From the Cyclops Cave: A Braided Memoir by Don Schofield intertwines past and present, weaving a turbulent childhood in 1950s California with an adult life shaped by solitude on the Cycladic islands of Greece. Below is an excerpt from the memoir.

1.

Walking the beach, I feel the waves wash over my feet, wet sand press between my toes. In a couple minutes I’ll let the waves draw me into the water, knee-high, chest-high, then give my whole body to their warmth. I’ll swim out toward that rocky islet beyond Náoussa Bay in leisurely sidestrokes, maybe try to reach it, maybe not. 

Later, after writing in my journal, thinking yet again about my past, I’ll sit on the broad, sun-exposed veranda of my Cyclops Cave (as the locals call this house I’ve rented), watch my neighbors come and go across the cove in their small wooden boats, hearing the ting-ting-ting of their little outboard motors, or the slow, rhythmic plash, plash of their oars as they row, facing forward, toward the open sea.

Or I might spend the afternoon on this beach, reading and watching the locals lay out their towels and straw mats. Though it’s early July, it’s a weekday, so not many bathers will be here. A grandmother with her grandkids maybe. Some boys kicking a soccer ball. A pair of lovers on the low wall near my well, in the shade of a long-needle pine.

Lying on my back, I’ll gaze across the sand toward the dozen or so houses on the other side of the cove, all bunched against each other along the rocky shore, some in the traditional Cycladic style, white cubes with red shutters, others just brick and cement, half-finished, with spikes sticking up out of their roofs like insect antennae.

When evening comes, I’ll be on my veranda again, sipping rakí or wine, letting my mind leap thought to thought, like goats leap along the slopes above this bay. After the sun sets, I listen for the bullfrogs in the cistern, there, where the houses end and the underground spring bubbles to the surface, watering a garden of lemons, pears and apricots. Soon the frogs start their all-night croaking, joined now and then by the high-pitched bray of a donkey tied to the garden gate, Francesco’s donkey, which neither he nor anyone else in Náoussa bothers to name.

I feel invisible here, leaping thought to thought, memory to memory. Just the way I like it.

2.

In my strongest early memory I’m at a hotel bar in Fresno with my father, several months after he left my mother, brother and sister in Reno but kept me—insisted on keeping me—even though he drives Greyhound busses up and down California, across Nevada. I’m four years old.

A redheaded woman with two Irish setters is sitting next to him. He’s leaning toward her, his back against the bar. She’s about forty, the same age as my dad. They’re talking low, sometimes whispering, laughing from time to time, sipping drinks, lighting cigarette after cigarette. Two overhead fans turning slowly.

I’m on the stool next to my father, turning in slow circles too. The redhead, sitting on his other side, is wearing lots of makeup, red lipstick, smelly perfume. Her setters are well-groomed. They have the same shade of red (almost) as her long, wavy hair. Their leashes clatter on the tiled floor as they get up, lie down, get up again, first one, then the other. Tongues hanging out. Panting quietly.

The bar is dark, though it’s late afternoon, black shades pulled tight over the windows, pins of light shining through. “Almost like stars,” I say, but no one hears me. No music from the jukebox. Just the sound of voices, Dad’s and that woman’s, her dogs’ panting, the squeak of my stool, the drone of the two heavy fans.

I hear him say my name now and then, or he’s talking about himself. My name is his name. But, no, he’s talking about me.

“Gordon’s a good boy. Never makes trouble.”

I’m not sure why he’s saying that, but it doesn’t matter. All that matters is that I’m hot and uncomfortable in this place, in spite of the tall Coke the bartender has just put in front of me, my second.

I try turning a little faster on the barstool. Maybe I’ll get dizzy; then I can complain to Dad and he’ll let me go up to our room.

He’s still in his grey uniform, his hat on the bar, shirt unbut toned. I’m close enough to see, if I squint, the sweat stains along the neck of his undershirt. He and that redhead have been drinking for a while. She has his full attention, though he turns toward me now and then, gives me that fake smile of his, bigger now that he’s been drinking, runs his fingers along the part in the middle of his short brown hair, and asks if I like the lady’s dogs: “Aren’t they beauties? Why don’t you go pet them?”

Sure, I like the dogs, but right now I just want to go back up to our room. I’d like to ask, Can we please leave? but I know I’m not supposed to interrupt.

Dad knows I don’t mind being in our hotel room, by myself or together with him, wherever we might be. He sent me to stay with his sister Greta in Van Nuys for a few days, hoping she might let me stay with her for good, but she didn’t really want me. And I can’t go back to Mom; he won’t let me. So these days I’m always with him, riding behind the driver’s seat when he’s on a run, or stretched out on the long seat in the back when there aren’t many passengers.

