“Return To Sender”

by Shane McFarlane (Jamaica)

The birthday cards always come. The mailman, a greying middle-aged Boricua with kind eyes, is careful to hand them to you as the second letter within the pile. He has gotten to know you and your family quite well as he has everyone in your Miami Section 8 government housing apartment complex. He has a child your age and feels indebted to your circumstance, so he tries to pass on a few wise words every now and then. He tells you to stay out of trouble. He tells you to be mindful of the company you keep. He tells you the importance of school. He tells you everything your father should but no longer can since he is in prison. You tell him you made the honor roll. He says he is proud of who you are becoming. In Kindergarten, he told you he worked for Santa Claus. You thought Mommy must have made the naughty list because he kept bringing her letters that made her cry. Each envelope had a zigzag symbol on it. Eventually, you learned it meant the power company was threatening to turn the lights off again. They did.

As a fifth grader, the letters keep coming. You have learned how to do your homework in candlelight. However, you make the most of daylight. You comb through textbooks under the squelching sun, sitting in a three and a half-legged lawn chair upon your 6 x 6 fenced-in patio. When the sun goes down, after finishing your homework, you remain outside under the moonlight as the flame within an old hurricane lantern flickers next to you. There is something special about the streetlight shining on your father’s inscription from prison. You trace your father’s words with your index finger. Each letter in your name has a colorful balloon spurting from it. You think you should feel too old for the balloons, for such childish things considering you are about to enter middle school, and with your father gone, you must help your older brother step up around the house. But at this moment, you allow yourself to simply be a kid. The strings wind like coil. The bases are drawn as candles. Each balloon dances in its own special handcrafted hue. Just the right amount of white and blue mixed with a dab of green captures the morning sky reflecting into the ocean. An enchanted red shimmers off the page as it is perfected with a hint of gold. You drift away.

The balloons come to life before you, floating past, drifting toward the moon. You are filled with unbridled joy. You only hope that your father could see what you can.

“Daddy, look.” You make a wish and blow out the candles.

You write back to thank him for the birthday party. You address his questions about your mother and brother by stating they are doing fine. You do not mention that your mother has two jobs now or that as a live-in nurse, she is gone most of the time, taking care of a Jewish family somewhere, being the mother to their children. At least this is what you have convinced yourself. She tends to their dying grandmother, but for you, it simply means she is not home. This means you are to be watched by her handsy boyfriend who is always inappropriate with one of your best friends, a girl your age who lives upstairs in your apartment building. You most definitely omit this fact to your father. You also leave out that he is teaching you how to drive, although you will not be able to legally have a restricted permit for another five years. Each week, when he forces you behind the wheel, he tells you to be a man. The alcohol on his breath lingers in the air. There is only one small victory: when he passes out in the middle of the night, you steal the car keys and teach yourself. You keep off the main road to avoid cops. You speed by the park to avoid drug dealers; this week, you have driven by your brother twice. It is the same reason why you do not share a single word of it with your father. Likewise, it is why you omit your bloody attempt to teach yourself how to shave the single microscopic ink dot of hair above your lip. It is why you omit your little league football coach showing you how to tie your first tie. It is the same tie you stole from a department store with your brother. You are getting good at those lessons too.

You dab the folds of an envelope with a moist sponge to avoid the taste. You smile as you remember that your father taught you this.

The next day you hand the letter to the mailman. He glances at the address and returns a hollow smile. For weeks, there is no response. Each day, you hover in anxious anticipation for sound of the mailman’s master keys dangling outside of the complex’s mailboxes. You visualize that magnificent key penetrating into the ridges of the keyhole like a saw grinding for all glory, sparking the ball bearings between the hinge knuckles, back to the thimble, sweet talking the tumbler to align the shear line and the gaps between all pins and OPEN SESAME.

Yet, there is still nothing. Did your father forget about you?

The mailman hands you a large cluster. You convince yourself to muster the courage to begin sifting. Just as before, the letter that catches your attention is second from the top. You cannot help but release a grin that is so wide it almost hurts. Upon closer examination, you realize that the letter you are holding is the same exact one you sent out weeks ago. Your eyes watch as velocity carries your fist through the air, as if it is not yours at all, but somehow the entire weight of your body is barreling towards the mailman’s face. As your fist connects, echoing a loud smack of skin, part of you cannot believe what you have done, but another part of you won’t stop throwing punches. Even though he is twice your size, he is too shocked to keep you at bay. You land aimless blow after blow upon his chest. Your arms continue to flail as you scream, “You didn’t send it,” over and over again until your mother comes outside to pull you off while apologizing to your victim.Your mother sits you down, covers you in a blanket and kisses your forehead. She squeezes you within her arms until your moans subside. She slowly holds the letter in front of her. Her fingers scroll over three stamped words: RETURN TO SENDER. You feel like an asshole.

Your father has moved to another prison, a closer one. Your mother says that he is almost finished with his time, and afterward he will have to go back home. Your eyes perk in excitement. She then conveys that the home in which she is referring is Jamaica. It will not be like the other times he went away. He will be deported. You are numbed by the reality. You will never again feel his warm embrace within your country. You will never again see him cheer you on from the stands at your football games.

