Chapter 6: What The Fuck Do You Want?

I had calmed down from my encounter with that pig of a meter maid and the cop and I had made myself a typical summer lunch of a sandwich and a beer. I had built a big cedar deck adjacent to my front entrance and from there I had a magnificent view of the Gulf, the mainland mountains and everything that passed by. This afternoon I watched the ferry making its way toward Comox from Powell River and a couple of big Yankee yachts heading north, probably destined for Desolation Sound. I had my ten power binoculars on the table and I could usually get a good enough look at anything to figure out what they were and where they came from. The Alaska cruise ships would show up just before or at sundown at this time of the year.

I'd finished my beer and put my head back on the fancy deck chair that I'd treated myself to last year and closed my eyes. The big hemlocks and cedars off to the south would shield me from most of the sun in an hour or two and until then, I'd rely on the sun block I'd slapped on a few minutes earlier and the tilt umbrella in the center of the table. It was warm and it didn't take me long to drift off.

I awoke with a start and it took me a couple of seconds to orientate myself and realize why I had jumped like that. It was my conscious mind that reminded me that I had heard a twig or a branch snap and then I recognized the sound of a car coming up my private road. It was at least a hundred meters to the town road and with the hill and the bend, I couldn't see what was coming until it was within a few meters of the house.

It was a late model compact, white in colour and I suppose it had tinted windows because I couldn't see who was driving. I was about to get up when the driver's door swung open and out stepped my ex-wife Joyce. To say I was surprised was the least of it. I must have dropped back into the chair and just stared at her. I didn't say a thing or move a muscle as she began to slowly walk toward me.

"Hello, Geoff." she said quietly. She looked nervous and uncertain and I suppose she should be. We hadn't parted on the best of terms and we had had no communications of any kind, written or spoken, since the divorce. The thought passed through my mind that she'd found out about the patent and she was here to get "her share". She'd get that when her fuckin' Swami walked on water.

"What the fuck do you want?" I asked in a snarl.

"I see you're still the same loveable old Geoff." she said without a smile.

"Cut the bullshit Joyce, what the fuck do you want?" I repeated.

"Family business." she answered simply. She must have been looking around for a place to sit down, but I had the only chair on the deck and I wasn't moving. I would keep her on the defensive for as long as I could.

"Do you suppose you could get me a chair?" she finally asked.

I didn't answer but gave her a disgusted look and slowly got up to find another chair. There was another in the spare bedroom, but it hadn't been used yet this year, so I took a towel from the bathroom and wiped the dust of it as I returned to the deck. I should have made her do it, I thought. I was being entirely too polite. I opened the chair and set it down on the opposite side of the table from me and returned to my chair.

"What family business?" I began.

"Your children want to know what's happened to you. You disappeared and they haven't heard anything from you. I had to hire an agency to find you." she said with a slightly cross tone.

"What do they want with me? Rick's got his own life someplace in god-knows-where and Kirsten's in some fuckin' commune in the Rockies smokin' dope just like her old lady did." I said with a sneer.

"Rick is in Alberta and has been for weeks. Kirsten left the commune and runs a day care centre in Calgary. She doesn't do dope and she never did."

"Unlike her mother." I snapped.

"Do you hate them as much as you hate me?" she asked.

"No... no... I don't hate them. I thought you had turned them against me though. You were really out in outer space and I had no idea what you told them but they seemed to think it was all my fault and I just said "fuck it" and quit bothering them."

"I never turned them against you. You were so angry they couldn't talk to you. You actually frightened Kirsten. She was afraid you were going to do something violent. And Beverly; she was so upset she forbid Rick from letting you talk to your grandchildren. That's how bad it was Geoff."

"Too fuckin' bad. I don't need their approval. Let 'em suck up to you." I spat.

"What is the matter with you? Are you going to live the rest of your life with all this hate for me bottled up inside of you? You won't live past sixty if you do. It'll eat you alive." she almost shouted at me.

I looked in her eyes and for a second, I thought I could see a flicker of fear. Why did she care about me? She had flushed me away like a used tampon and now she was telling me she was worried about me? What's wrong with this picture?

"Joyce... why do you care? You didn't care two years ago. Why do you give a fuck what happens to me?" I asked, still baffled by this visit.

She didn't answer me. She stood up and walked around the deck and looked out over the eastern view and seemed to be lost in her thoughts. I just shut up and let her compose herself. There was something she needed to tell me, but she didn't quite know how. I had a hunch what it might be, but even then, I wasn't sure. Maybe I just wanted to be right.

Finally, she turned and looked at me; leaning against the railing. "You have a beautiful home Geoff. The view is wonderful. It must be quite something to see at sunset." she said with a slight smile.

"Sunrise." I said. "You're looking east. It's the sunrise that's the most special. Sunset is behind the mountain." I offered calmly pointing over my shoulder and the mountain behind me.

"Oh. How did you find this place?" she asked as she walked slowly back toward the table.

"I kept looking until I found what I wanted and I bought it." I said simply.

"Where are you working... out of this home?" she asked, placing both hands on the back of the deck chair.

"I'm retired. I don't work anywhere."

"Really? I'm surprised. I though that you would need to... I mean... how could you afford this?" She finally asked the question I know had been on her mind for a while. She could see that this wasn't some lonely log cabin in the woods.

"You mean, how could I afford this after your cunt lawyer Claire got finished with me? Is that what you mean Joyce?" I snapped.

"I didn't realize how nasty she had been until it was too late. I should have stopped her. I didn't want to cripple you... I just wanted what was mine." she said apologetically.

"Well that my have been what you wanted, but Claire wanted my balls in her trophy case. She fuckin' near got them too." I said calmly.