I mostly like the layovers. That’s what drivers call them, “layovers,” as if all they do when they stay over somewhere is lay around, even if they’re in one place two or three days at a time. Dad and I do sleep late most mornings, that’s true, eat a slow breakfast at our hotel, or at the depot, surrounded by other drivers, or by ourselves at some nearby diner. We stop at a drugstore along the way so he can get a newspaper and the Daily Racing Form, if they have it, and sometimes a Batman or Superman for me (though I can’t read), a story book now and then if I beg him. He rarely reads them to me. He doesn’t really like to read, nothing more than the papers and his betting sheets. After we eat, if he has errands to do, he usually takes me with him, whether it’s to the laundromat, the bank or post office. We take our time.

Before it gets too hot, though, we’re back at our hotel. In the evening he’ll shower and shave—how I love to watch him lather his round, chubby cheeks and thick neck, steam coming up from the sink, mirror fogged. He splashes on aftershave when he’s done, dabs a little on my chin too, then gives me a wink. When he’s finished, it’s my turn to shower.

He calls me skinny and a towhead (whatever that means) when he wants to tease me. He doesn’t mention my small nose or my dimpled chin. But when I press my face close to the mirror, there they are—that little nose, that dent at the bottom of my face.

For dinner we go to whatever diner or coffee shop is nearby. He mostly orders steak and potatoes of some kind, usually mashed. Never talks much while we eat, never leaves anything on his plate, insists that I clean mine too. And he always has coffee, cup after cup, whatever the meal, puts down his fork now and then to have a cigarette, takes a few puffs then lets it burn down in the ashtray as he continues eating.

Some nights, if he’s in a good mood, we’ll go to a movie. I can’t see the picture very well—can’t see much of anything really, except from up close—so we always sit near the front. He likes Westerns and war movies. I like cartoons and the fast-paced newsreels. Always soldiers marching somewhere, planes crashing, big floods or earth quakes. And I like sitting there in the dark next to him, just me and him, the smell of popcorn, the feel of my shoes sticking to the floor.

Other nights we just watch TV in our room. He’s on his side of the bed, in shorts and undershirt, sitting up against the headboard, sipping a can of beer, and I’m on my side, head propped on my elbows at the foot of the bed. Just as often, I’m sitting on the floor looking up at the screen.

Sometimes, when I’m bored, I think about Mom. Do I miss her? I don’t know, I barely remember her. We’ve been away from her for a long time, since just after my birthday last October. I’ve talked to her once or twice on the phone, that’s it.

The last time all she said was, “You gotta start school soon, Gordon. Kindergarten.” Didn’t say she misses me.

“She was in a hurry,” Dad said.

I miss my brother more. Janet, my half-sister, not so much. We fight a lot, Larry and me. He never shares his toys. Or maybe it’s me who won’t share, I don’t know. I know that he likes to hit me with that brace he has on his leg. Tries to hit Dad with it too when he yells at Mom or throws something at her. Dad just ignores him, gives him a shove and sends him to his room. Sometimes he swats him for no reason at all. Doesn’t like hearing the clatter of that brace. But he’s never hit me, not once, not even when I’m bad. Won’t let Mom touch me either.

Will it still be like that when we go back?

I sleep better in these hotel rooms beside him than I do at home, sharing a bed with my brother. Larry always kicks me in his sleep. And if he doesn’t wake me, Mom and Dad do the nights they fight. And they’re always fighting, sometimes even before we go to bed, first yelling threats, then slamming doors, then one of them throws a beer can or an ashtray, and my brother and I cower on the couch or go hide in the bedroom. Janet, who’s older and has a different father, never seems to be there.

Yelling at Mom, Dad always accuses her of having guys on the sly, running around with truckers and ex-boyfriends while he’s out on his runs. Says my brother isn’t his. Larry was born with some disease and has to wear that metal thing. Dad’s ashamed of him, can’t bear to see him trying to walk with that “clanky appendage,” as he calls it. “Some
one else fathered that defect!” That’s what he used to say, according to Mom, before I was born. So when I came along two years later I was all his, even though I too was defective (a preemie, she says, kept in an oxygen tent for three months). Even named me after him.

He loved to put me on his shoulders and walk through the neighborhood. I was his. End of story. Which meant, when they finally split up….

I don’t remember what really happened that last night. Did she gather up my brother and sister and take off? Did she kick him out? Did he just up and leave, with me on his shoulders? I don’t know. Mom says one thing, he says another. But one thing’s for sure: He took me and left the ones “not his” with her.

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