Page 162 of Catch Me
He grabbed a pack of hotdogs and tossed them into the cart. After we’d found the buns and the hamburgers, I glanced over at him.
“What’d you mean about me not wanting to meet you because of what I’ve heard?”
For a few minutes, I thought he wouldn’t respond. It wasn’t until we were waiting in line to check out that he turned to me.
“I’m the villain in his story, see. The dad who sent him off to a place that hurt him.”
“That’s not... He doesn’t feel that way. You took him out, and you guys fixed everything between you.”
He nodded slowly. “Sure, but moving on from something doesn’t erase it. There are some people who don’t care about what I did after.”
“What people?” When he shook his head, I crossed my arms over my chest. “Come on.”
“There are people online who are cruel,” he said simply. “Just like everywhere in this world. They’re in their own pain, and they get angry. Maybe they want to defend Trav.”
“Have they threatened you?”
“On occasion, but mostly, they just shout at me through a keyboard. It isn’t a big deal.”
“That’s horrible. Does he know?”
He breathed a laugh and continued forward with the line. “My son is a protector. He sees injustice and needs to do something about it. These are just kids who feel the same way, who don’t have the influence he does, who maybe can’t say these things to their own folks. So, I let them do it.”
I thought about that, unsure what I could even say. Most people in his shoes would’ve gone private and probably asked Travis to hold back his followers somehow. I didn’t know how many went after Theo or how often, but I did know how cruel people could be. Even if he was right about where their intentions came from, it must’ve worn him down sometimes.
We were silent as we checked out and when he went to the food court. He ordered two ice creams, and when he passed me one, I muttered a thanks. It wasn’t until we got back in the Jeep that I was able to pull myself out of my head. Grabbing my tablet, I navigated to a sketch I hadn’t opened since December. I flipped it around and showed it to Theo. His eyes were wide as he studied it, from Carl’s small frame to his son, who was tapping the bat against the kid’s shoulder like he was knighting him.
“You said we were the ones who got ourselves here, even if someone once did something that nudged us toward it,” I said. “Camp Dumont was shitty, and it was even shittier that you sent him there, but do you think he’d be this person if none of it had happened? He’s the kindest person I’ve ever met, but I think it’s a kindness that he has to forge out of his own pain—his anger. I know a little bit about that.”
Theo took the tablet and stared at the picture. “He told me he hated me once, you know.”
I was surprised that he didn’t sound sad or even forlorn. It was just a matter-of-fact statement, a piece of the past he’d probably felt too deeply a thousand times.
“That was the moment in my life when I learned how horrific a single mistake could be. Like I said, though, we don’t get to erase those things. It’s not like this.” He hovered his fingers above the screen.
“I know a little bit about that too.”
With a soft smile, he passed the tablet back to me. “There’s no going back. You keep on trucking, day after day. Whatever mistake you made, you have to own it, then you keep adding more color, over and over, until you can barely see the old lines. Or”—he turned the key, and the engine roared to life—“you can start a brand new page. You’re not just talented, Roman. I can see that you’re a good person. If you were my son, I’d be so proud of you that I’d never stop gabbing about it, just like Trav did when he got you that gig.”
I gripped the tablet tightly as we pulled out of the lot.
Proud? He didn’t even know me. How the hell had a Costco trip done some weird shit to my emotions?
“Plus,” he went on, “you’re a burgeranddog guy. Ain’t no other way to do backyard grillin’. You can take that to the bank.”
I couldn’t help but laugh, which immediately got rid of the weird gloom.
Goddamn these McKinney men.
Chapter 54
Travis
“That kid is a good one.” Dad tipped his beer toward the house.
I looked inside and saw Roman sitting at the island with his tablet. Always with that damn tablet.
“What?”
