sins of the fathers

Central Station is a very busy place. Literally hundreds of thousands of people pass through every day, milling and scurrying like ants this way and that, silently cursing each other under their breaths, avoiding eye contact at all costs.

I was working at a large multinational corporation (lucky me) with headquarters in the City. Commuting into work by train, I would arrive at Central Station somewhere between seven and eight in the morning, and take a ten minute walk to the office. In the afternoon, I would leave the office for Central somewhere between five thirty and six thirty.

But whatever time I got to Central, she would be standing there, facing the ticket barriers. “She”? A bag lady, street person, homeless person, if you prefer.

She would be standing there in her regular spot between the fast food place and travel agent, back to the wall so she didn’t get in the way of the people rushing to and from work. Next to her would be a battered and buckled old brown suitcase gaping at the seams, and a supermarket shopping trolley containing—I assumed—her possessions. There were bits of cardboard, plastic bags full of god knows what, empty bottles, a plastic duck (of all things) and, bizarrely, a stack of crumpled paper napkins printed with the words “Mikonos Cafe. The taste of the Aegean”.

She could have been anywhere between thirty and fifty. Hard to tell really. She had the gaunt and haunted look—the blotchy skin and premature aging—of an habitual methamphetamine user. Her clothing was old, tattered and none too clean. Her hair was long and greasy and had not been combed or brushed or washed for many a month (year?). Every time I saw her, which was twice a day in the working week, she had bright red lipstick smeared inexpertly and rather gruesomely on her lips and around them too.

Of course, then as now there were plenty of dirty and damaged people on the streets of the City: runaway kids, junkies, alcoholics, whores, mentally ill (“differently-abled”) (!) people: all the usual dross and detritus of a culture in terminal decline.

But this particular piece of filthy, unwashed, unwanted trash was somehow different from the others. There was something about her that caught my eye and mind.

In the same spot—morning noon and night, rain sleet or snow, weekday or weekend—she would be standing there, a wistful smile on her red-smeared lips, looking at the people passing through the ticket barriers as if she were waiting for someone. She reminded me of all those stories about faithful dogs patiently waiting for long dead masters to return.

I wasn’t obsessive about it, but somehow I couldn’t get her image out of my mind. Who or what was she waiting for? I constructed a few peculiar scenarios around that question I can tell you.

And then I had the dream, the first time but by no means the last.

…I’m travelling through a labyrinth of twisting alleys, streets leading nowhere, tightly packed buildings blocking the view in all directions. I say “travelling” because I can’t see myself in the dream, and I don’t know how I’m getting around.

I see a young girl--somewhere in her teens, brown hair pulled into a long ponytail, complexion a little spotty but otherwise quite attractive--walking through the maze of streets. Wearing jeans and a t-shirt, she is pushing a supermarket trolley full of assorted rubbish: plastic bags, empty bottles, balls of old string, pieces of cardboard, and a pile of crumpled paper napkins printed with the words, “Mikonos Cafe. The taste of the Aegean”.

The girl reminds me very much of the woman who waits at Central every day. In fact, in my dream I know the girl is the younger self of the older woman.

Alongside the girl is a companion, her boyfriend I suppose—a young man, early twenties, of aboriginal descent. He is tall and thin, with dark curly hair, wearing jeans and t-shirt. He has one arm draped possessively around the shoulders of the girl. The dynamic between them is similar to that between Micky and Mallory in Natural Born Killers. The couple in my dream do not have the arrogance and aggression of Micky and Mallory, but they do have the same “us-against-the-world” feeling about them. I sense they are in retreat behind the walls of a pathological relationship that excludes the rest of the world.

I still don’t know where I am in the dream, where my vantage point is. But wherever it is, I can see the both of them. I see they are in love, and I see a dark shadow of fear, guilt and shame hanging over them.

They turn into a street that I recognise, Main Street, in Jacksonville, one of the outer west suburbs. The population of Jacksonville is mainly low to middle income, and with a high proportion of people of Greek birth and/or descent.

