We Sang in the Sunshine

Katheryn aka Kat main character
Steve husband
Sean- oldest son
Doug second son
Sara daughter
Larry piano man
John Kat`s lover



We Sang in the Sunshine


The piano man was having a lot of difficulty getting the audience involved in his sing along set. Several patrons had requested songs and then refused to sing along when the request was played. The grand piano was nestled snugly into the horseshoe shape of the bar. The stools around it were all occupied with the exception of the one next to me. That particular barstool proved to be instrumental in my downfall, or my salvation depending on one’s point of view.
I was in Victoria, British Columbia on an assignment for the software company that I work for in my home town of Seattle, Washington. It had been a hard day of trouble shooting programs, but the worst part was the company president who kept hitting on me and threatening to find another software provider if I didn’t go out with him. The funny thing is I might have taken him up on his offer if he hadn’t been such a creep. He was a good looking man and didn’t have to employ the techniques he used to get women. He told me he had been with half the women who worked for him and the only reason he had not been with the others was because they were too ugly. I figured any man who was that busy would be too worn out for me. Besides, he reminded me of my husband of eight years, who I was fast learning to despise. If not for our three beautiful kids, I would have left him long ago.
I finished my day of work and gave Mr. Company president an excuse that I wouldn’t have believed myself, but he seemed okay with it. I told him my husband was flying in to meet me for dinner as he had an appointment with an attorney concerning some international law suit that his company had brought against a Canadian firm. I had one more day of work and was scheduled to fly home the next day, so I wouldn’t have to worry about him tomorrow.
I left one particularly troubling piece of software half finished and caught a cab to my hotel. I took a nice relaxing bath and then called home. “Hi, hon. how are you?” Steve just grunted in response.
“How was your day?”
“What you really mean is how was Joe’s day?”
“What are you talking about?” Joe lives next door.
“So you two have been sneaking around haven’t you? Did you think I wouldn’t find out?” He was shouting so loudly I had to hold the receiver away from my ear to avoid the pain of his loud voice.
“What are you talking about? I haven’t seen Joe since the last time the four of us played cards together.”
“Then why in the hell was he asking about you today?”
“Well I don’t know, but I would assume he was just being polite.”
“That’s bullshit and you know it. No man asks about another man’s wife unless he’s been dorking her.”
“God, you are something else. That is about the craziest thing I’ve ever heard. I have not been seeing Joe. Just where do you come up with these crazy ideas?”
“I’ll meet you at the airport tomorrow and serve you with divorce papers, and you can count on that.” He had used that threat so many times in the last two years that it no longer frightened me He hung up the phone before I could ask to talk to our oldest son, Sean, who was seven now. I called back several times, but he wouldn’t pick up. I left a message for Sean, telling him I loved him. I knew he would never hear it, because Steve would delete it immediately. I screamed “you bastard” into the phone and slammed it down. I know he didn’t hear me, but I’ll bet the people in the room next to mine did. When I travel I carry a five by seven framed picture of Steve and the kids with me. When I check into a hotel room it is the first thing unpacked and the last thing packed when I leave. I picked it up from the nightstand now and studied it, trying desperately to understand what was wrong with Steve and me. God, Steve, what has happened to you? What has happened to us? Why are you so distrustful of me? Do you no longer have any self confidence? You used to be so sweet. Anger began to well up inside me, anger that directed more at me than at Steve. I was having periods of hating the man that I had loved all my life, and I was angry that I could feel that way about him. If I could feel hate toward him did it follow that I could hate the kids as well? I flung myself on the bed and cried as I beat my fists into the pillow.
Our relationship hadn’t always been this way. The first five years of our marriage were great. The three kids were born in rapid succession. First Sean, was born, then Doug, and finally Sara. It was shortly after Sara was born that his abusive ways began to show. In retrospect, I should have expected it. Steve and I grew up next door to each other. His mother used to send him over to play with me when her husband went on a bender and began to verbally berate and slap her around.
Steve was my first and only love throughout the thirty-one years of my life. My first sexual experience happened with him when I was eleven and he was thirteen. He came over one night to get away from one of his dad’s tirades. My parents had gone to a movie and left me home alone. That night I learned that certain parts of the male anatomy become larger when massaged. I also learned that continued massage causes that same part to shrink. I admit that I felt a certain sense of power in knowing that I could have that much control over him. I truly felt proud and worthy of being his girl. The feeling continued to grow stronger over the years.
Steve and I became inseparable after that night, and we always knew we would be married some day. After high school he went to an eastern college and two years later I went to college in the Midwest. We only saw each other on vacation for the next six years. As soon as I graduated, we were married.


I love Steve dearly, but the last two years of his verbal abuse has taken a toll on my tolerance. He was physically abusive, but I was becoming more and more afraid of his temper. I picked up the phone and called my mother and asked if she would go pickup the kids. She told me she had already done so. Steve had called her earlier and asked that she come and get them. I talked with Sean for a minute or two and asked him to get his brother and sister near the phone so I could say good-night and tell them I love them.

I got dressed and dragged myself to the piano bar in the lounge of the hotel. I was on my third glass of red wine and feeling pretty low. Piano man asked me several times if there was something he could play to cheer me up. “No,” I said, “I just want to sit here and feel miserable.” He left me alone after that.

My first awareness that a man had sat down next to me came when Larry, the piano man, acknowledged him and asked if he had any requests. “Lots of them,” the man said. He made a request for a song I had never heard of.
“Man, you’re reaching way back,” Larry said.
“I go way back.”
“I only know the first two lines,” Larry said. He sang them and then the man fed him the third line. “No phone, no pool, no pets,” he said. The crowded seemed to liven up a little. A few others joined in the singing. Larry and the man picked songs that I assume some may have been too embarrassed to ask for. He and Larry went on for an hour like this. I believe the man knew every song ever recorded and many that were never recorded. All genres were his specialty, rock, pop, blues, country and jazz. He was a walking music encyclopedia. I found myself joining in on the singing of many of the songs and the rest of the crowd came alive and soon everyone was asking for songs and singing along. Jokes were bounced back and forth between Larry and the man and the crowd laughed at most of them. To be Continued.