Page 95 of Pieces We Keep

As we arrive at the front door, I remember how I never used this entrance. I was supposed to come around back and use the back entry. That came in handy when I got older and would sneak my friends into the house. Hobo and his sister spent many nights in the basement when their parents were at their most dangerous or the weather got bad.

I knock on the door, knowing the asshole is home. He retired after my mom died. My sisters claimed his heart was broken. I don’t doubt he loved her. My sisters did, too. I just don’t care about their pain because they never got around to caring about mine.

Asshole Lloyd answers the door, wearing a robe and slippers like he’s lost the will to put any effort into life. His head is the sallow kind of bald. His eyes seem yellowish. My sister Harper claims grief is leading her dad to drink himself to death. I only stared at her when she said that since I couldn’t figure out if she was trying to cheer me up.

“What do you want?” Asshole Lloyd grumbles.

I push my way inside and make room for Irina. When the asshole tries to stop me, I warn, “Get out of the way or I’ll put you on your ass.”

“You have no right.”

I pin him to the wall and stare into the eyes of the man who refused to let me into his family. After he showed me zero mercy as a boy, I choose to offer him none now.

“Get out of my way, or I’ll burn this house down. Now, go sit in front of your TV and fuck off.”

Asshole Lloyd was once a strong man willing to intimidate his woman’s boy. He was never one of those flabby dads with a beer belly. He worked out every day. I’d see him jogging or hear him on the rowing machine upstairs in the room that should have been mine.

The days of Asshole Lloyd being stronger than me are long gone. I could have killed him as a teen boy. I had many fantasies about how I’d end him. I never did, though. Not because I feared him or going to jail. I just didn’t want to upset my mom.

Walking away from a frightened Asshole Lloyd, I lead Irina toward the basement stairs. I slow down so she can ease down each step. I think of her carrying my kid. The last time she had a baby inside her, she was trapped with a bitter jerk. Does she think that’s what I’ll become if she tells me the truth? I’m certain she’s pregnant just by how her hand goes protectively to her belly whenever she feels under threat. Yet, she keeps her secret.

I stand in the room, mostly unchanged from when I lived here. My bedroom has been cleaned out, looking bland now. Asshole Lloyd threw out all my stuff when I left. I knew he would, but I didn’t care enough about any of my posters or other shit to salvage them.

Mom did save the trophies I got in fourth grade Little League. She came to most of my games, even if Asshole Lloyd tried to distract her.

“I know my mom loved me,” I tell a confused Irina. “I know I mattered to her.”

“Of course, you did.”

Looking around the basement, I’m surprised by how small the place feels now. Was the ceiling always so low? This space used to fit all my friends who would sneak over whenever Asshole Lloyd took the family on one of their monthly getaways. How did this cramped finished basement with the wood paneling and thin gray carpet fit a dozen teenagers?

“I put my mom on a pedestal,” I explain to Irina as I look around. “I need Jillian to be special. I can’t accept how I might not have been special to her. Maybe if I were a young man, I could find a way to deal with her failings. But I’m too old, and she’s dead. I need her to be special.”

“She was, Eagle.”

I look around the basement again and notice all the eagle figurines still on the bookshelves. That’s how I got my road name. The guys started calling me “Eagle” as a taunt over this ridiculous décor left behind from when Asshole Lloyd would invite his buddies over for pool in the basement.

I used to hate being called Eagle. Then, Hobo insisted eagles were powerful and free. They could fly away from their problems or attack them.

“Rhett is just a kid stuck in a basement,” he said when we were stoned long ago. “Eagle fucks up people and goes where he wants.”

His words clicked for me, and I never wanted to be called Rhett again.

“I wasn’t allowed upstairs,” I tell Irina. “Even when only my mom and sisters were around, I had to stay down here. This was my home, not up there. I wasn’t included at meals. I never got to open presents on Christmas with the rest of them. When they went on family trips, even holiday ones, I stayed home. My mom let that happen, but I can’t hate her.”

“No one wants you to,” she says softly.

“I want her up on a pedestal, okay? I need her to have been a good person because she was the only one who loved me for a long time. To think she was a piece of shit would kill me.”

Irina rests her hands on my chest and stares into my eyes. She’s so damn beautiful, and I want to keep her with me.

“Your mom was a teenager when she had you. She had nothing but her boy. Then, this older guy with money and promises offered her a home. She probably figured he’d bond with you over time. Eventually, she realized he never would, but she was already weighed down with your sisters. I can imagine how she wanted more but didn’t know how to make that happen.”

Nodding, I admire Irina’s soft gaze. She seems like she loves me. I want to believe in her like I did my mom. Yet, I fear I’m fooling myself.

“Sometimes, dinner wouldn’t come down here, even though I could tell they were eating. I’d think they forgot about me. Then, Jillian would bring my dinner after they finished. We’d watch TV and talk about school and how I hadn’t made friends yet. She never made fun of me for that. She got how I was shy and didn’t know my place.”

“She loved you, Eagle,” Irina says, tearing up. “Don’t let people make you think about the bad stuff. Just remember how she loved her little boy.”

---