Chapter One - Little Tokens

         Tina Marie couldn’t really remember the exact day that she and Sissy had gone to the carnival, but she could recall everything about the fortune teller; the way that the woman had looked, the things that she had to say.

         The old, wrinkled gypsy had not been out of her element, looking like every one of the “carnival” fortune tellers; purple and red scarf wrapped around her head like a turban, large gold hoops in her ears, large clear marble set in front of her with her hands loosely cupped around it.

         Tina shook her head and tried to shake the memories away. This was no time to be thinking about the carnival. Her family was here under solemn circumstances. They were here to say goodbye to her mother.

         As the pastor droned on, Tina Marie found herself hearing the words of the old gypsy woman again. You will be a singer, she had croaked out, in a voice as old and wrinkled as her skin. You will have many in your audience, and they will cry for the beauty of it.

         Tina Marie came back to the present, and she realized that Sheldon was trying to rub her thigh. Leave it to him to make a pew in a funeral home into a place to make-out. She shot a dirty look at him, shoved his hand away, and realized that her father was watching this little exchange.

         Tina Marie stole a glance over at Sissy. She was a little concerned when she saw her little sister was staring glassy-eyed at the coffin; her mouth open. She was worried about how Sissy is going to take their mother’s death once the shock of it wore off. She was so young, so impressionable.

         Again came Sheldon with the hand. “Fuck you, Sheldon,” she whispers, as she stands up and heads to the other side of her sister. She knows that there will be hell to pay with her husband later, but Sissy is more important right now.

         As she squeezes herself in next to Isabelle, she drops a kiss on her forehead, and asks her if she is okay.

         “No,” Sissy whispers back.

         “I was thinking about that fortune teller we saw at the carnival last summer,” Tina Marie whispered behind her hand.

         “What’s your point?”

         “Do you remember when she said that I would be singing soon?” As Tina Marie asked this, she noticed that she was getting the evil eye from some of the people in the room. Too bad, she thought, this was her mother’s funeral. She’d damn well get up and do the hootchie-kootchie if the feeling should strike her.

         “Vaguely,” Sissy said in answer to her question.

         “Pastor Andrews asked me if I would sing Mama’s favorite hymn,” she said quietly. “How’s that for fortune teller?”

         “That’s really morbid,” Isabelle said dryly, but she rewarded her sister with a wan grin.

         After the funeral, there was going to be a small gathering at her father’s house. Sheldon didn’t want to go, he didn’t want her to go either. “I want to be there for Sissy, for Daddy, too,” Tina Marie argued. There was no way he was going to keep her from being with her little sister in her time of need.

         “You’re not going,” Sheldon repeated, a dark look coming into his eyes.

         “Come on, honey,” Tina Marie aid softly, reaching up to him, trying to draw him into an embrace.

         What Sheldon did next wasn’t totally unfamiliar, but it was totally unexpected at this moment. He pulled back his fist and he belted her across the face. When Tina Marie just stood there looking at him with disbelief, he punched her again, and then threw her against the wall.

         “Do you still want to go?” He asked in a dominant voice. His eyes were sparkling with the anger that she had invoked in him.

         “No,” she whispered, still cowering in the corner.

         “Don’t you ever second guess me again,” he said snidely, as he strode from the room.

         Tina Marie found herself shaking and sobbing in great breaths of air. Sheldon could be mean, yes, very mean. He had always been a bit physical, a slap here or there during the course of their marriage. Sometimes he got a little rough during sex. But he had never out and out mauled her.

         Tina had to admit to herself that she was scared.

***

         Isabelle was tired. A person would really have no idea how tiring and draining it was to sit in your bedroom and stare at the wall all day.

         Her mother was dead. How was she going to go forth into the world?

         Mama had been everything to her. Granted, Mama had always been so sick; needing to go to doctors, taking medicine every day of her life. Isabelle had been the one to take care of her. And Isabelle had taken very good care of her, hadn’t she? So why had Mama died?

         Isabelle was crying inside for Mama.

But for Daddy? He was a cold and heartless man. He had never shown Mama any love. Not even when she had gotten so sick. He hadn’t even cried at the funeral. Isabelle didn’t even think that he loved her mother. She didn’t think that she loved him. He was cold.

And what about Tina Marie? She had said that she would come by and see how Isabelle was doing, said that she knew how hard this was on Isabelle. The clock on the stand said that it was 8:30 at night, and not even a phone call from her big sister. Tina was not really high on her list now either.

