2084 The End of Days (7 page)

“If it was good enough for my parents, then it is just as good for me also!”

“Jesus, Maria, your parents ended up with nine kids!”

“Yeah, well I’m gonna do it right. We’ll have plans and charts and we’ll stick to them, okay, big Jack?”

“Okay, Maria Conchita, you are the boss!”

In mid-September 2066 Jack arrived home one night laden down with a magnum of champagne, a huge box of chocolates and an even bigger bouquet of flowers. Maria squealed with delight and little Isabella, already in her baby-grow pyjamas, clapped her hands excitedly. Jack had already had a couple of Jack Daniels and he was feeling elated.

“Jack, darling, what’s the occasion?”

“Maria Conchita Crossan - you’re dearly beloved husband has only gone and gotten the Big One!”

Maria screamed so loud that Isabella started crying with fright.

“Eeeeh! You got Air Force One?”

“Ah sure did, honey bunch. John Crossan, pilot to the President of the U-Ni-Ted States of America, at your service, ma’am!”

After Isabella was put to bed, they celebrated into the night, finishing the champagne and Jack helped himself to a few more bourbons. By the time they were in bed Jack was pretty tipsy and full-on horny. Jack snuggled up to Maria and kissed her neck.

“C’mon, baby, big Jack needs his momma –“

“Oh, no, Jack – we are way off the charts tonight. You know it’s too darn risky.”

“Big Jack promises his Maria that he’ll jump off the train before it hits the
buffers. Ba-by, Jacky needs his Maria Conchita?”

“You better jump off that damn train okay or ah’m gonna kill you Jack!”

Three weeks later Maria, in tears, gave him the news that she was pregnant again. Jack was profusely apologetic. He knew he had crossed the line and had put Maria’s life in jeopardy.

“Maria, I’m so sorry. Ah was so drunk that night ah just couldn’t stop myself. Look, baby, the best thing to do is go for a termination.”

Maria swiftly crossed herself and stared at Jack in horror.

“Jack Crossan, you horny bastard, don’t you swear at me.
Madre Dio!
My parents
and my priest would kill me if they even thought that I would contemplate an abortion. No, Jack, the baby is ours. I want my baby.”

Over the next few weeks Jack tried to talk to Maria into the abortion. She would not even hear of it and Jack worried himself sick over Maria’s
health. Maria on the other hand bloomed magnificently as each trimester passed. The doctors were delighted at her progress but they advised that Maria should take it easy during the pregnancy, including no alcohol and little sex. As far as Maria was concerned that meant no sex, nothing, nada! Jack, now flying in Air Force One squadron, was at lunch one day at the base canteen with his old wing man, Vance Mulcahey, who was now ‘Top Gun’ on the F-69s.

“So how’s Maria’s pregnancy doing, Jack.”

“Oh, ah guess she’s doin’ fine, Vance.”

“You sound a bit disgruntled there, Big Bro’? You okay?”

“Man, ah’m just friggin’ gaggin’ for it Vance. Maria won’t let me near her till the baby’s born.”

Vance put his arm around his old friend’s shoulder.

“What you and I need to do is to get our old F-6-9 buddies together and have a real good ole blow-out up there in DC. What do ya say, Jack?”

“Good idea - so long as we’re only talkin’ drinks here, Vance?”

“It’s the only thang on ma mind, Jacky boy! Although we both know what ‘F’ and ‘69’ really stands for!”

The eleven Old Boys of the F-69 squadron were having a grand old night out up in downtown Washington. It could not have been any better for Jack. Maria had flown down to San Antonio, Texas with Isabella because her grandmother was very ill in hospital. So it had not been a problem for Jack when Vance and the other guys suggested staying over at the InterContinental in DC. The cash and the drinks were flowing. They had started with a bar meal of Buffalo wings and burgers washed down with jugs of Bud in Georgetown. Then they all jumped into three yellow electri-cabs and headed back to hit a couple of clubs on the edge of Foggy Bottom, where the eleven guys all started knocking back shots dropped in Jack Daniels and Coke. To finish the night they all staggered on to one of the Potomac’s water-taxis and sailed leisurely down to get into one of the exclusive clubs in upmarket Alexandria. As they floated past the infamous Watergate building, Jack’s eyes were swimming as he looked on to the swirling Potomac, inky black in the darkness and interspersed with dancing eels of light.

