City Park is absolutely beautiful any day of the week, but especially so today.
Tucked away in the Mid City area of New Orleans, this is one of the nation’s largest urban parks. Actually, to say that City Park is “tucked away” is a feat on its own.
1300 acres of magnificent oak trees, vast green areas, a museum, a golf course, an art gallery a beautiful carousel and a premiere botanical garden. The park straddles a handful of eclectic New Orleans neighborhoods, including Lakeview, Gentilly and Mid City, areas that saw extreme devastation from the flood waters in the aftermath of Katrina.
Bringing this park back to life is another testament to the determination, pride and spirit which makes New Orleans a place like no other.
If you were in the middle of an urban city center you’d never know it at City Park. About 14-million visitors per year absorb its natural grandeur and serenity. Today, three of those visitors are enjoying a gorgeous Fall afternoon.
Marie shrieked and laughed breathlessly across an open field with Bailey, who was, ever so closely, nipping at her feet. A little game of tag the screaming girl as Chris stood nearby, arms crossed, watching the cat and mouse game unfold under the radiant mid day sun.
Marie tumbled to the ground, rolling feverishly forward as Bailey pawed and pounced on top of her. Chris scanned his story assignment sheet, looking up periodically; he smiled and shook his head, trying to decide which of these two were more entertaining, Bailey or Marie.
"C’mon Chris, this is fun!!" Marie yelled.
"For whom? You or Bailey?"
"Both," Marie yelled back, grabbing Bailey by her ears, pushing her face toward Bailey's.
"You’re a goofball, you know that right?" Chris announced matter of factly.
"Bailey doesn’t think so," Marie nonchalantly replied, brushing herself off as she walked toward Chris. "She loves to chase!"
"Yeah, I know, three of my neighbors found that out the hard way," Chris deadpanned. "They’re scared of Bailey now; they avoid me now too...I think they may be scared of me, now that I think about it," Chris pondered.
"How can anyone be scared of Bailey?" Marie laughed.
"The bigger question remains...How can anyone be scared of me??" Chris quickly retorted.
"True," Marie shrugged.
Chris and Marie sat on the grass as Bailey positioned herself as close to Chris as possible, resting her head on his lap.
"Soooo?" Marie curiously began.
"So what?" Chris tersely asked.
"Tonight’s date night; the Shrimp Fest with Angela," Marie teased.
"It’s not a date, it’s a friendly outing, where I plan to eat giant baskets of shrimp," Chris rebutted.
Aren’t shrimp an aphrodisiac?" Marie wondered aloud.
"No, you’re thinking of oysters," Chris corrected.
"Oh…OK, I knew it was one or the other."
"Hey, I forgot to tell you," Marie changed the subject. "I had drinks with Angela the other day."
Chris removed his sunglasses and solemnly focused his eyes on Marie's.
"I don’t suppose there’s any chance that this is the beginning of a joke?" Chris asked.
"Relax! She came by the pub to check it out and to say hi," Marie tried to calm Chris' skepticism.
"I’m sensing that there’s more to this story," Chris prodded.
"Nope; just some girl talk," Marie quickly dismissed.
Chris stared at Marie for a moment. Dead silence filled the air between them.
"What girl talk?" He firmly demanded an answer.
"Huh?" Marie replied, as though she’d just been queried by a suspicious parent as to who broke the window.
"You heard me the first time, I’ll wait for an answer," Chris expressed with an impassioned tone accompanied by a blank stare.
Marie slowly began, obviously stalling to ensure that her response was measured with the care and precision of a brain surgeon wielding a laser scalpel.
"We talked about girl stuff; shopping, TV, boys and…"
"STOP!" Chris interrupted. "WHAT boys?"
"Um, well, your name briefly came up," Marie timidly answered. "By the way, she likes you, so me and Thomas were right;" a beaming smile crossed her face.
"How do you know?" Chris demanded.
"Well, a four year old would know but, on top of that, she told me."
"Please tell me that you didn't talk too much," Chris pleaded, frustration clearly audible in his voice.
"No, not at all," Marie assured; "I wanted to tell her the truth actually."
"Yeah, that would have gone over well; she’d have taken you straight to the nut house," Chris assured.
"Not about the angel and everything...I meant that I wanted to tell her that you weren’t interested in anything other than being friends."
Chris sighed. "Marie, I like this girl. I know that I have a past with her but I like her, and the past is the past; I want to be friends with her. It helps me to somehow break through a wall that’s been in my head for a long time," Chris made his case.
"OK, you do realize that you just referred to your ex wife as this girl...right?" Marie asked incredulously. "That’s just bizarre Chris."
"Yeah," Chris agreed, "the whole fucking thing is bizarre. Listen, Marie, just limit yourself, don’t do me any favors OK?"
