You are a Bearer of Many Gifts, Quiet Man

I must have slept almost until at least noon the day after the Wrong’s party. I was that tired.

I remember rising, reclining back into bed, rising again browsing the internet blogs as I usually do from the comfort of my bed, while talking on the phone and watching television. Multi-tasking you think? Not really. I just have a short attention span and vacillate between all three at various times.

Showered, dressed and hair dripping wet as usual, but combed through (!), I was too exhausted to go down to the Starbucks for a tea or even to DD for a hazelnut coffee.

So, instead, I went to see my nephew and sister in law.

I knocked on the door, not bothering to have called her prior.

She pushes her door curtains to the side with one finger while balancing my nephew on her hip. She then unlocks the door.

“Woman, did you stay out all night again last night?” she said after seeing the baggy face I must have had that early afternoon.

I tried to ignore her, because she was in that too familiar state for my tastes.

“I got home at 4:30 am, ok? I am tired,” I muttered under my breath.

“Well,” she declared, “ at least I hope you got laid!”

I definitely ignored her. She is very nosy regularly, so even if you ignore her, it stops her from continuing the questioning, but it has never stopped her from asking to begin with at all.

My nephew, who was about 8 months old, was smiling from ear to ear with his toothy, two bottom teeth, smile. He is such a happy, beautiful baby.

Drool was glistening on his rosy lips, reflecting the brightness of his large, round baby eyes. I reached out to hold him and took a deep breath of his soft baby smell.

He grabbed my hair, held tight, and yanked as hard as his little Kung Foo grip permitted, while trying to bite my face, the little booger.
When I finally pried the hairs he had in his baby fist, I took him to the living room and sat with him on the couch. I chatted with his mother for a while, just vegetating.

My cell was ringing. I hear the faint Greensleeves serenading the inside pocket of my down jacket.

Struggling to look for it before it goes to voice mail, I pulled it out and looked at the number.

It was Quiet Man. He must have seen the message on the cup.

“Hello?” I said as if I did not know who was calling.

“Allo, Muse!” he said.

“Oh, Quiet Man, how are you?”

“How are you, Muse?” he said with a deep, manly giggle.

“Fine. How are you?”

By this time, my sister in law, who was across the room, was watching me talk on the phone.

“Did you get my message?” I said coyly, yet firmly.

“I see something on this cup when I come to office, Muse.”

“Well, did you READ it?”

“Yes, Muse, yes.”

“So are you still at the office now?”

“Yes.”

“I can’t talk now, Quiet Man,” I said.

“Where are you, Muse?” he asked.

“I am visiting my nephew for a bit, for about an hour.”

“You come to office, Muse, I be here.”

“OK, see you in about one hour.”

After I left my sister in law, since an hour was way too long to try and make small talk with her more than that, I drove to Quiet Man’s office.

I walked in and he was sitting at his desk. The cup was in front of his with the “YOU SUCK” plainly visible.

After our customary greeting to each other, I explained the message. Not that I cared, I wrote “You Suck” but I wanted to let him know how late I was there waiting for him with Ricky.

His story matched that of Ricky’s, but I did not really believe that he fell asleep at Fred’s house. But that is what he said.

What happened was that he dropped Fred off at his house. His wife, who was miffed to begin with, was waiting for him. Apparently he told her he would be home by 9 pm and Quiet Man was delivering the all night drunk Fred to Marsha at 12 am.

Quiet Man was at the foot of the hill to the office when he got a call from Fred, asking him to come back since Marsha was starting WWIII right there in his brand new spanking house.

So Quiet Man goes back and tries to referee between them. Lots of screaming and yelling. Marsha would not quit accusing Fred of everything her imagination could tell her he could have been up to, for in fact, in Marsha’s mind, Fred is some playboy.

There was also a lot of throwing things and the worst thing Quiet Man told me was their three daughters were having to witness all of this, how sad. Also, Fred’s elderly mother lives with him and she is almost bedridden and she managed to get herself out of her room to see what was going on.

