Tiny IV

Something incredible happens when you've finished using the toilet. You wipe your ass, get up, flush, wash your hands and go on your merry way. You don't look back at the toilet and regret losing the refuse to the dark lonely pit of the septic tank. No! You move on with your life and never give that turd a second thought!

 

That was kind of what happened next. Or, rather would have happened next if mother had chosen a more reasonable dwelling in which to relocate. Yes, we moved from the apartment to a rent house that was two numbers down from where my erstwhile husband lived. Well, yay.

 

Now he gets to see my love life in full blossom, all the cars that come and go and how popular I have become since getting away from his sorry behind. This was the perfect setup, if I hated him. That was the problem, no matter what a lush he was or a sorry step-father, or a useless husband, I still couldn't 100% hate the man. I guess the fact that I didn't hate him is probably what kept me from setting some of the unwashed rednecks I knew to whipping his ass good and proper.

 

Bah. There was time for ass whippings! Right now, it was time to live.

 

Getting married at 17 years old really doesn't allow a person to have much knowledge of the world, you know? I'll be the first one to admit that I didn't know shit. I knew less than my teen-aged sister about life in general and had lived through two sadly failed marriages already. I had never "dated" as an adult. I had simply fallen into the auspices of marriage all too quickly and forgotten what it was like to just "have fun" and not worry so much about being in a relationship with someone. Bullshit, I was geared for relationships. I was geared to want the family unit. I wanted Ozzie & Harriet.

 

Needless to say, I never got it.

 

So, having said all that, let me get back to what was going on down Ironton Cut-Off in the early 90's.

 

Mom worked as the accountant and Jack-of-All at a hauling and excavation company which was situated squarely between our new rent house and my husband. My husband had started doing some pretty radical partying and had invited Morticia (the extremely tall, thin, pasty girl who worked with him (when he worked) at the gas station) over to play too. Somehow in the process of getting even with me for leaving him on his knees crying on the Phillips 66 parking lot on Geyer Springs and this moment, he had gotten past loving me, and prepared himself to move forward with life. At least that was the image he was putting out there.

 

Morticia and Gomez - that's what my friends and I affectionately dubbed Rosie and Mark. They were an odd couple indeed, him at 5'7" and her at about 6'0". He had the strangest taste in women.

 

I, on the other hand, was busy scheming to keep Tiny interested in me. That was difficult indeed considering that he was madly in love with his best friend's sister. Now, during all this, Sherry had gotten pregnant and given birth. She assured Tiny that the baby was his, but we all knew that she hadn't exactly been faithful to her husband, Tiny or the other two or three guys she was banging without protection. Real gem of a gal right there, that Sherry. So, she's had this child and Tiny wants so much for it to be his that he's willing to give up his life for it. God love him. I wish I had known then what I know now - I would have told him to shove off! LOL

 

Well, Dwayne came by to party with me (that'd be the husband's best friend) and his friends came to my house (with Mark just two houses down) and you can imagine some of the fights that broke out in the front lawn. I think my wedding band got caught up in one of those. I just don't remember. I guess it wasn't that important.

 

My sister was the instigator of many a party at mom's place when mom would head off to Hot Springs for a weekend. Yeah, she was a real socialite, my sister, and somehow the parties all seemed to gravitate around me once they got started. Oh I suppose I was the oldest female there, and something about my age intrigued these younger fellas, the ones that were there to see my sister originally. They would come in with the best of intentions, and before the night was over they'd either be drunk, drunk and stoned, or just stoned and all sitting on the sofa staring at me, hanging off my every word.

 

I can't tell you how long that hero-worship went on, but it seemed like forever (much to my sister's chagrin). She and her best buddy invited everyone and their dog to our "parties", but when they would show, if I didn't leave almost immediately or lock myself in my bedroom, they got no action. Fortunately for them, I grew more and more cognizant of what was happening with these post-pubescent sexually frustrated boys, and I began to make myself a bit more scarce…and hooking up with Troy.

