Page 155 of Two Marlboros

Ash was silent for a moment. “Him too?”

“Yeah.”

“Are you really sure he said that?”

I thought about it for a moment. I wondered if maybe I was misremembering, but the crooked feeling I had felt when Nathan had said it was very clear to me.

“Yes.”

“Well, then it leaves little room for interpretation,” Ash continued. “If you didn’t tell him anything, it was impossible for him to know that someone he knows has something to do with the robbery and that the motive is drugs. Unless...”

“Don’t say that, not even as a joke,” I replied offhandedly. “He has nothing to do with this.”

Ash sighed. I felt embarrassed by how quickly I had defended Nathan, because it said so much - perhaps too much - of how I felt about him.

“You have to keep the two things separate, Alan. If you get too involved you risk compromising the investigation, and I’m not going to look like an idiot with Church.”

“Neither am I,” I retorted dryly.

“Look,” he said again, “give me some time to think about it. In the next few days, we’ll question him about the attack and hear what he says. In fact, we shouldn’t jump to any conclusions,” and he paused for a moment. “Not one way or the other.”

“That’s fine,” I only replied. I too needed time to chew over the attack, my feelings, Nathan’s feelings, his statements. Drawing sums at that moment was not an astute move.

“Ah, one last thing and I’ll leave you. Cossner stopped by the station to confirm his statements.”

“Really? I didn’t think he would do that.”

“Maybe he trusts us more than his friend William. Which is saying something.”

I blew out a laugh. We exchanged a few more pleasantries, said our goodbyes, and ended the call.

I stared at the phone, then thought back to Nathan, and wondered if he really knew about Ryan and the robbery. What had he gotten himself into?

27

New Nathan, old Nathan

(?Boyzone - No matter what)

My father had been a reference throughout my childhood. James Hayworth, a name that carried fame and esteem with it, a pillar on which to build one’s existence and, consequently, the man whose advice could only be right. It had been the passage of years that had turned the man into a giant, who had nothing good about him, however, good in fact only at ranting and raising his hands, and then looking at me with that guilty look, because I had ruined his life and he had to bear the burden of my existence.

In that moment, however, sitting in that chair that was too small for him, I was able to see him for what he was: a man in his early forties, perhaps a little bigger than me, but with a tiny little heart, standing there looking around the room with a strange interest.

I felt a little sorry for him. He had spent a good part of his life lashing out at me, at the son who was not what he had wanted, as indeed I had, because I had never been what he would have wanted. He had spit so much of that poison at me that I had eventually gotten used to it and a little bit I had become poisonous myself, detached, and maybe that was why no one had ever wanted to stay with me. I had been infected by that poison, and I would spit it out to make the poor guy on duty believe that he could be the most important person on this planet the day before, only to become a nobody the next day. Just like my father had done to me.

I looked a little like him. I looked like that man who now looked at me in the eye, but I didn’t care anymore. He could have said the most disparate things to me, offended me, but I wouldn’t have minded. I was no longer under his tutelage, I no longer had to submit to his laws. He had chosen to let me go, and with that gesture he had also given up educating me and imposing his way of thinking on me. I was at that moment free to do right and wrong, and he could have criticized me all he wanted, but I was no longer under his control. In a way, I almost felt like a new Nathan.

It was for that reason that I was not afraid of anything he would say. I was just waiting for him to open his mouth to speak, but I realized that I had waited far too long with him.

“Are you going to say something before time runs out?”

His expression did not change one bit. I couldn’t tell if it was blank or indecipherable. He barely tightened his lips, but it was the only movement that came out of him.

“The hospital called me.”

Old Nathan might have answered him stymied, but that life no longer belonged to me. If I had stopped embracing its poison and indifference, maybe I would have gotten rid of it too.

“Good.”

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