Page 87 of Broken Chorus

At least now he knew the reason behind those words.

“Unky Hawk, is Unky Aaron okay?”

Dani’s sleep slurred voice came from somewhere to the left of them, and Aaron tensed, drawing in a deep, shuddering breath as he fought to get his emotions under control.

“Y-yeah, sweetheart, I’m fine,” Aaron managed, easing away from Hawk but keeping his head turned so Dani wouldn’t see the tears soaking his cheeks.

“Why don’t you grab a seat at the table honey, and I’ll have your breakfast ready in a just a minute,” Hawk said, sighing heavily.

He gave Aaron’s shoulder a squeeze and hurried to the kitchen to deal with her before she decided to come any closer and investigate, which might have been the very best thing, because the tears wouldn’t stop despite how many times he wiped them away.

Another door opened in the hall, at which point, Aaron hurried out the front door before one of the kids caught on that everything wasn’t as okay as he claimed.

Outside, the sky was an endless gray, an early indication of a storm brewing. It would only be a matter of time before it unleashed all over them, though Aaron wished it would get it over with and maybe drown out some of what he was feeling right now.

Realistically, he knew none of it was his fault and there was nothing to be done for it now anyway. His mother was dead and hopefully she’d found the peace that she hadn’t been able to find in life, while the people who’d raised him were who they’d always been, and nothing in the world would ever change that or their lack of feeling towards him.

In the past, he’d have obsessed over that, maybe even searched for the answers in the bottom of a bottle. Now, he just aimlessly wandered up the path towards the blackberry bushes and The Thoughtful Spot, bypassing them both to push deeper into the woods, towards the clearing where he and Hawk had lay drunkenly stargazing and making out not long after the man had bought this place.

The last thing he expected was to see anyone there when he came slogging through a pile of leaves, angrily kicking them out of his path. Only there Micah was, looking as fucked up and wrecked as Aaron felt.

For a moment, their eyes locked, then Micah scrambled to his feet, head turned away, almost a mirror of the way Aaron had been when he hadn’t wanted Dani to look at him.

“H-hey,” Aaron stammered. “Y-you okay?”

“C-could ask you the same thing,” Micah shot back, still refusing to look his way. He had a folded-up newspaper in his hand, though it was hard to make out where it had come from.

“And I’d have to say no,” Aaron managed, closing the distance between them.

“Yeah,” Micah breathed. “Same.”

“I um…if you need an ear,” Aaron offered.

Micah nodded almost cautiously and lowered himself back onto the log he’d been perched on when Aaron had first stepped into the clearing.

“I…there was an a-accident…in the barn…my father…I was reading about it inA Plain Diaryit’s an Amish newspaper. I’ve only been able to keep track of my family by keeping a subscription to it. No one is allowed to talk to me until I repent and come home. Even if that were to happen, no one would accept all the ink I’ve got all over me or the fact that there are gonna be photos splashed everywhere of me with the band.”

He was rambling the way Aaron often did when he was trying to talk and still sort things out in his head. Recognizing it for what it was, Aaron stayed quiet and waited, though he was already certain he knew where the conversation was headed and felt gutted for him.

“Even if I’d known I couldn’t have gone to the funeral. I wouldn’t have been welcomed. I wasn’t even acknowledged as his child when they listed the rest of the family.”

It was on the tip of his tongue to comment about how shitty that was, but deep down, Aaron knew that was the last thing Micah needed to hear at this moment.

“I just…seeing it in black and white, being blindsided by it and knowing…” His words trailed off as he wiped at the tears on his cheeks.

Aaron sat on the ground in front of him and placed a hand on his shoulder, giving it a gentle squeeze, reminded of the way Hawk had just done this for him and hoping it helped ground Micah in a similar way.

“That you weren’t there,” Aaron said softly.

Glancing up, Micah met his eyes and nodded. “Yeah.”

“I was there when my mother took her last breath,” Aaron said softly. “But there were so many questions that I never got to ask and things I’m learning now that just muddy everything more.It still doesn’t feel like I got any closure. Being there with people who just used it as a time to point out all the ways they felt like I’ve strayed from the way they tried to raise me didn’t help either. A part of me wishes I could do something to honor her, but how am I supposed to honor someone who was barely in my life?”

“My old man was there every day until the moment I decided that I couldn’t commit myself to a faith and a way of living that wouldn’t allow me to embrace the music I loved…among other things.”

Aaron cocked his head to the side and studied him.

“Your friend Rebecka that you brought to family day, she’s more than a friend, isn’t she?”

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