 

Ah, yes, Troy. Where was Tiny in all this? Oh, he came and went. I mean he was there sometimes but most of the time he was up Sherry's ass, which was okay. I had my plate full messing with the husband and the parade of suitors who showed up unannounced at my mother's back door.

 

Troy was very tall, very thin, very tan, and very strange. I like the strange ones. Not crazy about the thin part, but strange yes. Makes things interesting, don't you agree? Troy was cute in his own way I guess, he had these dark brown basset hound eyes that you could sink into and stay forever, like a waterbed or a real comfortable chair. Troy was a little kinky too, not my bailiwick by any means, but still fun to play with. I remember this one time, when all the teen-agers were at play in the rest of the house, and Troy and I slunk off to the bedroom for some "adult time".

 

There was a partition between the living room and my bedroom that was more or less like louvered closet doors. If you tugged hard enough at one of the louvers or peered through the cracks, there was no privacy at all. So, the collection of idiots gathered outside the partition and giggled at the noises emerging from my bedroom. Lord only knows what they saw, but they were all blushing when we came out, all disheveled and grinning. I didn't get mad. It wasn't a big deal. Not like we hadn't done the same thing to each of them at one time or another. Hell, we still make fun of one of them to this day, 16 years later, for her use of the vowel sounds during coitus. Remember that, girl? LOL I know you're reading this.

 

On a more personal note, there were times during this period of my life that I genuinely wanted to kill someone. There were points that I thought I had it in me to hurt people. I would become so angry so quickly over the dumbest thing in the world, and then I'd wake up and realize that it really wasn't worth raising my blood pressure.

 

At some point, I grew weary of Troy. He wouldn't work. Well, that's not what I wanted from him anyway! I didn't want him to take care of me, hell I made enough money to take care of myself, I didn't know what I wanted but it sure wasn't him. So, I took the passive aggressive route and dropped his personal effects off at his uncle's house in North Little Rock and stood explaining to the uncle why Troy and I would not work out.

 

While standing there, this man walks past. He had the haircut of the day, the Billy Ray Cyrus mullet. We couldn't help but stare though because he was so cute, and was wearing spandex walking shorts. Yeah, he was wearing spandex and he was still cute.

 

Before the night was over, that handsome young man was sitting in my living room back at mom's house and we were talking about "hooking up".

 

Tony was great. He was cute, employed, didn't use drugs, employed, he drank quite a bit, but he was employed and he was cute. He was lousy in the sack though. Good grief was he ever. I mean he couldn't do anything right. He was all thumbs in that department. Now outside the bedroom he was a fabulous partner to me. We agreed on most everything and we could talk for hours on end, but that sex thing was ridiculous after a while.

 

Come to find out he was banging another girl behind my back. Who knew? I mean seriously, he went to work and came home, I had no idea that he spent his lunch breaks with this girl. LOL Did I care? Well, somewhat. We had found a little trailer over on Mobile drive and had moved out of Mom's. He left his little house in North Little Rock in lieu of living with me somewhere, so I know at some point he did actually care about me. I'm just not sure why we had the problem sexually. Some folks just don't click like that, I suppose.

 

So, there's where Tiny comes in. Just as Tony was wearing on my last good heterosexual nerve, Tiny squirms back into the picture. Nope, he wasn't the reason that Tony and I split up - that was David.

 

Oh my God, David.

 

If I ever met my match it was David. He was cute, but not gorgeous, sexy but not a sex-pot, affectionate but not smothering. He had been wooing me from afar since the first week I dated Tony. I just wouldn't mess with him because, well, I am fairly faithful (when I'm having a good time I guess). David was Tiny's "brother", or at least they called themselves brothers (whey they weren't fighting over a girl). David and I had everything in common, except his drinking, and of course I have to find flaws in everyone. I can't simply overlook something I don't like, oh hell no, I have to pick and bitch until I drive someone crazy.

 

Yeah, Dave liked to drink, but he was a funny drunk anyway. I just still had some latent issues with alcohol that were basically linked to the ex-husband (the divorce still wasn't final and it had been over a year since we split - he and Rosie had a child at this point). David was passionate and really knew how to make a woman feel like a woman behind closed doors. He was attentive and loving, gentle and kind, faithful and loyal. Great husband material, right? He even took out the trash. Now, getting him to keep a job was a horse of a different color.

