Date: Mon, 1 May 2023 18:28:29 -0700
From: Juxepe Albi <juxepealbi@gmail.com>
Subject: An Affair to Remember - Chapter 2 - It Was Assignation, I Know

Chapter 2 - It was Assignation, I know [tune of "It was Fascination"]

Nearly a year had passed. It was 2am when my phone jarred me out of
sleep. It was Marlene. She called to ask me for a "favor": could she
send Etienne to New York to stay with me for a few weeks? It seemed he
had gotten in with a bad crowd, was running wild, and had gotten a young
girlfriend pregnant. The girl's father, a local gangster, had threatened
to kill him on sight; and Marlene wanted desperately to get him away from
New Orleans----I agreed to take him.

I had a four-bedroom townhouse in Chelsea, which had an additional small
apartment with a bedroom, sitting room and bath for servants. My
on-the-side business was a small, rather successful, medical publishing
company, where I worked nearly ten hours a day, which left me with little
time to spend with a troubled teen. We got along extremely well; but
Etienne knew no one in New York. School was out for the summer; and he
was bored to death. I began to take more time off from the company; and
we drove to the New Jersey shore on the weekends. I had a three-bedroom
cottage in Wildwood and came in one evening to find Etienne with a
teenaged girl in his bed. They were both out cold and the room smelled
like rum. They were lying naked on the bed; and Etienne had a condom
still on his manhood. It obviously had burst at some point. I didn't know
if that happened before or after he withdrew.

"Shit!" I said aloud.

In an ashtray on the nightstand was a fat, half-smoked joint.

"Shit!" I said, again.

The girl was the sixteen year old daughter of my Wildwood next-door
neighbors. They were extremely permissive with their children; and I
hoped that we did not become "related."

When the school year approached, Etienne wanted to go home to New
Orleans. I called Marlene, who had made a deal with the family of the
girl there. Marlene (read that: "I") would pay for the hospital costs
and keep the baby. The girl did not want a baby, any baby, nor did her
Catholic parents, who did not believe in abortion.

A month after Etienne was back in New Orleans, I got a call from
Wildwood. My neighbor was calling to inform me that my son had gotten
their daughter pregnant. She didn't want the baby; but she would carry it
to term for $3,000 and hospital costs, which would be considered by some
to be a real bargain. They had a lawyer friend, a Mr. Finley, who called
me the next day to find out where to mail the paperwork. While we were on
the phone, he let it slip that the girl had had a baby the previous year;
and they had settled for $5,000 and hospital costs. She liked Etienne, so
he got a cheaper price. I was shocked, but told the lawyer I would agree
to the terms. Etienne was not quite fourteen years old, and was going to
have two babies by two different mothers----one would be born in
September, the other in November!

It was a welcome surprise to learn that the townhouse next to mine was
available for sale. The owner had died, having lived there as an invalid
for many years. I looked at it and was horrified at the condition of the
place. It would need to be refurbished from floor to ceiling. I couldn't
imagine how the walls could have become so grimy. Siobhan, one of the
girls who worked in my office, was married to a man named Hiram
MacCauley, who was a very good carpenter. They lived in a real dive on
the Lower East Side and Hiram agreed to fix up the townhouse in exchange
for a year's free rent at their own place. While we were negotiating, his
building was turned into a co-op. Buyers willing to make an advance
purchase were offered a very good deal. I bought their apartment, a
four-bedroom, with the understanding that they would move back there
after the remodeling was completed; and we would negotiate the rent.


Siobhan's sister, Colleen, and her husband, were living in a mobile home
(or trailer) somewhere near Scranton, Pennsylvania. She had woken up that
morning to discover that her husband had packed up his clothes during the
night and left her, taking their car. They had a two-month-old baby, and
she had no means of support; although she had graduated from some cooking
school in the City. I had been wondering what I was going to do when I
had a baby to care for; so, after calling Colleen, and telling her to get
ready to come back with us, I took Siobhan with me in the car and left
for Scranton.

Colleen and her baby boy would now be living in the servant's apartment
in my townhouse. She was thrilled with it; as, compared to where she had
been living, it was a palace. There was a small kitchenette off the
sitting room, but most of her meals would be from the main kitchen, where
she would be doing the honors of preparing our meals.


Hiram, Siobhan's carpenter husband, brought in his work crew, and quickly
converted one of my bedrooms into a nursery and playroom in anticipation
of the "baby-boom," and I made sure it had every baby thingy that I
could find.

Colleen was determined to breastfeed both babies, as her milk production
far exceeded what her little bundle of joy could consume; and she was
glad; and I was surprised, when Marlene called on September 10th, begging
me to take the baby she had contracted to take. She had been diagnosed
with cancer, and was going into the hospital for treatment. It seemed no
one among the New Orleans relatives was inclined to take over a newborn,
no matter whose it was. I sent Siobhan for the infant, as Marlene was due
to go in for treatment in two days.

Not surprisingly, the baby boy had my and Etienne's hair and eyes;
although there really wasn't that much hair yet sprouted. The Wildwood
lawyer, Mr. Finley, took care of the paperwork at a very modest fee. I
noticed that I had been listed as "grandfather" on the custody
paperwork and the baby had been named Reynald Drayford Falkessen, my
surname. I had no idea where the other names had come from, but it didn't
matter to me. Marlene had changed Etienne's last name to Falkessen, as
well. She hadn't told me, but that's what was on his birth certificate,
Etienne Collard Falkessen. Collard was Marlene's maiden name.

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