Joseph Cirelli - Attack from behind

And for the first night since their marriage, they slept together as strangers, each with his own private shame.

"Hey, Don, are you deaf? That's the third time they've called you on the squawk box!" his friend Eddie shouted to him from his seat on the fork-lift truck that he operated.

Don turned to the source of Eddie's voice. "Oh, I guess I was thinking about something… Thanks, Eddie."

"Thinking? Man, you must have been unconscious to miss that thing!" Eddie yelled as the loudspeaker was beginning to call Don Willard for the fourth time, the operator's voice showing signs of growing irritation.

His head throbbed with the sick-pain of a hangover, but it wasn't his morning-after-malady that made him miss the message three times running… it was his worries about Diane. He had awakened ahead of the alarm this morning and switched it off so that she wouldn't get up to fix him his usual coffee and orange juice. He dressed quietly and slipped out of the house without waking her to catch his ride to work. And all the way there he chided himself for his dishonesty… He had to tell her about the night before sooner or later, only he just couldn't bear to spring it on her now. Hell, she was carrying his kid… what kind of man would tell a pregnant woman something like that?

He shook his head – slowly, so the throbbing wouldn't become worse – and laughed at himself as he walked across the floor to the switchboard to get his message. You're full of crap, Don Willard… what kind of man would even do what you did? You went out and got laid and left your pregnant wife at home? You're rotten, buddy, rotten like bad meat!

"Well, there you are," the elderly telephone operator said snippily. There was a rumor going around that she was older than Mother Nature, but nobody could prove it. She had white hair that was purple now from countless rinses and a perpetual sneer on her lips like she owned the factory and everyone else just worked here. "I was about to go looking for you. Mr. Collins wants to see you." Don nodded and headed outside to the loading ramp. "Not there… in the personnel office."

The bastard, he thought. He's probably going to lay me off ahead of schedule! They can't wait to hand me that pink slip!

Sanderson, the personnel director, wasn't in his office when Don arrived, but Red was there, standing beside the personnel man's big walnut desk. Don winced as he saw the smirking grin on Collins' face and he wanted more than anything to knock his head around backwards, but he knew that he would need a good reference if he hoped to find another decent job.

"You wanted to see me?" Don said coolly.

Was it his imagination, or was Red looking at him strangely, like he knew some special secret? Oh, it's just my imagination… I'm getting punchy now that I'm almost out of work. A few weeks and I'll be like those winos down on Main Street, punching at their shadows and flinching every time a horn blows.

"Yes, Don… I have some news for you," Red smiled… or was it a smirk?

"I'll bet."

"You're off the list… you're being kept on…"

"I'm what?" Don suddenly perked-up. "Just what I said… you're not going to be laid off or furloughed. You can keep your job," he said.

Don stammered for words. All his defenses, all his fast comebacks had been shot down by this inexplicable turn of events. "But I don't get it… why me?"

Red laughed nervously. "Well, let's not question the front office… now run on back to work."

Sanderson returned to his office once Don was back at the loading dock. "Well, did you do it?" he asked irritatedly.

"Yeah, he's back on the payroll."

The personnel director settled at his desk and sifted through his papers. "I still don't like it… it's sure to cause trouble with the other men. But I'll go along with you this once, Red, because I've had no reason to distrust you."

"Right, Sandy… and that business about Mr. Cooley's wife had nothing to do with it, huh?" he grinned.

The personnel director flushed and waved the burly foreman out of his office. "I told you before, Red… I was just giving her a lift home and we stopped for a minute to talk. That was all."

Red laughed as he opened the door. "I don't care if you fucked her or not, Sandy… but whatever your reasons, thanks for the hand. I'll be seein' you."

He sighed deeply when the foreman was gone and reached for the pint bottle of Jack Daniels that he kept in the locked middle drawer. Only after he had downed a solid mouthful and popped a chlorophyl mint in his mouth did Sanderson breathe easily again. He didn't know what Red Collins was up to… but he didn't care. His own secret was safe for another day.

"Diane, Diane, where are you?" he shouted as he ran into the house.

She hurried from the kitchen, wearing an apron and wielding a half-scrubbed pot in one hand. "Don… what is it? Is something wrong?"

My, God, he's found out… he knows!

"Nothing's wrong, honey… I got my job back!" he beamed. "We don't have to leave and you can have your baby right here in Evansboro!"

Diane smiled thinly. "That's great, darling… just great."

"Is that all you can say? I just told you all that and you just smile and shrug like it was nothing." His voice showed signs of bitterness and hurt.

"I'm sorry… I guess the shock hasn't hit me yet. It'll take a while," she explained weakly. "I'll probably start screaming in the middle of the night when it finally comes home."

"That's better… I rushed all the way home without stopping for a beer just so I could tell you." He still had on his work clothes and his light windbreaker and he made no move to take them off.

"You're not staying?" she asked hopefully, though she already knew the answer. It was written all over his face… he wanted to get back to that awful bar and those women.

"Uh, no honey… I think I'll just slip back to the Stop-Over for one or two beers. After all, I've got something to celebrate tonight!"

And that's the way it went for three days running… Don would rush home from work, sometimes not even having dinner, and then it was back to that bar and his friends. Diane hardly saw him at all, like it used to be when he had to work overtime practically every night. Only then it was for them, for the down-payment on their little house.

Now… well, she was afraid to guess why he stayed gone so much, though in some secret moments she was glad. At least she hadn't been faced with the dreaded moment of making love again. He scarcely touched her now, slipping into bed after she was asleep, and hurrying away in the morning without even his coffee. For a couple of days, her relief at being spared the agony of lovemaking with the memories of her adultery still vivid in her mind blinded her to the real situation… he didn't want to make love. He was avoiding it as surely as she was that night after leaving Red's.

But like any problem, smothering it beneath the surface was no long-lasting solution. Sooner or later, like a volcano, it was sure to erupt…

"Diane… Diane, wake up…"

The voice came to her through a shocking mist of grays and blacks, an overpoweringly sinister cloud that had swirled about her and cut her off from the ones that she loved. In the distance, she could see her house… her unborn baby… her darling Don… but the misty fog obscured her way and she stumbled and groped blindly, never quite reaching them, always taking the wrong path… until she awoke.

His face came into focus slowly, as through the lens of some avant-garde filmmaker's camera. "Oh, Don… I was dreaming. What is it, honey?"

"Diane… I know this sounds stupid, but were you in Forest Acres last week? The night I was, uh, at the armory for Reserve meeting?" He looked more worried than angry and in her grogginess she let it slip out.