Quiet Man told me how he tended to her and the girls to try and make the whole situation less traumatic. Eventually he said he fell asleep on the couch. He awoke at 6 am and then headed home.

Hmm, I thought, a likely story or not?

Quiet Man was looking me directly into my eyes.

“Well, all I know was that Ricky kept me here all night with the promise that you were coming, but then he told me the truth when I got up to finally leave.”

“So sorry, Muse. I want to come back.”

“Whatever,” I told him.

I changed the subject and we began to talk. He had in front of him a cigar that was in a glass case, but looked kinda dry.

“Avid, he bring this cigarra yesterday when he come.”

Avid, was Ricky’s brother in law.

As we were chatting, I watched him extract the cigar. The outer wrapper was curling off, so it was definitely a dried up cigar.

Quiet Man, was rolling the cigar between his fingers of both hands as he spoke to me. After a while, he licked the entire length of the cigar and his saliva pasted it back to together. Ech, was what I thought of that as I continued to converse with him.

With surgical like skill, slowly and carefully he sawed the cigar in two. Ok, he one part was shorter than the other.

He held each up and examined them. He put the one with two cut ends in his mouth, rolled it around a bit, and lit the stubby cigar.

He handed it to me while exhaling the smoke he drew in while holding the flame to catch a burn.

I took the cigar from him and watched him light the other half.

Surprisingly, the cigar was smooth and did not unravel. We both continued on, Quiet Man telling stories of his homeland and I just sitting there listening to every word.

“Oh, Quiet Man,” I interrupted him, “ Do you think Fred will go to Binnie’s Christmas cocktail party tonight?”

“That tonight, Muse?”

Quiet Man was not invited by Binnie, simply because she did not meet him that night at Fred’s party as I had.

“Yes, I think he go with Marsha, because he no take her last night.”

“Oh,” I said thinking about the logic of that.

“I have to be there at 7:30 pm,” I told him. It was about 4:00 pm or so at that point.

I had to bring Binnie a hostess gift, but had been so lazy all week to have gone and gotten her something.

I said out loud that I had to go to the liquor store or the pastry shop to get her something. I did not budge from my chair to go and do it, now did I? No.

I was figuring that if I got home by 5:30, I would have enough time to get ready. Binnie was Fred’s neighbor and they lived only ten minutes from my house.

Quiet Man had to drive to pick up his daughter for Christmas break and he planned on leaving at 5 pm.

By the time 5:15 arrived, we were still sitting there talking. I rationalized I would not re-shower, and perfume myself to cover up the smoke my hair must have obsorbed.

“Do you think I can make it to the liquor store, Quiet Man?”

“You no need, Muse. I give you wine to take.”

After much back and forth about not being given a bottle of wine, I conceded because it was better than arriving empty handed to a new friend’s Christmas party.

We go to another part of the building and he opens up a large closet. It is filled with CASES of red and white wine. He also opened the door to another room, that held more cases.

“What she like, dry or sweet, Muse?”

“Sweet, red,” I replied remembering the first invitation I got to her house when she told me she preferred a sweeter wine than the dry one we were drinking.

“I only have sweet white,” he said taking inventory of his stash.

He pulls one out and hands it to me. I never heard of it before, but it was not like I was a connosieur of anything.

“You have bag?” he asked me, “I sorry Muse, I no have bag for you.”

“Don’t worry, Quiet Man, I have a bag.”

I was so happy to have a gift and I would be able to go home and arrive relatively on time to Binnie’s house.

Clutching my hostess gift, we go out to our cars in the parking lot. I was sort of sad that Quiet Man was not invited, it would not be the same without him there, though I thoroughly enjoy Binnie and her husband’s company. And Fred would be there with Marsha. Poor Fred. He must be in the dog house to be bringing Marsha.

I guess it serves him right for being caught earlier in the day prior to the Wrong’s party with two twenty year olds in his office, having some Christmas cheer. That Marsha is a hound dog. Despite Fred’s cameras in his store Marsha was able to get back there and catch him having a drink with those trashy girls.

We kiss each other good bye and he wished me well for the evening.