The Sarge

“Son, I need to ask you a favor,” he said in his usual gruff voice.  “Do you remember the Sarge?”

Dad served in the Gulf War, and over the years, I met many of those he fought beside in Iraq and Kuwait.  The Sarge was hard to forget.  He was a big black man with a receding hairline and rough face.  The man was brutish, with a heavy brow and a large nose and lips, but there was something in his overt confidence that always scared me.  I remembered how he used to come and stay with us for a few weeks here and there.  I never enjoyed his visits because he bullied me as a kid while my parents fawned over him like he was royalty.

“Um, sure, I remember him,” I said, screwing my nose.  “How is he going?”

My dad chuckled.  “Oh, you know the Sarge.  A Sherman tank couldn’t knock that man down.  He still works for veteran affairs in the military, though he’s just a civilian these days.”

“OK.  So, what about the Sarge?” I asked.

“Well, he’s gonna be in LA next month, and I volunteered you to put him up.  He’ll only be there a few weeks.”

I gasped.  “You volunteered me?  Maybe I should talk to Lilly before any of your old Marine buddies come to stay here.  She’s not used to their boorish behavior.”

“Oh, don’t be stupid,” my dad admonished.  “The two weeks the Sarge will be there is when Lilly will visit her parents in Idaho.  Your mom told me.  So, the Sarge won’t bother anyone.  You’ll barely notice he’s there.”

“I don’t know.”

“Come on, son.  This man fought for our country.  The least you can do is let him sleep in your guest bedroom while he’s there.  It’s the American thing to do.  The Christian thing.”

What annoyed me the most at this point was that I knew that my dad didn’t believe any of what he was saying.  He couldn’t give a fuck about the American or Christian thing to do.  He was pushing me because he promised his pal he could stay at my place for free and didn’t want to lose face by having to recant that offer.  My father had me over the family barrel, and he knew it.

I sighed.  “Oh, OK then.  The Sarge can stay here.  But don’t go offering my guest bedroom to your buddies again without asking me first.”

“Sure, I promise.  Thanks, son.  I knew I could count on you,” my dad said, relieved.  “He’ll be there on the twentieth of next month.  It will probably be in the afternoon.  He’ll get a hire car from the airport, so you don’t need to pick him up.”

“I wasn’t planning on picking him up, dad,” I said coldly.  “I’m only doing this as a favor to you.  He gets a place to sleep and maybe a meal or two when I’m home to cook it, but after that, he’s on his own.”

“Don’t worry about the Sarge.  He can look after himself,” my dad said.

That’s how it all began.  The Sarge, a man I never liked, is coming to my house.  ‘It’s only two weeks,’ I thought and told my wife.  She didn’t mind the arrangement because she wouldn’t be here anyway.  I had never told her about my dad’s Marine buddies before, so Lilly’s thoughts were pure hospitality.  Mine were dread.

*****

The twentieth rolled around, and sure enough, the Sarge arrived at my doorstep.  He was older than I remembered, but I figured he must be in his sixties by now, and I hadn’t seen the man in years.  The Sarge is a good thirty years my senior.  The receding hairline had gone to total baldness, but the beer gut was still there.  The big flat nose and lips typical of black people were just as I remembered.  Standing at my front door, he gave me what felt like a predatory grin before laughing and putting out his hand.

“Little Willy,” he said merrily.  “Great to see you.  It’s been a long time.”

I had forgotten he used to call me ‘Little Willy.’  My name is William, and most people call me Bill, as is the custom.  But the Sarge always added that sting to it.

“Please, call me Bill,” I said, taking his hand.

He crushed my hand in his for a long, unnecessarily forceful shake.  He smelled like sweat and cigars.  He was a big man, taller and broader than me.

“You’ll always be ‘Little Willy’ to me, boy,” he said gruffly.  “Thanks for letting me stay.  I do appreciate it.”

“Fine.”

Somehow I managed to pull my aching hand free and invited him inside, and the black man pushed past me through the doorway, going into the house with a suitcase.  I saw he had more luggage in the car.

“Let me give you a hand with your stuff,” I called out, then headed to his car to grab the remaining suitcases.  When I got to the living room with his cases, the Sarge was sitting, booted feet on the coffee table and a beer in his hand.  The man was watching football on my big screen TV.

“I helped myself to a beer.  I hope you don’t mind,” the Sarge said gruffly.  “Can you put my stuff in my room?  I’ll unpack later.  I got money on this game and want to watch it.”

“Um, OK.  Are you sure you don’t want to see your room and tour the house?” I asked.

“Nah, I’ll figure it out, boy.”

The man had been here less than five minutes and was already treating me like his servant.  I shook my head and took his luggage to the third guest bedroom.

I have a three-bedroom house, and Lily’s niece Jane who’s nine, used one of the rooms.  Jane is a gifted dancer and often comes to stay on weekends and school holidays when she’s training at a nearby prestigious dancing academy.  The room is considered Jane’s, and she had made it very girly.  So, I wouldn’t be putting the Sarge in there.  Besides, the bed is narrow and small and has Elsa from Frozen on the bed sheets, Ariel on the comforter, and Wonder Woman pillowcases.  See what I mean about being girly?  Lilly even painted the room a light pink for Jane.  I just put up with it.

When I returned to the living room, I found him sitting in my recliner with his shoes and socks off and smoking a big cigar.

“Why don’t you go get me another beer, kiddo?  That first one didn’t touch the sides.”

Instead of telling him to get his own beer (preferably beer he paid for), I quickly fetched another round.  The Sarge loudly belched as he took it out of my hand.  I sat on the couch meekly and took a sip of my beer, unsure of what was happening here.

“So, who’s playing?” I ventured.

He brought his fingers to his lips, not looking away from the screen.  “Shush,” he said.

It reminded me of watching TV with my older brothers as a kid, constantly silenced and told not to be a bother.  I just sat there.  My focus was not on the game but on the same obnoxious man I’d known for years who had so quickly made himself at home.  His big, hairy bare feet propped up on my ottoman.  His large hand idly scratched his crotch.  At the commercial, he turned to me.

“When’s dinner?” he asked, blowing smoke in my face.

“Oh, well, I wasn’t, uh, planning, but—”

He stared at me for a moment, his broad neanderthal brow furrowing, until I began babbling again.

“But I could whip something together, I suppose.”

He grunted in approval, nodded, and turned back to his game.  I hopped into the kitchen; my face flushed.  I couldn’t believe I was being treated this way in my own home by an unwanted guest.  I was doing this guy a favor for my dad, and now I was making him dinner.  However, I did enjoy cooking when I had the time.  As I laid out cookware and ingredients, I rationalized what I was doing.  Lilly and I always wanted to be as friendly as possible to house guests.  Maybe the Sarge is a bit pushy.  I might as well make the best of it.

Forty minutes later, I had put together a pretty good meal.  We ate on the deck overlooking the pool, toasting a good bottle of wine the Sarge had taken off the wine rack and had me open.  The sunset was beautiful.

“Damn, you make one hell of a spread, boy.  You always did take after your momma,” the Sarge said and laughed.

I smiled, but I knew he insulted me with that phony praise.  He was calling me a girl.

“What do you do, Little Willy?”

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