Outside the Mikonos Cafe, the young couple stop. From their gestures it seems they are arguing about whether to go inside the Mikonos or not. At that moment I hear the low growl of a powerful motorcar. A long black limousine pulls up with a screech of brakes—my father’s car! The back passenger door opens and a small man—my father—wearing an impeccably tailored black suit and an impeccably coiffed black moustache, gets out of the car and approaches the couple.

A loud and angry argument develops, but I can’t make out the words clearly.

Suddenly my father grabs one of the plastic bags from the shopping trolley. The young girl screams and claws my father in the face with her long fingernails, drawing blood. He breaks free, turns and runs to the limousine clutching the plastic bag under one arm. The door opens for him. He gets in, the door shuts, and the car pulls away at high speed.

The girl continues to scream, except that it is now more of a wail of despair. She gestures inconsolably in the direction of the departing limousine.

And her companion, her boyfriend, is now inexplicably astride a motorcycle in pursuit of the limousine.

“Meet me at Central,” he shouts over his shoulder, “Platform 6!”

“OK” she yells back, “what time?” But he is already out of sight. The deep growly vibrations of the motorcycle get fainter and fainter.

...and that’s the dream I had, repeatedly, must have been at least twenty, thirty times or more, over about three or four months. It wasn’t exactly the same dream every time, identical in every respect. But by and large the overall pattern was repeated over and over again: The couple pushing the trolley up Main Street. The pause on the sidewalk outside the Mikonos Café. The argument about whether to go in or not. The arrival of the limousine. My father grabbing something from the trolley. The girl clawing my father’s face. The boyfriend getting on the motorcycle and chasing after the limousine. Yelling over his shoulder for her to meet him at Central.

At first the dream didn’t bother me. I found it interesting that at least once a week I would dream a dream about a woman’s younger self, and every weekday, on my way to and from the office, see the woman in her older self, with garish lipstick, waiting just beyond the ticket barrier of platform 6 at Central.

Oneirology, the study of dreams, can throw light on those dark depths below conscious knowledge where many a fearsome creature lurks.

In my dream, for example, the young girl clawing my father’s face is a transformation of something that happened in the real world to my father. During the war he had stepped on an enemy landmine and received a blast of hot shrapnel leaving him blind in one eye and badly scarred on his left cheek.

But why would my dreaming mind create an alternate explanation (the girl clawing his face) for my father’s injuries? And what did that alternate explanation mean, in real terms (whatever those are)?

At first, as I said, I found the whole thing quite interesting, in a perverse sort of way. But when I realised that this was a dream that was not going to go away, I became more and more determined to understand why the dream was recurring, and what, if anything, was the connection between the events of the dream and the woman waiting at Central Station.

Over a quiet beer in a noisy pub, I told my brother Dennis the whole story.

"Go and speak to her, if it bothers you that much," he advised, "ask her who she's waiting for. In fact, ask her out to dinner! Woof! Woof!".

He's always been the wiseguy, has Dennis, and I've always been the one that takes everything seriously. You couldn't find two brothers more different from each other, not so much in looks but in temperament. I'm a tall, quiet introvert. He's a short, down-to-earth realist. I normally take his advice on most things.

Which is exactly what I did, the following Monday morning. I left home 30 minutes earlier than usual, alighted from the train at Central shortly after seven, punched my ticket at the barrier, and walked over to where she was standing, in her usual spot.

At first she seemed excited to see me, but her attention soon refocused on the stream of people emerging from the ticket barriers.

“Excuse me," I said, "I’m sorry to bother you, but can we talk for a minute?”

She did not respond to the question. She continued scanning the faces of the people going through the ticket barriers.

“Are you waiting for someone?”

“My Jack," she replied, a loving tone in her voice, "Jack’ll bring my baby back, you’ll see,” she replied.

“Where is Jack? Where can I find him?”

“Jack will come soon, you’ll see. Been waiting, jus' like he tole me.”

“Where is Jack? Can I help you find him? Can I call him for you?”

“Jack will be here soon,” she said, “I’m waiting jus’ like he aksed, you’ll see.”

