with that understanding, I can now agree to your terms as well."

"Tell Gerta to cook something good. Tell Joyce that I forgive her."

I had gone out and gotten myself a professional shave and a nice haircut. I dressed up for dinner too, although my clothing fit too loosely on my frame. I showed up at the house at six thirty, deciding to just walk in, rather than ring the door bell. I saw Joyce and Brenda standing together as soon as I walked in. I turned, and saw Mama and my father coming out of the library, drinks in their hands, and smiles on their faces.

"Kenny, dear. Welcome home."

"Thank you, Mama. It's good to be here. Hi Dad, hi Joyce and Brenda." I walked over and gave Mama a kiss, and then stood still long enough to allow her to give me a big hug. Dad and I shook hands. Brenda and Joyce came over too, so I kissed each of them in turn.

"Kenny, Joyce called me and told me you were coming here. I just sort of invited myself over, because I wanted to see you again. I wanted to tell you I was sorry about not coming to your house when you asked me to. It was just that we had all agreed that we'd all have to go together."

"Thank you, Brenda. I wasn't mad at you. I never did get to find out if you can cook though. Speaking of cooks, I need to go say hi to Gerta and Hans. I hope you're staying for dinner, Brenda?"

"You mom invited me, but I wasn't sure you'd want me here tonight."

"Why not? You can sit next to me, and we'll fool around like we used to, under the table."

I left her there smiling, and went into the kitchen. I got another big hug from Gerta, and then she bawled me out because she said I was too skinny. I told her I planned on gaining weight at dinner, and that pleased her. She told me Hans was running an errand, but told me she'd send him in to see me and say hello as soon as he got back.

Dinner was great. Dad and I talked about how the business was doing, Brenda and I took turns playing footsie under the table, and Mama and Joyce just sat there, quietly smiling at all of us.

"So, Joyce, do twins run in your family?" She looked confused when I asked her that without any prior conversation with her.

"No. My mother's aunt has a daughter who had a set of triplets once, but one of them was born dead, so I guess the other two were twins."

"I think they stay triplets even if one of them is stillborn, dear." Mama was probably right.

"How about you, Brenda, any twins in your family tree?"

"No. Why did you ask us that?"

"Mama and I were talking about twins today, that's all. What do you have planned for after dinner, Joyce?"

"I don't know. I really hadn't thought about it. I usually try to get caught up on my reading, like your dad does. I've got some files on three of the new girls. I need to check to make sure everything's in them. Did you need me to do something?"

"There is something I need help with, over at my house. I could do it myself, but it would be better if I had some help with it."

"I'll help, Kenny." I looked over at Brenda and smiled. Her hand had slipped over into my lap, and she was giving my dick some really friendly squeezes. I reached down and removed her hand.

"This is something only Joyce can help me with tonight, although I really do appreciate your very generous offer."

"Maybe we could both help you? We used to both help you before."

"Maybe Joyce doesn't want any help?" I looked over at her when I said it. Joyce had her face staring at her empty plate. "Would you like Brenda to go with us to keep you company?"

"Not tonight Brenda." Joyce looked up and across the table at both of us. "Kenny and I need to talk in private tonight." Brenda pouted, but she didn't insist. Right after dinner was over, Brenda thanked everyone, then told Joyce she'd see her at work in the morning. Joyce had never mentioned that Brenda was still working for the company. Her school had to be starting back up pretty soon.

I went back to the kitchen and thanked Gerta for her efforts with dinner, and we were talking together about my weight, when Hans came in through the back door, carrying a big box filled with food, that he hurried to put on the table.

"Kenny, it's so good to see you again. Gerta said you were coming tonight, but then she said I needed to go get this meat and cheese for her too. I'm glad to see you. Sit, tell me what you've been doing. Do you have any new girl friends?"

"I haven't been doing much, just the usual. No new girl friends, and no old ones either. I guess it's true what they say about how the older you get, the less girls find you attractive. Except for you of course, Hans. Unfortunately, I don't appear to be an exception to that rule." Hans had a wide grin.

"Tonight though, it's going to be different, no? Gerta told me that you and Joyce, you're going to make up?"

"Well, we're going to talk. We'll have to see about more than talking. She might just want to yell at me."

I spent five minutes with Hans, listening as he told me about how well the golf academy was doing, and how nice everything out there was looking now.

When I excused myself, and went out to join my parents and Joyce in the library, I noticed that Mama was looking a bit miffed about something.

"Is there something troubling you, Mama?"

"No, dear. Joyce and I were just having a discussion. Nothing for you to worry about."

"I see. Is it possible that you and Joyce have different ideas about what might be on tonight's agenda?"

"Kenny, can we just go? I really want to talk to you." Joyce was angry. She didn't get angry that often. I wasn't sure if it was me or Mama that she was angry with.