As Isabelle was sitting there feeling sorry for herself, she felt the tears welling up in her eyes, she just let them roll down her cheeks, as she stared up at the ceiling.

Are you up there, Mama? She thought to herself. How could you leave me?

Soon Isabelle turned over on her side, pulled herself into a fetal position, tucked her fists under her chin, and cried herself to sleep.

***

When Tina Marie woke up the next morning, her face felt like it had been drilled by a hundred tiny jack-hammers. Or one Sheldon Travels, she thought grimly.

She didn’t relish the idea of looking at herself in the mirror, but she had to go past it to get to the commode, so she figured that she might as well take a look-see.

Tina was shocked by what she saw.

Her right cheek was swollen purple around her right eye, and her jaw on that side was swollen to twice it’s size. Her left eye was swollen shut, and her nose looked like it was twisted off to the left side.

“Oh my god,” she said with tears in her eyes. The face looking back at her from the mirror had not one single resemblance to her. The tears just kept coming as she stood there and looked at her reflection helplessly.

Not knowing what she was going to do, Tina Marie finally dragged herself away from the mirror, and layed herself back on the pillows, knowing only that she couldn’t possibly go into work today.

She called the bank where she was a teller to say that she was going to be out today. Her supervisor, Naisha Dye, told her that she hoped that she was feeling better tomorrow, and just let her know how things were going.

Tina made no agreements. She didn’t know how her face was going to look tomorrow, but knowing that it couldn’t possibly be back to normal within a day or two.

Next she picked up the phone and dialed the number to her childhood home. She knew that her father would be at work. She also knew that Sissy would not be going back to school this soon after Mama’s death.

The phone just rang and rang.

Tina Marie knew that she couldn’t go over and see Sissy, because the sight of her face would scare her sister to death. She would just have to keep trying her on the phone.

She put on her old flannel rob, padded barefoot down to the kitchen, intent on making herself a cup of tea.

“Jesus!” she heard when she stepped into the kitchen. She looked up quickly and her eyes collided with her husband’s. In his she saw guilt. And she thought that she saw a little satisfaction.

She walked right past him and reached into the cupboard for the tea leaves. When she turned around to put her cup on the table, Sheldon stood up. He captured her chin in his palm and gently ran his fingers over her bruises. It was heard to believe that those gentle fingers could dole out so much hurt.

“I’m so sorry, Tina,” he said in a hoarse voice. “Can you ever forget me?”

Tina Marie didn’t answer him. She didn’t think that she could forgive him right away. She was still scared that he would strike out at her at any moment. What her voice didn’t say, her eyes conveyed.

Sheldon moved his hand away from Tina Marie’s face to reach behind her for his thermos, and she couldn’t help it, she flinched. She was still frightened.

Sheldon could see it, saw the weakness. She knew that he resented her for it. He left without giving her a kiss, without saying goodbye.

Tina Marie just sat at the table and cried.

***

That was how Isabelle found her a few minutes later. As yet, she hadn’t seen her face, because Tina had her head in her arms.

When Tina Marie brought her head up with the slamming of the door, all thoughts of anger fled from Isabelle. “What happened to you?!” she cried, beding down and taking her sister into her arms.

“Oh, Sissy,” Tina Marie cried. “You weren’t supposed to see me like this.”

“Is that why you didn’t come last night?” Isabelle asked. The truth slowly dawning on her, and leaving a sour taste in her mouth for the angry thoughts that she had been having.

Tina Marie just nodded her head. She was humiliated. The last thing she had wanted was for her little sister to see this vunerability. Isabelle had enough troubles of her own, she was just a baby for God sakes!

Isabelle said just one would that brought the deluge of tears again. “Sheldon?”

***

Orville Jamison was fond of his daughters. But love? He had never loved another soul but his Eleanor, and she had gotten sick and died.

Sure, the doctors said that it was the demons inside of her head, but Orville knew that Eleanor had just had too fragile a hold on life, and she just couldn’t hold on anymore.

He had seen Isabelle watching him the last few weeks of Eleanor’s life, criticizing him with her eyes, shaming him when he wouldn’t help care for his wife.

He couldn’t help care for Eleanor. Watching her waste away had been too painful. He felt like he was losing his heart, bit by bit.

His youngest daughter had watched him with caustic eyes at the funeral too, damning him with her hostility. She was probably thinking that he didn’t care. But why cry? All the tears in the world wouldn’t bring back his wife.

Isabelle just couldn’t understand that the loss of Eleanor had left a huge hole in his heart. She was young. She would go on. She had Tina Marie.