“Why don’t you write down Jack’s number for me, on this piece of paper, or his address? And I can go and find him for you.”

At the sight of the paper she became very agitated.

“No! No! You can’t take him! Mine! I want him! Mine!”

“OK, OK, sorry to bother you,” I said, not wanting to be part of any theatrics, and I beat a hasty retreat. As I left a took a few quick photographs of her on my mobile.

A few days later, after work I took a cab to the Mikonos Cafe in Main Street, Jacksonville. Got there at around seven. The Mikonos was clearly not a popular dining spot; only two of the twelve or so tables were occupied. The waitress was a woman getting on in years, wearing a white apron over an old-fashioned full length black dress, her grey hair whirled up into a tight bun on the top of her head. She had a kindly face, smiled at me as I walked over to the counter at the back.

Behind the counter was a bald-headed man, possibly around sixty or so, with a very cold eye. He was wiping the counter with a grubby looking tea towel. He may have been getting on in years, but he was still a person with whom I would not want to tangle in a dark alley. With his powerful shoulders, three-day grey stubble and broken nose he looked like a retired boxer gone to seed.

This impression was reinforced by the framed posters, hanging on the wall, of ancient Greek urns featuring scenes from the ancient Olympic Games, in particular, the Pankration.

“Excuse me sir, can I please have a moment of your time?” I adopted my most courteous, humblest tone.

“Very busy! You no eat? You leave,” he said gruffly.

“OK, no problem,” I said, “I don’t want anything to eat but I’ll pay for your time”.

I put a fifty dollar note down on the counter. He looked at me for a long second, then reached out and took the money.

“What you want?”

“Well, you see,” I said, starting to tell the story but then realising how silly it would all sound. How could I ask anyone, let alone a bad-tempered Greek man I'd never met before, about a girl I see in my dreams? Who may or may not have come into his restaurant, with her boyfriend, many years ago?”

How ridiculous it would all sound. So I took out my mobile, and showed him the photographs of the woman at Central.

“Do you know this woman,” I asked.

He said nothing but I was sure his eyes flashed in recognition.

“A customer maybe, with a young man, her boyfriend, named Jack?”

“No, not see! You listen good now!”

The tone of his voice was getting surlier by the second. On the other hand, I was getting more and more irritated. I felt I was not getting very much value for my fifty dollars. So I tried to make my voice even more humble and respectful.

“A neighbour maybe? Someone who worked here? Your daughter maybe?”

“No daughter! You go now pliss!”

His expression changed from surly and taciturn to hostile and aggressive. He came out from behind the counter with a rather large steel wrench in his hand. It was time for me to go. I exited the Cafe and walked up to the next cross street.

I stood there waiting for a cab, my mind processing the events inside the Mikonos. After about five minutes a soft voice interrupted my revery. Standing behind me was the old woman, the waitress from the Mikonos. She seemed very nervous. She didn't speak but instead pointed to my mobile.

I flipped it open and showed her the photos of the woman at Central.

Her eyes lit up, an expression of excitement crossed her face. She nodded vigorously and was about to say something when we both noticed the surly old man—presumably her husband—approaching with an extremely unfriendly look on his unshaven face. He gestured angrily toward the Cafe, as if to say, “get back to work!” and the old lady obeyed. But as she turned to walk back to the Cafe, she whispered something to me that sounded like “Saturday”.

Let it go, I told myself, on the way back to the office, it’s not your concern. But as usual I failed to heed my own advice. Instead, I made a mental note to revisit the Mikonos that coming Saturday.

The rest of the week went by at a maddeningly slow pace. I couldn’t focus on my work, couldn’t think about anything other than the strange events into which I had inserted myself.

Anyway, at three thirty that Saturday I arrived at the Mikonos Cafe, keeping a wary eye out for the proprietor. Thankfully, there was no sign of him. Nor was there anyone else in the Cafe, just the kindly old lady. She nodded when she saw me, walked to the entrance, closed the door and turned the sign over to read “closed” from outside.