It’s Saturday. It only takes thirty-five minutes off the turnpike to reach the prison. Your brother is not in attendance. You think it’s because of all the visits to County growing up. You see the carton of Marlboros in your mother’s hand and realize how little has changed.

The prison fences seem never ending in all directions. The barbed wire grazes Heaven and thwarts any angel from ever landing. God has abandoned this place. The perimeter is like a labyrinth. The devil’s towers have sprouted from the depths of Hades’ underworld to watch over his version of hell on Earth. It reminds you of school. You even submit your school ID when asked to furnish proof of identification at the main checkpoint. However, you are not allowed to enter without a copy of your birth certificate. The officers ignore you as you fight back tears while your mother pleads in her moment of ignorance.

Two more thirty-five-minute trips later and you and your mother are allowed to commence visitation. The first door you enter cranks like a drawbridge. After a few steps forward, it slams shut. The loud clang radiates through your flesh. You walk through a never-ending hall of white pillars. You know you are too old to squeeze your mother’s hand, so you focus on your destination straight ahead, hoping that it is not a single step more forward.

An officer escorts your father before you. Your father nods to the officer’s instructions. He puts the phone to his ear and then raises his fist to his mouth to clear his throat. The raspy cleanse is the first sound you have heard from him in what seems like an eternity. It alone makes you smile; this is reward enough. You are face-to-face. You try your best to ignore the inch of Plexiglas between you. He looks pale from lack of sun.

He can tell you have noticed.

He says, “The chicos dem, think mi ah one’ah dem.” He is just tanner than the khaki prison issued uniform he is wearing. Prison has aged him. His hair has begun to gray, and he has lost weight, yet his face is still chubby. “Good, it’s better that way,” you respond having watched one too many episodes of prison shows on HBO with your brother. You follow with, “You’re lucky you don’t have to wear an orange jumpsuit.” This manages to break the ice.

“The brown remind mi ah Catholic school when mi ah pickney in Kingston. Maybe it is the reason mi drop out. Nah, mon, dem nun wicked, give nuff box cross yuh head.”

You share a laugh.

Your mother dodges most of your father’s questions. He inquires the whereabouts of your brother. You also avoid any real answer to spare his feelings.

“He grew his hair out,” you say excited to report the news. “The dreadlocks hang to his shoulders now.” Your father is displeased. He expresses that it is supposed to be a covenant with God and that it should only be done if he is truly willing to accept Him into his life. He adds that it is the reason he cut his own in his twenties. He goes on to quote a passage from the Bible and reveals the small version kept in his shirt pocket.

Ten minutes remain in the visitation. Your mother walks away to allow you both to catch up. She begins to whimper in the corner. “What’s her new man’s name?”

“You don’t know him.”

“His, name?”

He demands, dragging each word from his mouth. The name flies off your tongue. In an instant, it is crossed referenced with a mental list of so-called friends that could possibly be sleeping with his wife. The results are negative. This is important to him.

He asks to speak to your mother once more. You cannot confirm what is being said, but his eyes look apologetic. He presses his hand upon the glass. She looks away avoiding any real eye contact. She reveals a manila envelope and says, “I feel it is time for you to sign.”

His eyes water. She sighs. “Please.”

You can read his lips mouthing the same. His head falls to the window. He squeezes the receiver and bangs the glass. The guards overhear the commotion and approach. You have never seen this expression upon your father’s face before. You rush over to the window and place your palm upon the glass to relieve his anguish. Years after the day you were born, your palm still fits within his.

“You remember that story you use to tell me?” He has told you plenty throughout the years, but your eyes say come on, come on, Dad, you know which one. It is the one of how he held you for the first time and cut your umbilical cord.

“The hospital staff,” he says as if grabbing the memory from thin air. “Them she mi have the best cut all week.” The words sputter from his mouth like warming an old Chevy engine.

“Mi have finer hands than the doctor.” His eyes well as he brings himself to look at you.

He lifts his head. His eyes reflect yours. He expresses that he loves you. You manage to do the same just before the guards drag him away.

The silence is thick on the car ride home. Your mother searches for sage words, the kind of words found on a Hallmark card, but they don’t quite make one for this moment. Another thirty-five minutes and you and your mother are sitting in the car in your family’s parking space, exactly six spaces from the apartment complex’s mailbox station. Your mother removes the keys from the ignition and tries once more to find those words, the words that her mother never taught her, and the words that her father neglected to mention before walking out to start another family. She simply puts her arm around you, drawing you in, sensing that you don’t want to leave, that you do not want to reenter this place called home. You unbury your eyes from your mother’s embrace. As you do, exactly six spaces away you see the mailman arrive. Looking over her shoulder, your mother nods to consent. You open the car door. Your foot hovers over the pavement like an astronaut’s stepping on a foreign surface for the first time. You begin a long stroll down the sidewalk toward the mailman. You do not want to end up like your father. You wonder if the mailman will press charges. He will not. He will never utter a single word about that day to anyone: the police, his employer, and especially not even you. He has masked his bruises. He has said that the wound on his lip was a sporting accident. And he promised himself to make sure that the next time he saw you, he would say, “Hola, mi nino. How are your grades in school?”