But who did Orville have? Two daughters who brought to mind his beloved Eleanor every time he looked at them. Tina Marie with her mother’s eyes and her smile, and Isabelle with her mother’s sandy-brown hair and her temperament.

Yes, he was fond of his daughters. Would do anything for them. But to love them would cost him too much. He couldn’t bear to lose them like he had lost their mother.

Then came Isabelle’s frantic phone call.

“Sheldon beat up Tina Marie,” she half-whispered, half-sobbed. “She needs your help Daddy.”

Orville assured his younger daughter that he would be right over, and he hung up the phone with a heavy heart.

He sank down into the nearest chair, closed his eyes, and offered up this prayer, “Ellie, if you are looking down on me and your girls, help us through this, give me strength.”

***

By the time that Orville got to Tina Marie’s house, Isabelle had gotten her older sister upstairs and safely ensconced in her bed for a nap.

Now she was sitting at the kitchen table, quietly waiting for her father.

“She didn’t want me to call you,” she said softly, as Orville opened the screen-door and stepped in.

Isabelle looked away from her father, concentrating on Tina Marie’s antique clock. The truth of the matter was, that while she had been trying to convince her sister to let her call Daddy, she had been trying to convince herself as well.

Isabelle didn’t know what had made her think that her father would come and help Tina Marie. She just knew that he had to come.

And he did.

So, while she was heaving a huge sigh of relief, she got up to pour her father a cup of coffee. Two creams and one sugar, just the way he liked it. Her way of thanking him for not letting Tina Marie down.

She set the cup of coffee in front of her father, as he took a seat at the table. She went around to take a seat across from him.

“Is she okay?” he asked with anxious eyes.

“Her face…..” Isabelle began, stopping when her eyes began to tear. She looked at her father helplessly, shrugging her shoulders. “Her face is badly bruised.”

Orville pressed his cold finger-tips to his forehead, sliding his eyes away from his younger daughter. Anger swelled, but he held it inside. It wouldn’t do any good for Isabelle to see the ugly side of him.

So, concealing his annoyance with his son-in-law, probably giving Isabelle that he didn’t care, Orville turned his attention to his coffee cup, and proceeded to gulp the hot liquid.

This was a terrible situation, he was thinking to himself. His Tina was in trouble, and his baby was indirectly in the middle of it! What was he going to do?  Another large drink of coffee.

“Daddy!” Isabelle cried impatiently, startling Orville, who was lost in his thoughts, and causing him to spill coffee on the table.

Isabelle jumped up for a paper-towel, and when she turned back to her father, there were tears in her eyes. “Isabelle?” Orville questioned softly, reaching an arm out to her.

But Isabelle was as glacial to him as he was impersonal to her. She ignored his outstretched arm, turning instead to her chair at the table. She continued to stare at her father, her eyes impaling him. Once again, accusing.

“Aren’t you going to do something?” she cried unhappily.

“What would you have me do, Isabelle?”

“Nothing,” came a weak reply from behind Isabelle. Isabelle stood up quickly and ushered her sister into her seat, both sisters heard Orville’s sharp intake of breath.

“Oh my God,” he exclaimed.

“It’s okay, Daddy,” Tina Marie said quietly. She accepted a cup of coffee from Isabelle. “It looks worse than it feels,” she tried to joke.

“Oh, baby,” Orville sighed. He reached his towards his daughter, withdrawing it when she flinched.

He didn’t know if the flinch was meant for him or Sheldon, but Orville felt the surge of anger again. A man just didn’t lay his hands on a woman; any woman, but especially his daughter.

Yes, there was a distance between his daughters and himself, particularly between he and Tina Marie. Orville knew that his eldest daughter felt hostile towards him. Shit, who was he kidding? Tina Marie hated him. Had hated him since she was a child.

Tina Marie had somehow gotten it into her head a long time ago that Orville had little feeling for her. He had never done anything to enlighten her. Showing no emotion was easier than trying to show love.

He cared for her, whether she knew it or not, and he wanted to protect her. He wanted to make sure that Tina Marie was out of harms way.

With no farther thought, Orville turned to his eldest daughter, and with a look that left no room for argument, said to her, “You’re coming home with Isabelle and me.”

“No,” Tina Marie muttered, nervously running her finger over the edge of her coffee cup.

“Tina!” Isabelle cried. “Why?”

Orville looked into his daughter’s eyes, and suddenly he knew why. She would rather live with an abusive husband than move back home with her heartless, insensitive, and unfeeling father.