She gestured for me to take a seat at one of the tables. I was intrigued to see that on each table was a metal dispenser holding a wad of paper napkins identical to those in my dream (“The taste of the Aegean”) and identical to those stuffed into the trolley of the homeless woman at Central.

The old lady’s English was not great, but with some effort and a lot of gesturing, and writing or drawing on the napkins, we understood each other.

It’s hard for me to talk about this without getting all choked up with emotion, so if you don't mind I'm just going to give you the bare facts.

What the old lady told me was that the woman at Central, the one whose image was stored on my mobile, was indeed her daughter.

In her rebellious early teen years, the daughter had gotten herself pregnant, much to the dismay of her parents, who were very religious, and quite prominent in the Orthodox Church and the local diasporic Greek community. The parents had insisted that the daughter put the baby up for adoption. But the daughter had run away with her boyfriend, Jack, taking the baby with her.

The father, the old lady’s husband, had reacted in typical old-school patriarchal style (“I have no daughter! She has dishonoured us! She has brought shame to our family and our community!”)

I told the old lady that I knew where her daughter could be found (outside the ticket barriers at Platform 6, Central Station) but she just shook her head sadly, and turned her face away from me. I could hear the quiet desperate sobbing, and wondered what if anything I could do to help. After a couple of minutes she turned around to face me, and dabbing her eyes with a lace handkerchief, explained that her husband would not permit any contact with their daughter. It had been many years since she had run away. But in all that time, the father had made no effort to find her, and had forbidden his wife--threatened her with physical violence--from doing so.

I offered to take a message to the daughter. At first the old lady refused. She was too respecting of or fearful of her husband and the laws he had laid down. Finally, though, she did write a note, in Greek, on a piece of notepaper, placed it in an envelope, sealed the envelope, wrote “Christina” on the front, and gave it to me. I nodded and promised her I would deliver the note within one or two days.

She smiled sadly, stood up to indicate our meeting was at an end, walked over to the entrance and turned the sign around to read “open” from the perspective of people on the pavement. Before I left, she kissed me on both cheeks in turn. (I had to bend forward for her to reach me).

The next day, at lunchtime, I walked over to Central. She (the daughter named Christina) was standing there, as ever, in her usual spot.

What happened next pretty much followed the pattern of the previous meeting.

“Hello Christina,” I said. She seemed excited to see me.

“I’m sorry to bother you,” I said, “but I have something for you. A letter, from your mother.”

Christina gave no immediate response. Instead she continued looking over my shoulder at the people going through the ticket barriers.

And then she said, “My Jack he's coming, you’ll see”.

“Your mother loves you very much,” I said retrieving the letter from my inside coat pocket, and offering it to her.

I say “offering” because I did not succeed in handing it to her. As soon as she saw the envelope, she became very agitated.

“No! No! Don't wanna! Go way! My Jack is comin' soon, you watch out!”

People were starting to stop and stare at us. She still refused to take the envelope, so I dropped it on the floor at her feet, said “your mother loves you very much," and walked away.

That night I met my father at his club for our weekly dinner and catch-up, but I wasn’t very good company. My brother Dennis would normally have been there, but he was away on business in Indonesia. I sat there, picking distractedly at my food, not saying very much.

“What’s the matter?” my father asked, “you seem preoccupied”.

“Oh it’s nothing really,” I responded, “just a strange dream I’ve been having.”

“Want to talk about it?”

“No Dad, it’s fine, really. Been frantic at work and I’m a little tired, that’s all.”

Naturally he picked up on the one lie (“strange dream”) contradicting the other (“frantic at work”) and flashed me a cynical smile to let me know he had seen through my equivocation.

We finished our meal. He paid the bill and we left the Club. Nudging our way through the thronging tourists, we walked down to George Street.

“Nightcap, or can I drop you off?”

“No thanks Dad, I’ll get a cab,” I replied, but then changed my mind and said, “actually, that nightcap sounds good, but only if you have some of that Germain-Robin cognac left.”

“For you, Danny boy, anything,” he replied.