 

Yep, for all the fun that David and I had, he still wasn't mature enough to hold down a job. That was always very important to me. I'm not sure why it was so important, I guess that gene or organ that I have that instructs me to marry, settle down and have a family requires that my partner be gainfully employed too. I'm going to have that organ removed one day.

 

So, David and I were living in the house that Tony and I had rented. House….I mean, er, uh, trailer. Yeah, it was a real trailer, not even qualified as a mobile home. I liked it, but seriously it was a trailer. Ok, so David's "brother" comes by for a visit and seeing how happy we are he starts showing his ass.

 

There's Tiny, the one I'm really in love with, flaunting his gorgeous body right in front of me, talking about how much he missed me, and I'm trying for all I'm worth to stay strong. I mean, it wasn't just your average Joe, it was the man of my dreams (nightmares) and he was right there in my home, begging me to love him - begging me to want him again, apologizing for hurting me and swearing off that hateful bitch Sherry for all time.

 

Well, who can resist that? When the object of your affection is begging you, it's just darned near impossible to say no. Hell, David and I weren't married and he drank all the time and he didn't work for a living. Sure he was funny and kept me in stitches and he was good in the sack, but shit - this is Tiny we're talking about.

 

So, I picked a fight - as is the norm, and David ended up leaving for Colorado. He just could not stay in Arkansas and watch me set up housekeep with Tiny. Something about that sickened him. If I had realized that then I might've thought differently about the whole situation. David really did love me, Tiny was just using me for a place to live that was cleaner than Sweet Home. Ok, that was harsh, he actually did love me in his own unique way, but not enough. No, sir. Not nearly enough.

 

The trailer was home to many parties including my sister's "sweet 16". I wasn't opposed at the time to providing a full sheet birthday cake and alcohol for the Halloween party of 1992. Nope that was all great fun and the next morning there were bodies strewn all over the house…that was also the night I realized that Tiny was taking my car and sneaking over to see Sherry. That is also when he got the proverbial boot!

 

My next misadventures brought me to (and through) the Carl era (please let's not relive that) which seemed to go on forever and then back to Tiny again (no I never learn). Oh he had sworn her off once more, seeing that I was happy with someone else, and he wanted to marry me. So he told his family that we were married. We went to see them, Christmas 1992, as husband and wife - more to gauge their reaction than anything else. I think I have pictures of that somewhere. I'll have to look. If I do, I'll add them to this blog later.

 

I was so happy. Yes, dammit, I was truly happy. Down deep inside somewhere I really had a feeling of accomplishment, having won the day over the nefarious Sherry. He was mine, claiming to be my husband and all that. Yes, I had won and was victorious, and so I felt through the spring of 1993. Until, of course, Schalena burst my bubble right after Mother's day when she told me that she had been sleeping with Tiny and so had Sherry, behind my back, and gave me details.

 

Oh was I ever shocked. I really had hoped he had changed. Our lives had become so intertwined at this point, having gone through all of these things and jumped all these hurdles, and now to find out that it had all been a lie. Sure I hit him. I knocked the shit out of him. Hit him so hard the chair he was sitting in slid halfway across the kitchen. He said "I deserved that".

 

Meanwhile, across town, Sherry was living with my best friend. They had been holed up over there for months. Keep in mind, my best friend was a girl. Yep, Sherry was playing all fields now, wide open. This story is not about her, I could write volumes about her, literally, no, I digress.

 

Tiny and I had experienced the most magical moments sexually that I had ever seen to this point. He was a most incredible lover and knew just exactly where to scratch my itch. We could lay in bed and talk for hours, we went horseback riding, we went swimming, we just did everything normal couples do when they're happy and secure. It just seemed so impossible that he might be having several affairs behind my back…but he was. The truth was out. He had to go.

