Absence, Presence, Both?

On a cold November night in 2005, a 19-year-old kid was constantly cheating on his pregnant, financially struggling 25-year-old girlfriend. They were a seemingly fine couple: both Colombian churchgoers who modeled what “young people” were supposed to act under the light of God and elders. They looked happy on the outside – respectful, had jobs and a baby coming soon, went to church every Sunday. They lived together in a small, cramped apartment in Queens with my grandmother. I looked at the old photographs of the apartment, it was painted an awful bright green color. Today, I could see scratches on the wall, revealing remnants of the old color. 

The pregnant woman was the primary provider for the entire household of three and a half: Herself, the boyfriend, her mom, and the baby coming soon. She wasn’t supposed to play the part, but she had to. 

They were months behind on rent, and she had no help. Her unborn son was hungry, but she was working two jobs, trying her best to feed everyone. One job at the bank and the other babysitting, serving only the richest around her, that had no idea what it was like to live like her, and hide the face of hunger that she had no money to feed into. 

That 19-year-old, 6’5, slowly balding Colombian had a job at a Men’s Warehouse selling suits, but refused to pay rent even though he lived at the apartment. 

Their foundation as a couple slowly unraveled, fell apart, and then came the big fight. But that big fight is where the story ends, where she can’t bear to continue. She dwells on that part of her life, but can’t continue on. She shuts down. I had to fill in the blanks in the historical timeline of my life, making my best guesses, but shortly after, in cold January, at Mount Sinai, that young woman became my mom.

Now, I’m 17, laying in an unfamiliar bed, with shorts and a beater on. It’s hot outside and humid inside. Even though the air conditioner is blowing at a million miles an hour, you could almost pull the dew drops out of the air. Brian is asleep, but I am wired. We came back from Yankee Stadium, celebrating a win, holding up a “fire Cashman” sign. Life is a gift for me, a day when I can escape New Jersey.

Brian’s legs are fully stretched out in bed – body wrapped in a blanket, and his face laying on his arms, sleeping like a baby. The house is old and loud. His family planned on doing serious renovations, but that hasn’t really worked out for them. 

You can hear every footstep, every whisper, every movement, and the floorboards creak like a war siren. I had to pee, really bad, but I couldn’t. I felt frozen, and I didn’t want to move. 

His parents were going through a nasty divorce. I knew his mom well. Knowing me, she asked me questions about what it was like to live with a single mother. She was so worried about her four-year-old son, a handsome kid, who I know is going to be a player, with his light brown skin and slowly growing Afro.

They’re fighting, and it’s loud. I hear yells, screams, both in English and Spanish. I could hear shuffling in the room, things falling all over, and at one point, I closed my eyes, shut them tight. I wanted to rush in, stop them, stop the screaming and the fighting, but I couldn’t. I was too scared, and, at that moment in time, I was frozen. 

I opened my eyes, staring at Brian, still sound asleep, who never wakes up to hear or witness any of this. If at this point in his life, he just slept through it, I wonder how many nights of fear and exhaustion he must have gone through to be able to sleep through this.

I still had to pee really bad. The screaming was now as loud as ever.

Elementary school was always hard for me: Thanksgiving, Christmas, Fathers” Day, all days we were supposed to make cards for “Mom and Dad.” Those were days that were a reminder that something was wrong. That was my first instance of social awareness. Six-year-old me then knew I was different. I would always put my head down for those card-making sessions, because I had no dad to make one for. 

Growing up in middle school, there was nobody to really help teach me how to dress. My fits were wack because my mom didn’t know how to dress a guy. My shoes were from Payless and Mo’s Sporting Goods, because she didn’t understand sneaker culture between men, and said that my kicks worked fine. I had to present a serious business pitch to get my first pair of Jays.

My mom liked weird old music and books. I wanted to go out and play. Anytime I tried though, I was immediately kicked off of any sports court because everyone's dads taught them how to play, and no one would teach me. Don’t even get me started with the other basics, like fishing, plumbing, tools, building furniture, how to shave, talk to girls, change a tire, fix a car, camping, hunting, grilling, making a fire, biking, going to and finding a barber. I didn’t have someone to help me with that, and I can’t blame my mom – it’s not her fault. How could she know how to raise a man without the help of one? 

