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The Secret Shame
Indigo Media, LLC
Whenever Caroline spoke to her mother in a time of need, the memory of that awful event seventeen years past and hidden for so long was reopened, like an old wound. Sitting on a lonely little bench in Denver waiting for a bus, resolute in her grand plans for the future with her newly found companion of a bottle of vodka tucked into her sleek leather briefcase, bemoaning her lot but fortified by pride and stubbornness, refusing to give in or give up. Her mother had thrown her out of the house after a disastrous night of drinking, which had culminated in her noisily stumbling home in the early hours.
Her mother had greeted her at the foot of the stairs in pajamas, a pained expression of sorrow and disgust on her face, deaf to her apologies and protestations. Her words were sharp and biting and low, and progressed to shrill screams that climaxed with a hard slap across Caroline’s dazed face. Emboldened by the alcohol, she had angrily retaliated by slapping her back with a force that almost knocked her off balance but instead sent her reeling against the banister. All she remembered were her mother's parting words venomously spoken as she ascended the stairs, ordering her to leave by morning.
Her job had been eliminated and she had capped off her last day finding solace in the company of happy strangers at the Brown Palace Bar, fighting back the tears and her fears, not realizing how much alcohol she had consumed and not caring about anything but fear of the future and the pitiful state of her life. The night air was cold and it was very late and somehow she boarded a bus, but when the nausea welled she disembarked in the middle of nowhere and was sick for a long time on the side of an unknown road with little traffic and no streetlights to guide her. Relief turned to fear and loathing, and in her disoriented state, she started to walk. She had no idea where she was or how long it would take to find her mother's house. She couldn't remember the address and feared being robbed, or assaulted, or both.
A minivan pulled up alongside slowly as she stumbled along, and through the passenger window she saw the blurred but concerned faces of a woman and her daughter. She waved them off instinctively, embarrassed and afraid, but they kept up alongside, asking her through the now open window if she was lost and to get inside. She relented finally and climbed inside clumsily, sinking back in gloomy silence and anticipation, sensing their pity when she attempted to give them the address in a fog of inebriation. When they arrived at her mother's house the alcohol had reached its full effect, and she vaguely remembered thanking them and getting out of the vehicle in shame. After she closed the door, the car turned around and started up the hill and she stared after it for a time, wishing she could go with them, wishing she had never gone to the bar, wishing she had never come to Colorado, wishing she'd never been born.
Life in New York had sobered her up quickly, and a bright career had replaced the fear and emptiness alcohol had filled temporarily. She drank socially and had regained control and chalked it all up to youthful indiscretion and rebellion. Living in a man's world, surrounded by men growing up, surrounded by men in her career, she felt as strong and as capable and as able to handle alcohol as any of them, and looked back on her past bingeing dismissively. And then there was the time in South Florida after her first layoff just six years earlier that had triggered a wild binge, but it was her secret alone and too horrifying to recall. She was just grateful she had not been caught drinking and driving and had been shocked into the realization that maybe a third time would be her undoing, and there was never to be a third time.
Excerpted from "After the Fall: Trials and triumphs of an old soul," copyright 2009, Janet Van Rensburg.
Article submitted Thursday, December 24, 2009 & read 71 times.
Janet Van Rensburg has been in the publishing business for twenty years.During that time she has been a magazine publisher and editor, newspaper editor and special projects director, and television news editor.
Ms. Van Rensburg has written scripts for documentaries and is the author of many articles and editorials in trade and consumer magazines. She has just published her first nonfiction work; a memoir that is available on Amazon.com
She is the owner of Indigo Media, LLC, a specialty media services company providing literary, publishing, creative and marketing services based in Colorado. Janet was born in Zimbabwe, raised in South Africa and immigrated to the U.S. with her family when she was sixteen.
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