Page 126 of Sapphire Spring

Mason could hear Tony trying to interject, could see the mancoming toward them out of the corner of his eye. “You didn’t have to! That’sthe point. Every day you made it crystal clear what would happen if I ever toldyou.”

“I didn’t know who you were! It wasn’t about you!”

There was pressure on Mason’s shoulder. It was Tony,standing next to his chair now, trying to put a stop to this. But Masoncouldn’t stop. “You’d never so much as give me a hug or pat me on the back. Ifyou ever got hurt or I tried to help you, you’d bat me away like you thought Ihad a disease. You knewdamnwell who I was, and youthought I was so disgusting you couldn’t touch me.”

“I was protecting you!”Pete’s roar would haveterrified Mason if there hadn’t been something else in it—something Mason hadnever seen before. Pete was crying. “The bestdamnthing I ever didfor you was not touching you!” He’d pointed a finger at Mason, but his jaw wasshaking. All of him, it seemed, was shaking, as if this admission was a gasvent that had burst through layers of bedrock.

Tony still gripped one of Mason’s shoulders, but his otherhand was open and extended toward Pete, as if to hold him in place. The groupwas stunned silent. It felt like they were doing the same thing Masonwas—waiting to see if Pete was about to fall apart.

The next thing Mason knew the chair across from his wasempty and they were listening to his father’s Mercedes peeling out of the dirtparking lot.

They took a short break. Thesympathetic hugs he got from the group implied they assumed he’d been rejectedand cast aside. Mason didn’t feel that way.

He felt drained, humbled, but his head felt clear.

A map to his father’s anger was being shaken free of dust,and Mason wasn’t the source.

His dad never wanted to talk about his own father.

Never wanted to refer to the man as Mason’s grandfather.

Never wanted to draw a link between his son and his own dad.Mason had always assumed this meant Pete thought he and his own father occupiedsome special men’s club, and Mason hadn’t earned membership. But his father’sparting words rang in his head, suggesting a distinctly different possibility—Iwas protecting you.

The day before Pete had admitted for the first time that hisfather drank. Drank worse than Mason which, given recent events, was sayingsomething.

And then, in the one on one, the kicker. His belief that nottouching his own son was the best thing he could have done for him. And hehadn’t used the word hitting or throttling.

Touching.

Tony gave Mason the option of sitting out a few of the othersessions, but he stayed for all of them, did his best to pay attention.

The last scheduled event of Family Week was a s’mores-makingsession around the fire pit. As the afternoon darkened into evening, there wasstill no sign of his dad. Another family invited Mason to sit with them duringdinnerso he didn’t feel abandoned. He was midway throughhis turkey casserole when Tony appeared over his shoulder. “Bring your food tomy office,” he said. Then Mason was taking a seat at the same desk where he’dcalled and asked Pete to come to Pine Rise. Tony picked up the receiver, tookthe call off hold, and handed it to Mason.

Mason listened, hearing faint country music in thebackground and a low clamor of conversation.

“Dad?”

“I went to a bar. Down the road.” Pete’s voice was slightlyslurred. “That’s why I didn’t come back. I went to a bar, and I thought itwouldn’t be right to… You know, my breath probably stinks, and I figured itwouldn’t be right…” He didn’t sound wasted, but he sounded fairly numbed out.

“It’s fine,” Mason said. “I’m glad you called.”

“Are you?”

Mason closed his eyes and tried to summon all the gentlenesshe could. “What did he do to you, Dad?”

Silence.

“What did your dad do to you?”

He was prepared for the man to hang up. But the countrymusic continued, the glasses clinked. A door opened and closed on greasy hinges.“The fucked-up part is I was so young I didn’t know it was wrong at first. Butpart of me thought…maybe.Soat school I keptlistening to the other boys talk about their dads, and nobody ever talked abouttheir dad doing stuff to them like mine was doing to me. That’s when I knew itwasn’t normal.”

Mason felt something inside of him give way. He prayed forthe perfect words and realized the best he might be able to offer his old manin this moment was his ability to listen.

“Whatever,” Pete said. “Like that’s the only fucked-up partof it.”

“How long? How long did it go on?”

“He lost interest around the time I would have been bigenough to shove him off. Not sure if one was connected to the other.”

---