Carmen
The Adventures of Carmen
SO MY QUESTION
is: If somebody’s already had two abortions, will having a third one jeopardize their chances of having a healthy baby in the future?”
By now my uncle was used to me asking questions like this. Being an OB-GYN is all but an open invitation for me and my brothers to direct girl-plumbing questions his way.
“It’s not yours, is it, Davy?”
“No. But it’s a friend of mine.”
“Davy -- what kind of friends do you have?!”
I can almost see him shaking his head as he asks that one. Then -- as I knew he would -- Uncle Elvin proceeds to give me a straight answer.
“Tell your friend not to worry. Sounds to me like she’s fertile enough. And tell her to be more careful.
“And maybe you oughta consider getting some new friends.”
As an uncle, I suppose he had to say that.
As soon as I hang up, I call Carmen. Like the Puerto Rican dancer of the ‘50s who wore a hat stacked high with fruit, Carmen’s full name is Carmen Miranda.
“Good news …” I say, hearing an audible sigh of relief on the other end.
Carmen and I both work at the world headquarters of a very fundamentalist denomination.
She’s someone’s secretary.
I work in the Communications Department.
I can’t remember how it is that we first met. We do
have a common interest in racquetball.
Turns out we have other similarities as well.
Both of our dads split when we were young -- mine when I was three -- hers before she was one.
Her uncle on her mom’s side often came by or slept over -- at any rate, he was a constant fixture at breakfast when she grew up. His favorite refrain, whenever she came into the room, was “You no good for nothin’. You prob’ly grow up to be a whore.” Her mother did little to defend her.
She took this as a challenge -- a challenge to prove him wrong. It’s what motivated her to put herself through college and ultimately to get her MBA before returning to Puerto Rico to work for Proctor and Gamble.
Carmen became a member in good standing of IDEA -- the international organization of aerobic dance instructors. This year they were having their annual convention in Washington, D.C. As a member, Carmen got their promo pack.
They wanted $300 per person and you could bring an escort. Carmen really wanted to go, but the idea of ponying up $300 was less than appealing. She phoned their headquarters and offered her services for the three-day affair as receptionist, registrar -- whatever they needed in the way of boots-on-the-ground -- in exchange for herself and an escort to attend the festivities,. To her delight, they agreed!
The highlight of the convention was the Sunday night banquet and costume ball. Three hundred of the healthiest women on earth would be in attendance. What to wear, what to wear …
I drove her to a costume shop at the outskirts of D.C. Carmen insisted I join her as she shopped for a costume. After an hour or so, she settled on a cave girl outfit. That’s when she invited me to come along as her escort. I suggested we rent a 6’ guerrilla suit and bring a long leash -- an almost fatal decision.
It’s hard to line up a date when you’re new in town on such short notice. I was the only guy in the place, other than the DJ. One advantage to being a guerrilla is nobody knows who you’re staring at!
Turns out everyone wanted a picture with the guerrilla.
No problem.
I love hugging dressed out aerobics instructors from around the world!
Then it got crazy. Everyone wanted to dance with the guerrilla.
Not good.
It was already 108 degrees in the too-tight costume on an overweight couch potato whose dance partners had stamina in spades.
First the cave girls.
Next the bananas -- both slender single Chiquita’s and girls dressed as whole bunches!
If I hadn’t been sweating before, I started sweating profusely now …
It was like being wrestled by a tag team that had 300 team members -- each waiting for her 30-second turn!
Moments before I decided to have a heart attack, the music stopped. The evening was over. I could barely make it to the van!
* * *
While we weren’t dating per se, we were becoming fast friends.
Carmen married some guy from Mexico.
I had rented a doctor’s house near the Chesapeake Bay. It had a pool in front. We put a trampoline out back. It was the perfect place for friends to come and crash for the weekend.
One of the crashers was Alfred -- a high school student from out west whose parents were going through a divorce. Jackie, my oldest brother’s wife, was one of his teachers and had asked my wife and I if Alfred could stay with us for a few weeks during the final stages of his folks’ breakup.