“Man, great idea, Vance. I so needed a blow-out like tonight.”

Vance was actually avoiding looking at the swirling river. The dancing eels of light were making him nauseous.

“Jeez, Jack, ah’m to-tally wrecked, Big Bro’. Ah think ah go back to Inn-
Con-nen-nen-al-“

“Vance, you’re as drunk as a monkey, man. How d’ya end up like that?”

When the boat arrived at the pier at Alexandria, most of the guys realised that enough was enough and that they had drunk their fill. They argued for heading back to the InterContinental and finishing the evening with a night-cap. Jack was certainly not finished with his night out.

“Aw, come on guys. This is the first big night out ah’ve had since ma daughter was born. Who’s up for paintin’ Alexandria red?”

It certainly would not be Vance. He was already being held up between two of his buddies. The heads were all beginning to shake except one, Dan Kowalski.

“I’m still game if you are, Jack.”

“That’s ma boy, Dan the Man!”

The pair ended up drinking in The Fish Market, Alexandria’s most exclusive night club, which catered for guests who liked their R & B music, mainly from the late-20
th
century and expertly mixed by the world-famous techno-jock DJ Steeley from “Steel-town” Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Jack spotted her drinking alone at the other end of the bar. She looked mesmerisingly stunning, but Jack reminded himself that most women began to look stunning after the amount of alcohol that he had consumed. She spotted him and smiled, subconsciously signalling to him by gently rocking her glass on the bar to signify that her drink was requiring replenishment. Jack turned to Dan. He was already chatting up a very pretty black girl in a stunning and clinging red dress who worked up at the Pentagon. Jack indicated with a nod of his head towards the other girl at the end of the bar, who was in an equally slinky little black number.

“Dan, you okay here? Ah has a friend down there lookin’ mighty thirsty.“

“Ah’m doin’ great, Jacky boy. I’ll see ya at breakfast in the mornin’. Good huntin’!”

Jack never made it back to the InterContinental that evening. Instead he woke up in a strange bed in a small apartment across the river in Anacostia, his head bursting with the worst hangover ever. She walked into the bedroom wearing only a very short skimpy Japanese silk dressing gown and carrying a tray arranged with a light breakfast of grits, eggs over easy, biscuits, grape jelly, orange juice and coffee.

“Morning, Jack.”

Jack rubbed his forehead and glanced at her through his fingers. She was still beautiful, even in this semi-sober state, he thought. She had long dark auburn hair and legs up to her armpits. Just the way I like them, Jack thought.

“Hi, eh, have we been introduced, ma’am?”

“Many times, Jack. Why you were introducing yourself to me all night long.”

“Oh, God, that’s what I feared. Look – ah – look - ah don’t even know your
name.”

“Ah’m Peggy Sue Milner from Birmingham, Alabama - at yore service, sir.”

“Look – ah – Peggy Sue. Ah don’t think you’re gonna be surprised to hear that ah am a married man.”

“Don’t worry, you told me that last night before we even made love. Ya were a proper gen-nel-man, so ya were.”

“So where do we go from here, Peggy Sue?”

“Let’s jest start with breakfast, Jack.”

That night had been the launch pad for a torrid affair between Jack and Peggy Sue. He saw Peggy Sue each time he was up at the Pentagon in Washington for briefings on the scheduled plans for Air Force One flights over the coming weeks and months. The sex was amazing, but every time Jack looked at Maria’s ever expanding abdomen he flagellated himself with the guilt he felt. One night he even pleaded with Maria to make love with him but she was adamant that they should not take any risks.

“
Madre de dios
,
Jack. Can you not keep it tucked away for a few more weeks? It won’t be long my darling.”

Another night while in bed in Anacostia with Peggy Sue, he had a nightmare, which had caused him to wake up in a blinding fear-laden sweat. In the dream his drugged up mother Annabel came up to him and Peggy Sue while they stood outside a multiplex, which they had recently gone to in Washington Center. Annabel was like a spitting cobra swirling in front of them.

“John Crossan. Get back to your wife. Get back to your wife, you devil!”

