Page 59 of Wandering in Darkness
“Why areyouinvolved?”
“What part of that is staying out of it?”
What can I say? I’m a stubborn man. “I want to know.”
“Tell me about this old mean guy.”
“He’s old and mean.”
“Tell me about him.”
We fall into silence while I pet Trav. I feel like if I tell him anything, it requires telling him about myself. And even as we spent all of that time together in the past, that’s one thing I always tried to avoid. I don’t know why. Maybe I felt like if I told him about myself, I’d be letting him know that I wasn’t good enough… because that is what I’d always been taught.
Fuck, Felix has given me more familial love than anyone else ever has. He’s hugged me more than anyone else. He’s held me…
I take a deep breath.
“Growing up… this grumpy old man was the only one I had most of the time,” I say. “He never exactly…wantedme, but I gave him no choice. And it’s not that he specifically didn’t want me around; I don’t think that grouchy old man wanted anyone around. He had kids who didn’t like him, a wife who cheated on him…
“And I… I had nothing. My mother never wanted me. My father died when I was young. I think she kept the house just so she had a place to store me as she moved on with her life without me. And whenever she did see me, I never said the right thing. I never did the right thing. I was always so fucking wrong all the time. So I saw him shooting some targets one day after my mom was especially shitty to me and I wandered over. I don’t even know why. We didn’t say a damn word to each other. I just sat on the ground, hugging my legs to myself, wanting something to distract me from the shit that was my life, and he played around with his rifle. Then we went home… and I did it again the next day. He told me I was a ‘nosy little bitch’ and then that was that.
“He became my only noise in a quiet world. He taught me to shoot and he taught me to shoot damn well. If I ever did anything wrong, I was chastised and forced to do it again and again until it was perfect. But it’s weird… it wasn’t the same as the way my mother made sure I knew that I could do nothingright. She made me feel like absolute shit, whereas when I did it right for Arthur, he made me feel so good. He made me feel like I accomplished the biggest damn thing every time I did it right.”
“Why didn’t you go to him after all of this? Why did you wander around alone?”
“I couldn’t fucking face him. The first time I did, drunk off my ass, he was so damn disappointed in me, Grayson. The disappointment… I can’t even explain it. And it hurt so badly. He was going through cancer at the time. And I was over there losing my fucking mind, drinking until I couldn’t think straight. I was… doing shit to hurt myself. And there he was… struggling to care for himself, let alone me.
“So I ran away like the fucking coward I was. I called his son up and I told him that I would go over there and beat his fucking face in if he didn’t take care of his father… Thankfully, he listened.”
“You’ve been doing better, so why haven’t you gone back?”
“I couldn’t,” I whisper. “I couldn’t face him after all the shit I did.”
“Cal… you need to stop being so hard on yourself,” Grayson says.
“There’s a lot I need, Grayson… but I don’t know if I can do any of it.”
“I have faith in you.”
“At least one of us does.”
“Far more than you realize.”
When he pulls into Arthur’s driveway, I find myself too reluctant to get out of the car. I’ve wasted so much time avoiding him. I wasn’t there for him when he needed me the most, even though he was there for me for so much of my life.
The door to the house opens and Arthur comes out with a gun in each hand.
“Is that normal?” Grayson asks.
“Crazily enough… it is,” I say as I watch him go over to the golf cart and get into the passenger seat.
He just sits there, and it’s quite apparent he’s going to sit there until I get out of the car.
I take a deep breath and get out, Grayson and Trav following me. I get into the driver’s seat as the other two get in the back and begin driving.
“You look good,” I say.
Arthur looks over at me with an arched eyebrow. “Of course I fucking look good. You think I was going to look like my bitch ex-wife? All shriveled up and wrinkly?”