I had to teach myself how to do all of those things, except for fishing; I refuse to teach myself how to fucking fly fish, hoping that maybe my dad, or maybe just a dad, step in and help me learn. It hasn’t happened yet. Learning to be a man was trial by fire.

My mom worked a lot. She had to if we wanted to eat, and we did, in fact, want to eat. After my grandma died when I was eight, there was officially no one to look after me. My mom would leave for work at seven and wouldn’t get back home until eight or nine. I would go to school, take the bus home, lock the door, and not open it for anybody. The rule was to always keep the TV under volume 10 in case someone knocked, and always turn it off, and never make a sound if that doorbell rang. 

My mom was always off on the weekends – I never let a second pass me by. I made use of all my time with her, but we’d do typical girly things like getting our hair and nails done together, going sightseeing, or watching Pitch Perfect and romance movies. I loved every second of it and loved my mom, but I was still lacking a male figure. She did her best to play the role of Colombian 6’5 bald father, but it was never like the real thing. I still loved her for trying her best.

Now comes my junior year of high school. I'm sitting in the student activities office, with  Ed Gormley and Joe D, two of the best adult men I know, in late May. I’m exhausted, needed coffee, and I was ready to call it quits.

I rip open the Rice Krispie Treat, sit down, and I’m talking to Gormley and Joe D, some of the kindest and most interesting guys who worked on my campus. They totally dedicate  themselves to working for kids and making students' lives better. We’re sitting, like we always do, talking about how miserable the Jets are, and whatever a weirdo is doing what at Masters, the weirdo school I go to, because holy shit there are a lot of weirdos. 

Joe, who knows my life story, tells me “you know what Matthias, you’re growing up into becoming such an awesome man, you are truly a great guy.” He tells me that he loves me and that I’m a great kid, and that just stuck with me. I’m the one that really looks up to him, so the idea that he believed in me, played such a large factor in why I continue to push myself. Those two guys believe in me, and I learn a lot from them.

Back in the bed, still having to pee, watching Brian, I wonder what if I was put in that position? What if my parents stayed together, and I was still powerless? What extra suffering and frustration would I have gone through? What painful fights would I have to witness from my parents? Watch my mom, the person I would do anything for, have her power hit out of her? Would I hide? Would I step in? Being in that kind of household leaves lasting effects on people. People that are close and distant to me can’t hide how that affects them: I see right through it. That abuse, hostility, and toxicity is ever so present in those surrounded by that. What would I be like? 

That’s the question I asked myself, after pissing out of the window of 32-45 Meadow Boulevard laying in bed, with hand sanitizer nowhere to be found, the yelling as loud as ever. Looking at sleeping Brian, I think, maybe I was better off to not have a dad in the first place? I feel for my friend, then quietly thank God that I don’t live his reality. 

In the multiverse, it could always be worse. I breathe heavily, after replaying all the fatherless moments of my life.

But the story takes a strange turn, like everyone’s does. Because if 18-year-old Matthias told Matthias laying in that bed that things between his father and him would get better. That the relationship would grow, and show signs of something that could flourish. That his anger would dissipate, and feelings of forgiveness triumph, he would never believe you. He still doesn’t live with him, and probably never will, and nothing can change the past that led up to that cold January night that led to my birth, but that’s okay. I’ve got to admit, it’s getting better. 

I exhale and shift my position in bed, laying face to face with Brian, not breaking eye contact with him. His eyes weren’t open, but I stared into his soul. I saw how he was feeling. Brian looks cold, even in the humidity, and I turn the AC off and throw another blanket on him. He doesn’t react, move, or feel. He’s laying there, because he knows there’s no stopping the yelling at the other side of the home.

It’s a hard-learned lesson, because you have to compare yourself to your friend who is suffering in silence. You feel some pent-up anxiety and guilt building up in your stomach, but he’s the perfect example, to prove to me that I was just okay, and was going to be okay, on my own. Matthias today hopes that things for Brian improve. I can never be sure it ever will, but I can hope. 

That night, I rested, grateful for the first time, that I’ll wake up, get to go back to New Jersey and be at peace. 

He rested, to deal with it in the morning.