The black limousine appeared and we got in. Jethro was behind the wheel as always. Jethro was my father’s chauffeur—loyal retainer one might say.

We arrived at my parents’ house, and went inside. Jethro parked the car and retired to his room in the servants’ quarters.

Although I say “my parents’ house”, it was really my father’s house. After my mother's death (shortly after my second birthday) my father had continued to reside in the gigantic old mansion, for sentimental reasons I suppose. Dennis and I had moved out as soon as we were able to support ourselves.

We made ourselves comfortable in the so-called “smoking room”, which featured a lot of leather, wood panelling, antique swords and fox-hunting prints hanging on the wall, drinks cabinet, cigar humidifier and similar accoutrements.

“So, tell me about this dream of yours,” said my father, pouring the cognac.

“Not much to tell, really,” I said, not intending to broach the subject until I had at least three cognacs under my belt. “Let me settle in first, if you don’t mind.”

“Sure, no problem,” he said, “you brought up the subject originally, so you get to decide when to continue. How about a game of chess in the meantime?”

After fifteen moves, I could see the end was near for me so I tipped my king over to resign the game. He may have been well into his sixties but his mind was clearly still as sharp as ever. After I’d allowed him the murderous pin on the knight at F3, the rest had been no more than a mopping up operation.

By this time I was well into my second cognac—time to start talking turkey, as they say.

“About this dream,” I said hesitantly, “Actually it’s at the point now where it’s more than just the dream.” I took a sip of cognac before continuing.

“Go on,” he said, “sounds serious.”

“But before I get into that, I’ve been meaning to ask you about the whole eye-thing: you did get that in the war, right?”

“Well yes, Dan, of course,” he replied. “You know the story, I’ve told you often enough. The big old land mine: Boom! Poof! Ouch! You’ve seen the photos...”

“I’m sorry Dad,” I said hesitantly, “but they only show you in uniform, there aren’t any that show the injury. I’m not doubting you, just pointing out the photos don’t mean anything.”

I couldn’t help but notice the little flicker of doubt that momentarily replaced his normally confident, even arrogant, expression.

“What’s this all about, Dan? Spit it out, there’s nothing you and I can’t talk about. I’ve always been honest and open with you.”

“Are you sure about that?” I asked softly. I was finding the conversation very difficult. I loved my father dearly, and did not want to cause him any pain. I’ve always been a person with a strong need to be liked, and a strong aversion to conflict of any sort.

I gulped down the rest of my cognac, placed the glass down on the side table, took a deep breath and spilled the beans, the whole beans and nothing but the beans.

I’m not going to go into detail about his reaction, firstly for reasons of privacy, and secondly, because I want to get to the punch line quickly now.

But I will say that he took it very badly. As he listened to me, he seemed to shrink within himself, seemed to become ...diminished, as a person, seemed to age ten years in the time it took me to tell him about the dream and everything else. Nor did I leave out any part of it. I told him everything: the dream, the Mikonos Cafe, the woman at Central, everything.

He has never been a man to allow his emotions to show in his face. Emotionally very unintelligent, you might say. But that night his guard was down, the mask slipped, and I saw the real person for the first time. The tears coursed down his cheeks as he listened to me, but still he clung to that last vestige of reserve: he would not allow himself to utter a sound. Not a cry or a sob or a sigh.

And when I had finished, he stood up, dabbed his face with his handkerchief, poured two stiff cognacs, and then told me his side of the story.

Before Dennis or I had been born, my parents had struggled for a number of years to conceive a child. Ultimately, they decided to adopt. After making extensive enquiries, via formal and informal channels, they became aware of a potential candidate: a young Greek girl by the name of Christina who was well into her third trimester. After a number of meetings with Christina and her parents, as well as with the relevant agencies, agreement was reached, paperwork done, all the relevant documents signed. (The father of the child—strictly speaking, the “inseminator”, given his low level of interest in the whole thing--a young man in his early twenties, was not involved in the discussions. He could or would not be found.)