"What the hell could I do Chris? She walked into my bar; what could I say? HEY get out, we don’t serve your kind in here!"
"Don't be ridiculous...Of course not, just don’t talk too much because, when you do, you usually say something that you think is harmless and it blows up in your face," Chris warned.
"How so?" Marie indignantly asked.
"Remember the cell phone incident in Angela’s hospital room??" Chris reminded.
"Oh, yeah…you promised you weren’t still mad about that."
"I’m not, just try to keep a low profile," Chris begged.
Later in the day as Chris got dressed for the festival, his phone rang; it was Erin.
"Hey, what’s goin’ on?" Chris answered.
"Not much, just wanted to see if you had plans tonight," Erin inquired.
"Yeah, I have to go to a thing tonight." Chris ducked telling Erin about the Shrimp Fest. He certainly didn’t want to say anything about going with a friend, who happens to be a girl.
"Oh…well, maybe sometime this weekend if we’re both free," Erin suggested.
"Yeah, that'd be great! Look, Erin, I'm sorry."
"No big deal Chris; I may go do something with Jen tonight anyway," Erin dismissed.
"OK, I’ll call you later, or if it’s late I’ll call tomorrow if that’s OK," Chris assured.
"Sounds good, talk to you then; have a good night OK?"
"You too Erin."
"Shit!" Chris exclaimed, thinking about what Marie had learned from Angela. With things progressing so nicely with Erin, Chris felt more strongly the need to be completely straight forward with Angie, quickly.
Angela and Chris strolled past a virtual wall of food and drink that stretched for as far as the eye could see. A small city of festival tents, filled with Zydeco music which blared through the street; it's upbeat tempos wrapped around the downtown skyscrapers.
The aroma of Louisiana shrimp hung thick in the air. Any and every shrimp recipe known to man was represented as festival goers wrestled with the biggest decision of all…which tent to hit first? So much food, so little time. After all, it’s impossible to sample offerings from every single booth, unless you haven‘t eaten in 4 days. These must be carefully weighed decisions in order to get the ultimate Shrimp Fest experience.
Across town, Erin strolled into the pub. Jen, one of her office co-workers, accompanied. They’d just finished a few games at Rock N Bowl, a legendary Mid City bowling alley. Erin decided that they should check out the Mid-City scene and to see if Marie might be working.
Marie spotted Erin as soon as she walked in.
"Hey!!" Marie loudly greeted.
"Hey Marie, this is my friend Jen, we work together."
"nice to meet you Jen; what can I getcha’ ladies?" Marie politely asked.
"I’ll have a chardonnay," Erin replied.
"Grey Goose and tonic with a lemon," Jen ordered.
Erin and Jen talked and laughed at the occasional inexperienced drunk coed, which could be found on most weekend nights at the pub.
"Jesus, I’m glad I’m not bar tending here tonight," Erin laughed.
"Yeah, well I am workin’ and these shit heads aren’t tipping nearly enough for as much babysitting and drama that’s involved," Marie laughed as she delivered the drinks.
"So, I heard Chris’ painting skills were revealed the other day," Marie joked.
"Yeah, there was no skill involved," Erin laughed. "He tried though."
"Where is he tonight?" Jen casually asked Erin.
"I’m not sure where he was goin" Erin replied.
"Oh, he went to the Shrimp Festival tonight," Marie announced.
"Oh shit! Jen exclaimed; "I forgot all about that. My friend is playing one of the stages tonight; we should go Erin!" Jen encouraged.
"Yeah, maybe we’ll run into him," Erin agreed.
Marie’s smile quickly vanished; her face went blank and the sound of deep heartbeats pierced her ears; deafening thumps in rapid cadence, one after another, increasing in speed and intensity with each passing second. She felt as though she could hyperventilate at any moment, desperately trying to conceal any hint of horror and panic that raced through her body and mind.
"Shit!" Marie blurted.
Erin and Jen turned to Marie with a surprised smile.
"You OK Marie?" Erin hesitantly asked.
"Uh, yeah, I’m good…I forgot about a pizza in the oven back here; I’ll be right back." Marie quickly replied, racing to the back room, hitting speed dial on her cell.
"Please, please, please, please God let him answer," Marie whispered, frantically dialing Chris 6 or 7 times in a row with no luck. She didn’t leave a message.
"Fuck!" She exclaimed from the storage room.
Marie composed herself before emerging from the back room to rejoin Erin and Jen.
"Hey Marie, we’re gonna tab out," Erin requested.
"Oh...OK," Marie nervously smiled as she handed over the tab. "You guys goin’ home?" Marie hopefully pried, begging for the response she so desperately NEEDED to hear right now.
"No," Jen answered. "We’re gonna go check out a little bit of the festival."
Erin and Jen paid out.
"Nice to meet you Marie," Jen extended her hand.