But Peggy Sue was like his drug. He was addicted to the adrenalin rushes every time he knew that he was going to see her, have those wild sexual encounters with her. He never thought of it as truly making love with Peggy Sue. In his mind he had reserved that for Maria. Then one afternoon in a restaurant in Anacostia Peggy Sue exploded the life that he thought he had under control like the flash of a supernova. She whispered across the table.

“I’m pregnant, Jack.”

“Oh, God, no, Peggy Sue - how could you? You said you were always careful on the pill?”

“Ah was, Jack. But you see - ah love you. Ah loved you when ah first saw you in Alexandria –“

“No, Peggy Sue, this can’t be. Ah love my wife, Maria.”

“Ah know you do, honey. But that’s why ah wanted to get pregnant. If ah can’t have you to myself then ah want to have something that is a piece of the two of us –“

Jack blurted out loudly in a mixture of anger and confusion, which turned the heads of some of the other diners seated in the eatery. He felt his life was being sucked into a black hole. Its gravity was so powerful that he was not going to escape its fatal attraction. A strange feeling crept over him. He felt the presence of the man in the room with the gun and this time his finger was on the trigger.

“Christ sake, Peggy Sue, Maria’s pregnant too!”

Peggy Sue showed genuine surprise. Jack had never let on.

“Oh!”

“Peggy Sue, you gotta get rid of it?”

“No way, Jack. Ah want this baby desperately an’ ah am Catholic.”

The black hole’s pull was getting stronger and stronger. The man’s finger on the trigger was just itching to put a bullet in Jack’s head.

“You’re Catholic - God - not you too, Peggy Sue?”

When Jack got home to Silver Springs that same night he had thought through what he needed to do. He loved Maria and Isabella so much that come what may, Jack had decided to come clean. He told Maria about his affair with Peggy Sue and that she had deliberately allowed herself to become pregnant. Maria went ballistic. The only Mexican words that he picked up from the tirade of abuse that she spat out at him were Madre de dios!
Mother of God, he thought, what have I done? It was like he felt the bullet exploding in his brain. A couple of days later, despite Jack’s protestations, Maria, heavily pregnant, packed some things and took Isabella on the plane down to San Antonio to stay with her parents. Although he tried many times he knew after each call to Maria that she was finished with him and he knew that he only had his super-ego self to blame. Peggy Sue begged him to move up to Anacostia. She had determined the sex of the baby she was carrying and told Jack he was going to have a son. Peggy Sue told him that she would be expecting Jack to accept paternity over the child, which he knew he could not and did not want to argue against.

“Jack, he’ll be called Milner Crossan – a piece of me and a piece of you.”

Jack did not move to Anacostia but threw himself into his work on Air Force One. Fortunately for Jack, but less so for the cause of world peace,
some dangerous flashpoints had arisen in the Middle East and also on the Pakistan / Indian frontier causing tensions to rise between the UN and the LOIN. The US President realised that the fragile peace, which had existed for a number of decades now, was under threat and he and the UN General Secretary embarked on a whistle-stop round of diplomacy on Air Force One across Europe, the Middle East, China and the Indian subcontinent. It did not take the President long to pacify the Mullahs but at least it provided Jack with some breathing space. He still yearned to have Maria, Isabella and the imminently arriving new baby back in Silver Springs. In late May 2067 Jack got a call from one of Maria’s sisters in San Antonio. Maria had given birth to a healthy baby son, which Maria had named Xavier Gonzales Crossan after her father Xavier Gonzales. Jack was allowed to go down to San Antonio for Xavier’s christening. Maria’s parents blanked out Jack but Maria’s brothers and sisters were politely pleasant to him. Xavier was a beautiful boy. He had Jack’s look about his face but he had the fiery auburn hair from his mother – and her Mexican temper too. Xavier screamed throughout the Christening Mass in San Antonio’s San Fernando Roman Catholic cathedral. Maria was polite enough to speak with Jack after the service in the Gonzales’ backyard where the christening party was for Xavier. Jack saw the bloom of her pregnancy had gone and she looked sickly, sad and pallid-looking.

“Maria, I’m asking you one last time. For the sake of your health, if not for me. Please come back to Maryland with me?”

“I can’t, Jack. You have broken my heart. I’m suing you for a divorce.”