After the birth, however, things did not go according to plan. Christina changed her mind about the adoption. She became determined to ‘keep’ the baby. Her parents, especially her father, did not respond well to the change of plan. Christina left home, or was forced to leave, and took to the streets.

“The rest, you know,” said my father sitting crumpled and small in his leather armchair, unable to meet my eye. His hands were shaking as he took another sip of cognac.

“But what about the boyfriend, Jack, on the motorbike,” I asked, deeply affected by what I’d heard, but determined to get the full story.

My father grimaced, clearly reluctant to continue. But he took a deep breath and spilled the rest.

The young man on the motorcycle did catch up with my father’s limousine. Angry words were exchanged, about the adoption and about Christina’s unwillingness to keep to the agreement. But in the end my father did what he does so well—he bought him off, the young man I mean. Gave him a large (relatively speaking) sum of cash.

“I don’t know for certain,” said my father, voice thick with emotion, “but from what you’ve told me, Jack didn't turn up to meet Christina at Central, that day or any other day. He was probably too ashamed of himself, that he valued money more than he valued his lover and their child.”

That’s rich, coming from you, I thought to myself.

Despite the revelations my father had reluctantly made up to that point, I sensed there was still more to be revealed, still some loose ends to be tied up.

“What happened then? You’ve got to finish, now that you’ve started,” I said, wishing I’d never raised the subject in the first place.

“Well, if you must know,” replied my father, “he’s been asking me for money ever since.”

“Blackmailing you?”

“It could be described as such, by some,” he replied.

And then I had one of my bright ideas—to reunite Christina and her long lost lover. So that she need no longer wait faithfully at Central for someone who was never going to turn up. And I could stop thinking and dreaming about the whole sorry saga.

“Do you know where he is, this Jack, the boyfriend? Where to find him?”

"Yes, I think so," replied my father, "but first, I want your word to keep this all completely confidential. No-one must ever know what I've told you tonight, not even Dennis, no-one." I gave him the required reassurance.

It took a few days, and some discreet enquiries. But find him, we did. The young man I mean, Jack. Except that he was no longer young. Nor in particularly good shape. We found him at the All Saints Shelter, an institution run by the Church as a refuge for the homeless. He absolutely reeked of cheap booze, sweat and mould. My father and I gagged continuously throughout the conversation.

Jack was initially very reluctant to come with us and meet Christina, but some money and the promise of more soon persuaded him. We all got into the car, and off we went, Jethro at the wheel as usual.

We arrived at Central and made our way toward the ticket barriers at platform 6. I had no idea how Christina would respond to the arrival of the person for whom she had been waiting, so long and so faithfully. But I hoped it would go well. I was expecting it to go well. My good deed of the decade. To be honest, though, I had mixed feelings about the whole thing. Was this really the right thing to do?

When we got there, no Christina.

Just an upturned supermarket trolley, several police, and a pool of blood on the floor.

That night, the lead story on the news was “Murder Central: homeless woman bashed to death.”

About ten days later, the police announced they had taken a suspect into custody. I saw the whole thing on the TV news: Christina’s father, trying but failing to conceal his identity as he was bundled into the back of the police van. Standing on the sidewalk outside the Mikonos Cafe was the old lady, looking as if her heart was broken. Which no doubt it was. As was mine.

Yes, I may not have done the actual deed itself, but I was the cause—the efficient cause--one might say. Clearly, it had been my conversation with the old lady about where to find her long lost daughter that had set in motion the chain of events leading to Christina’s death.

I have been unable to come to terms with my role in the tragedy, to find a way to live with myself. In fact, with apologies for inappropriate flippancy, these days I’m not living with myself, I'm living in my father’s house.

Oh, one last thing. A couple of days after Christina’s death, I remembered the question I had meant to ask before, but never did. We were in the “smoking room”, drinking cognac. I turned to my father, and said, “What did you take from the shopping trolley? Was it the baby? Whatever happened to the baby?”

“You still don’t get it, do you,” he said softly, sorrowfully. “You’re the baby, Daniel, you’re the baby.”

Copyright © S R Schwarz 2007. All rights reserved.

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