"Nice to meet you too Jen."
"See ya’ soon Marie, thanks for everything," Erin said with a smile.
"Yeah, I’ll see ya’ soon Erin," Marie returned a forced smile.
Marie's thoughts raced as she trained her eyes on Erin and Jen all the way to the door. She excused herself from behind the bar, asking Sally to keep an eye on her customers for a few moments.
She darted to the back room, slinging open the walk in cooler door, slamming it behind her. Marie collapsed onto a box of bottled beer, staring at her lap for a moment before shifting her head forward, then between her knees…Marie then began to cry.
"Wow! I’m stuffed!" Chris heartily announced, strolling with Angela farther through the festival.
"Me too!" Angela agreed.
They found a bench nearby where they could chat and do a little people watching.
"Glad we got here before him," Chris jokingly pointed to a giant of a man who had just emerged from a vendor tent with, what appeared to be, the entire season’s catch on his plate.
Angela tried not to laugh; she elbowed Chris.
"That’s mean!" She scolded.
"It’s true," Chris laughed.
"I had some drinks with your buddy, Marie, the other day," Angela changed the subject.
"Yeah, she told me."
"She’s a nice person," Angela complimented.
"She is indeed," Chris immediately agreed. He continued, "she’s a goof and she puts her foot in her mouth a lot, but she means well."
"I’ve never met her boyfriend," Angela curiously prodded.
"EX boyfriend," Chris corrected. "You don’t want to meet him either," he continued with a hint of irritation.
"She’s not with him anymore? Why not?" Angela was quite curious by Chris’ tone on the subject.
"He was an asshole; he fell in with the wrong crowd, did a lot of drugs, stole money from her for his drugs. He was also real jealous. Anytime he saw her talking to one of her bar customers he’d go nuts; he always thought she was trying to get with them; he thought she tried to get with me for a while", Chris continued.
"As his drug problem increased, his rationale decreased; he became a very dark person."
"How so?" Angela listened with utter concern as Chris continued.
"He’d come home, drugged out like a maniac, then he’d lose his temper and they’d fight; it usually ended up quite physical."
"Oh my God!" Angela shook her head.
"Yeah, she took it for a while and finally got away but not before she ended up in the hospital for a few days; she was pretty banged up. We convinced her that he was not going to stop until he was dead or both of them were dead...He didn’t want help, we could all see it and so could she."
Chris finally offered a bright spot in Marie's life.
"She’s much better and stronger now, over time. He’s actually in prison now, so we know he’s gone for sure now. She’ll find someone when she feels the time is right, she’s just not in a hurry, understandably." Chris concluded, staring blankly ahead.
"Well, she’s a sweet girl and she’s a good friend to you," Angela noted.
"More than you know," Chris quietly acknowledged.
"How so?" Angela pried deeper.
"Look, she helped me through some tough shit a while back. I had a lot of stuff goin’ on and me and my ex girlfriend had some tough times. The ex was no perfect angel, but I let life get the best of me and I began to sink into alcohol as an escape from reality. Next thing you know, our fights became more than just angry words," Chris remorsefully confessed.
"Marie was right there for me and I knew that I had to fix things; I had to fix myself. I begged the ex to get help too. I knew I couldn’t do it alone and I leaned on Marie. I’m sure some of the stories I told her were not pleasant to hear, but she listened anyway.
She scolded when she felt it necessary, she supported but she also didn’t sympathize on many occasions. It was tough love; it was what I needed.
Granted, me and the ex didn’t take fighting to the level at which Marie and her guy experienced, but I’m sure that it was still difficult for her to be around me, to help me, since it was so soon after her own situation," Chris sighed.
"At least you moved forward and knew what you expected of yourself," Angela comforted.
"Yeah," Chris agreed, "but it left two broken hearts in the aftermath," he sighed.
Chris rose from the bench, looking at his watch.
"You bout’ ready to head out?"
"Yeah, if you are," Angela smiled, studying Chris’ eyes for a moment as if to be searching his thoughts.
"Look Angela, I usually don’t spew all that out to everyone, sorry if it was a lot to absorb."
"Not at all," she assured. "I’d be more concerned if you weren’t open about it and if you didn’t seek help." Angela comforted, leaning forward to give Chris a long embrace.
Jen hadn’t noticed Chris in the distance; Erin, however, did. She stood motionless for a moment, staring at Chris and Angela, who were fully embraced.
"Oh, hey Erin, here’s my friend over here," Jen anxiously tugged Erin’s arm.
As Erin and Jen walked toward one of the music stages, Erin glanced back the entire way, finally turning her head from Chris and Angela. A troubled expression was clearly visible on her face.
With deeply preoccupied thoughts, Erin forced a smile as Jen introduced her to the band.
copyright, Pontchartrain Press 2008
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