Page 169 of As the Rain Falls
I SAID, SHE SAID
Beckett
DECEMBER, 2016
“You’re not going towork there forever, Beckett. That’d be fucking stupid.”
My father shakes his head, looking at me like I’m nuts. I angle the phone towards me as I brush my teeth, listening to his rambling.
“You wouldn’t have to do this if you just went to college,” he adds a beat later. “Your grandmother could get you a real job.”
“Right.”
“You’re her favorite grandson, you know that?” Gregory sighs tiredly. “The old lady favors you, Beckett. Her whole business could be yours if you just tried to put in some effort—”
“If I just stopped wasting time?” I cut in, feeling numb.
“You and Lucia had your plans,” my father concedes. “But what you’re doing at the farm is… foolishness! You like wasting your life in the middle of nowhere doing God knows what? Helping an old man who’s about to die alone from a heart attack?”
“Well is a good man,” I object defensively, walking out of the bathroom now. “He’s honest. I admire that about him.”
“You admire him?” my father snaps. “What, is that the future you want for yourself now, too?”
I flinch. This isn’t about me, at least not really.He is alone in a hotel room, not doing much else.My father has no one left. Not a single soul to share his pain with. He feels alone in the world, without a family to take care of, lacking any real roots. A man who doesn’t have his feet steady on the ground is a tortured man.
I get scared about my future and how likely I am to become like him.
“I don’t know. I’m not thinking that far ahead for now.” I drop next to my computer in bed, determined to fill out all the tax forms for the farm.
Well needs a lot of help, especially now as he’s getting older. There are a lot of small administrative details he constantly misses doing, which always gets us in trouble later.These kinds of tasks aren’t his strongest suit anymore.He’s old, and his mind is slowing down.
“What about when you want a family?” my father presses more anxiously now. “Children?”
Children.
Of course, he wants me to have children. He wants me to have a kid so he can place all his best expectations on him, too.
“What do you want me to do?” I ask, closing my eyes and rubbing my temples. “You want me to do what you and Mom did?”
Study something safe. Work at the same firm my cousins do. Get married to someone I barely like. Have two kids and tolerate it all until one of them dies?
I’d genuinely rather kill myself than go through all that. It’s not worth it. Not after what happened to Lucia. I don’t have it in me to pretend anymore to try to placate him.
“That’s disrespectful.”
“I don’t mean for it to be.” I shake my head. “I’m just honestly asking at this point.”
“Don’t make me the villain for wanting better for you. I just want you to have ambition, Beckett,” Gregory curses. “For you to want a real life for yourself and get things going. You used to be different before that last year around Principal Rivera. Argh… What the hell even happened to you?”
“I—”
“Are you seeing that girl?”
I freeze, wondering where he’s getting any of this.
“What?”
“The Rivera girl,” he drags out the last word of his following sentence, sounding almost a bit mocking. “The one with thedog. Are you still seeing her?”