Carmen and her husband would often come out on weekends to relax.
Alfred got along fine with my kids. They were all into video games in a big way.
Carmen would often take these weekends as an opportunity to get an even tan out by the pool.
It took several weekends before Alfred figured this out. He pestered me to signal him if the situation came up again.
This seemed like an opportunity in the making.
I pulled up a chair beside Carmen’s chaise lounge and together we plotted and connived.
When I gave Alfred the signal, he came running out of the house in his swim trunks like a Pavlovian dog who’d just heard a bell.
“Alfred,” I said conspiratorially, “I think Carmen has something to show you.”
He looked at me eagerly, then her. Lackadaisical, she motioned him over with a curling index finger.
He bounded over to her. If he’d had a tail, it’d be wagging vigorously.
Just as she sat up and started to untie the string to the top of her bikini, I snuck up behind him and pants-ed him, yanking his suit down to his ankles.
For a split second, Alfred’s focus never wavered from Carmen. Then, it dawned on him that he was standing there stark naked in front of a girl! Quickly he side-dived into the adjacent pool to cool his … uh, jets.
* * *
I remember a few years later having reason to be out west. Carmen was in the same area and asked if I could run her to the airport for her flight back. No problem. I got her to the airport in plenty of time. She wanted to grab a bite to eat. I checked my watch. That'd be cutting it close. Oh well.
There was a restaurant right there in the airport. We ordered. The food came. She was very nonchalant about eating.
Several times I tried to hurry her up. Even after they said, “Final call” for her gate, she continued to eat at a leisurely pace. As you probably guessed by now, she missed her flight.
I hadn’t brought much money with me. She said she didn’t have any. I had enough for a Motel 6, but of course they only had a room in my price range with one bed.
It didn’t dawn on me that she had set this whole thing up. I guess I was a bit naive.
Next morning I got her to her plane on time, but was still a bit disgusted at having to spend the extra time and money, not to mention trying to sleep in a cheap chair all night.
* * *
Fast forward a few more years.
Carmen and her Mexican didn’t work out.
She got her MBA, moved back to Puerto Rico as a high-paid employee of Proctor and Gamble.
She found the love of her life in Puerto Rico and got married.
By this time, I was with Jackie. We flew down for the wedding.
They do things a little different there. Almost no one actually shows up for the wedding. But everybody shows up for the reception!
We stayed at the hotel at the airport. Car alarms went off all night long -- about one every thirty seconds. Police cars never turn off their flashing blue lights!
Her husband seemed like a nice guy.
Later, through correspondence, I learned that my uncle’s once-removed advice was spot on: Carmen had a baby boy. She said she couldn’t be happier.
Great job.
Great husband.
Great baby boy.
Lived near her relatives.
LIfe was good …
That is, until she came home one day to find her husband dead on the living room floor, her baby whimpering nearby.
Heart attack at thirty-one.
Carmen was beside herself.
She couldn’t sleep.
She was having difficulty performing at work.
Coming home late one night, she fell asleep at the wheel and drove off the side of a mountain. Broke nearly every bone in her body.
Her mother took over care of the baby while she took nine months to recuperate.
Still deeply depressed, she went back to work.
Fell asleep at the wheel again.
Ran her second car off the side of the mountain again.
Was in the hospital for several months.
Came home. Extremely depressed. Tried to hang herself with an extension cord. The cord broke when she stepped off the chair.
They took her child away.
* * *
I tried to talk to her a few months later. She was so depressed she could hardly speak. That’s the last I heard from her more than 15 years ago …
* * *
It was only after coming to Sheridan’s FCI camp that I got an email from my number one son, DJ (David John), saying someone wanted to reunite with him -- someone named Carmen. She’d seen a Facebook page with the name Dave Ruskjer on it and wanted to know if it was me. It wasn’t, but close enough.
She’s now living in Texas, raising her seventeen-year-old son. She sent DJ a picture.
Fantastic radiant smile!
She didn’t remember, when I reminded her that the last time we spoke, after her extension cord failure, I had offered to marry her …
My loss.