 

I pitched him out once more, and once more my life caught up with me. My contract terminated with the company for whom I had been doing some quality work, and it was time for me to go back on unemployment and just kind of fart around for a while. I still had enough money to get by, but things just kind of fell apart when Tiny left that last time.

 

I quit caring about things. I let my car go back and bought another one. I left the trailer and moved in with some friends. I even let my son go live with his father (shock and amazement). There wasn't a thing about my life that I didn't change. Finally I went back to work for the local hospital, something for which I had always shown a great deal of aptitude, and settled back into a life.

 

Life. Yes, it was my life - constantly changing, like the temperature, and every person affected my life like the tide affects the grains of sand on a beach. You don't realize how much people influence your world until you look back. Hindsight is always 20/20. I just wish these things hadn't had such an emotional impact on me.

 

I found a place to live with an old high school buddy, and though I wasn't truly dating anyone, Carl came back into the picture, as did Sean. Now these relationships weren't the kind that are meant to last. Actually, none of my relationships during this era were substantial enough to last. I wish I had known then what I know now. God I wish I could redo that life.

 

Well, I can't, so on with the story.

 

While living at Mikey's trailer, I had become acquainted with a gentleman over the internet. Yeah, this was back in 1992 when folks didn't do that type of thing. Ok, being the person I am, I was not afraid to meet someone in the dark of night on a commuter parking lot on Dixon Road. No sir. I just drove right on out there.

 

Meanwhile, as I pulled out of my driveway onto Honeysuckle, I passed a car heading toward my house. I got a really strange feeling as the car passed me, an eerie sort of foreboding, but I kept going, heading out to Arch Street and then on to Dixon. After a moment passed, I noticed that there were headlights behind me that seemed to be turning everywhere I turned, speeding up as I sped up and slowing as I slowed.

 

I've never really been given to paranoia, but it was starting to bother me. I jerked the car into the commuter lot and stopped abruptly after doing a 180 so I could face the folks that were following me. They stopped too and I could not see from the glare of their headlights. Just then I realized the car doors were opening and two people were stepping out. I had absolutely no fear. My date was sitting just a few cars away, eyeing the situation, not knowing what to make of it.

 

Then I heard that voice. That sound which haunted my dreams and plagued my waking thoughts. It was him, my beloved, the one I hated and loved at the same time - Tiny. Yes, he and his brother had been on their way out to Mikey's to try to catch up with me because he had some kind of revelation and wanted to reveal it to me right then. It could wait no longer. I stared at him in disbelief and had made my excuses to my pending date and came back to hear the rest of his tale.

 

Oh he was so sorry that he ever left me. Sherry was a whore and he hated her and never wanted to see her again. Sherry had been mean and abusive to him and he hated her and the only woman who had ever been kind to him was me. So his brother Gary is standing there nodding his head in agreement. "Yeah, Shannon, she has made his life miserable." He said, convincingly.

 

That night, Tiny went back to Mikey's with me and we collected a few things and drove to his mother's house where we made our announcement that we were getting married for real this time.

 

My divorce from Mark had been finalized during the summer when Tiny and I were split up. I was just getting used to the idea of not being Mark's estranged wife anymore when all this happened. Hell I'd only been divorced a few months!

 

I called my mother who was just devastated by the news. She knew what quality of trouble Tiny was and refused to allow it. She said that he wasn't welcomed in her home and I had to make my choice. Well, the next day Tiny and I were married. That was the day before Thanksgiving 1993.

 

I was finally married to Tiny. The love of my life and I were together at last and we were actually married. It wasn't a joke. It wasn't a lie. It wasn't a hallucination (though I wish now that it had been). We were married and I was happier than I'd ever been.

 

We moved into another trailer that was just a few miles from Mikey's place, but way out of town. Hell we weren't even in the same county. It was my hope that a fresh start would do both of us some good. If I had one eye and half sense I would have relocated to Hot Springs right then. I mean if I had any intention of keeping him….

 

The story continues.

 

Dawn, please feel free to remind me of parts you think would be interesting. It's been a long time since 1992 and I am getting old and the details somewhat scattered. We still haven't gotten to Main Street… LOL That's next.