“Sheldon said he was sorry,” Tina Marie whispered, avoiding her father’s eyes.

“But your face!” Isabelle said.

“You won’t come home?” Orville asked softly.

“This is my home.”

Orville placed his large hand over Tina Marie’s small, cold one, grateful that she didn’t pull away, and gently said to her, “The offer is always on the table.”

Tina Marie nodded her head in response to Orville’s words. Then, noticing Isabelle’s tears, she pulled her little sister into a hug. “I’ll be okay, Sissy,” she soothed.

Orville wanted to believe her, problem was, he didn’t. He knew that he would have to do something to help his daughter. The daughter that didn’t want his help, didn’t want anything from him at all.

Determining that he would just have to go to the source of the problem, Orville climbed into his pick-up and headed down to Bemo’s Auto, Sheldon’s place of employment.

***

Sheldon Travels was in the middle of an oil change on a 1989 Lincoln Continental when he heard his name being called over the crackling speaker that was hung haphazardly in the corner of the dirty garage.

“You’re on,” his buddy Mason yelled from under the Ford Escort he was pulling a muffler off of.

“Let him wait,” Sheldon grumbled. Not willing to be bothered, too lazy to walk the nine yards to the main office.

Besides, if his boss, Lasiter Ryker, could sit on his fat ass all day in his office, barking orders left and right, looking at girlie magazines, and still getting the “big bucks”, then he could certainly wait until Sheldon was done with his current job.

“Turn up the tunes!” he yelled to Mason. He got lost in the hard rock pouring from the transistor radio sitting between his and Mason’s bays.

The next thing Sheldon knew, Ryker and his really bad breath was in his face, telling him that he had a visitor, grinding out the words between his rotten teeth.

Sheldon could tell that his boss was really mad, but that didn’t concern him much. What concerned Sheldon right now, was the identity of his visitor.

Shit, he thought to himself, Tina Marie’s father. “Tell him I’m busy,” Sheldon told his boss with a troubled look.

“No way,” Ryker yelled, grabbing Sheldon by his already torn tee-shirt, and making the hole a little bigger, as he shoved him outside.

“Sheldon,” Orville said with a stony expression, as Sheldon walked up to him. “We need to talk.”

“What’s up?” Sheldon asked pleasantly enough, hiding his scorn, keeping his eyes away from Orville.

He knew that his father-in-law was here about Tina Marie. He wondered how Orville had found out? He knew that Tina Marie would never have called her father for help, she knew better. How had he found out? He intended to find out as soon as he got home.

“Did you see what you did to her?” he stammered with rage.

“Yes,” Sheldon said peevishly, taking a deep breath. “I told her that I was sorry, and I truly am.”

Sheldon was sorry. Sorry that he had left any visible evidence of his argument with his wife. Sorry that his father-in-law had gotten involved in it. Sorry that he had been caught.

“Sorry didn’t beat up my daughter,” Orville returned, his eyes narrowing in contempt.

“What do you want from me?” Sheldon asked, exhaling heavily.

He knew that Orville had come here because he wanted something, but what? Tina Marie and her father had never been close, he hadn’t even come to her wedding. He had never liked Sheldon. Why all of the sudden interest?

“What do you think I want?” Tina’s father demanded, not letting his gaze waver.

“Why don’t you tell me,” Sheldon put forth, he tried to sound strong, but his heart was beating triple-time.

“She doesn’t want to press charges, she doesn’t want to leave you,” Orville stated, finally looking away from his son-in-law.

Sheldon took this as an indication that he had won. Nothing was going to be done about what happened between between Tina Marie and himself.

“So, what business of it of yours?” Sheldon asked boldly. Knowing that Tina Marie wasn’t going to leave him gave him the strength to stand up to Orville. The was powerless in Sheldon’s eyes, as well as in Sheldon’s marriage.

“It’s my business,” Orville spat out loudly, slamming both of his fists on the hood of the car they were leaning against. “She’s my daughter!”

“Since when?” Sheldon asked with a smirk. “When have you ever given a damn?”

Sheldon honestly thought that his father-in-law was going to hit him, when Orville had swung around and raised his fist, but he only grabbed Sheldon by the collar. “If you ever touch my daughter again,” he said in a voice so low and cold that it sent chills up and down Sheldon’s spine. “I will kill you with my bare hands.”

Orville was not a large man by any means, certainly no bigger than Sheldon. But, as Sheldon watched his father-in-law walk across the parking-lot, he was left shaking in his boots.