Warning: this is dark and not for sensitive readers.
I open the door without knocking. Maxon sits on his bed, a photograph in each hand. He squints at them for a few more seconds while I cross my arms. Then he seems to realize my presence ad his head snaps towards me. The photographs float to the bed sheets. "Dad?" he asks.
"Right now it's King Clarkson," I say. His head stays still, fixed on me, while the rest of his body backs away.
"What did I do?" he asks, like he doesn't know.
"To my room. Now," I say. He stands up and follows me mutely through the hallways.
He doesn't know. That's the problem. Maxon is only 19 years old and he has no clue about how to run his life, let alone his future country. Which would be forgivable, if only he would listen. If only he would get it in his head that I understand, that I've been through all this before and if he keeps making these mistakes the rebels are going to dance on charred palace beams. He looks up at me with wide eyes, confused and trying not to show emotion. I contort my face in anger back at him. Today he will learn a lesson the hard way, since he insists on refusing to learn one the easy way. If he would just listen, I wouldn't have to hurt him.
I shove him ahead of me into my room and then turn to the guards outside. "I have some private business with my son. You are dismissed." My words come out quick and tense, hiding raw fury. The anger pounds against my skin, against my mouth, and I need to destroy something to get it out. I walk into the room and slam the door behind me. Then I reach over to the table by the door, grab a vase from Swendway, and smash it against the wall.
In front of me, Amberly sits on the bed next to Maxon. She has compassion in her eyes and one arm around our son. She looks up at me with a weak smile on her face and holds her other hand out to me. A drop of blood has started at the thumb and worked its way to her wrist. At the origin of the wound, a small shard of the vase I just broke sticks out. It must have bounced off the wall and landed in her.
I storm up to her and bring my face inches from hers. "Get out. Now. Go see doctor Ashlar and stay out of my sight."
She nods, gets up, and leaves without flinching. I turn to Maxon. "I bet you thought your foolishness just hurt yourself, didn't it? Well, yourself and your dear old dad, but you've never cared about the pain you cause me. Now look what your actions have brought. If you had only listened to me, your mother wouldn't be in pain right now."
Maxon stares up at me and I want to slap the defiance out of the line of his mouth. He thinks he's being tough and cool when all he's doing is resisting what's best for him. Why is this so hard for him to grasp? Did Amberly give birth to an imbecile after all?
"Are you sorry?" I ask, giving him a way out. Maybe he'll finally acknowledge that I'm not some mean old ogre, I'm a man who's lived through the same things he's going through and come out knowing a thing or two.
"Sorry for what?" he asks.
One of his hands twists the edge of the comforter and I slap it away. "Pay attention to me, not the blanket. You know what you did."
"No, I don't. I don't know what you're angry at me for. The only thing I did recently was send Natalie home. Her younger sister just died; surely you can't be angry at me for that?"
"Amberly did give birth to an imbecile," I say, half to myself. "Doctor Ashlar warned us, but you seemed so healthy as a baby. You were such a bright young boy, what happened?"
There go his fingers, twitch-twitching at the fabric again. "I don't know, dad. I mean, King Clarkson. I don't think I've changed that much."
I grit my teeth. He must be playing dumb, that's it. He's trying to put one over his father. My son has no respect for me. I need to show him I'm a man to be respected. I walk over to the mahogany cabinet by the window, unlock it, and take out a cane. It feels cold and alive in my hands, like it wants to move. I wish there was another vase around, something I could destroy and watch it shatter. I could punch the cabinet, and I have before, but it will only bloody my knuckles. Then in the next meeting with my advisers, they will stare at my hand and mutter to themselves and I will grow louder and louder, trying to fill the room with my voice to empty my shame from it. No, today I'm not desperate enough to punch the cabinet.
The shard of vase on the ground crunch and crackle as I walk back to the bed. Maxon sits insolently, still except for the fingers that rub the comforter against itself. I should have broken his camera when I had the chance; maybe that would have finally driven in the lesson.
"You're playing a long game with this selection, aren't you," I say as cooly as I can, tapping the cane against my hand. The cane itches to do more.
I wait for a response; none comes. "Aren't you?" I ask louder, and closer to his face.
"No, King Clarkson, I don't know what you're talking about," he lies. He raises his hand to wipe off a fleck of saliva that landed on his cheek.
"Natalie had to go home because she lost her sister to the rebels. Keep the girls around long enough and they'll all have personal tragedies eventually. And you'll act so sad and compassionate when you send them home. All except for America, because all her tragedies won't be good enough for her to return to Carolina. No, no. And in the end you'll just have to make America your wife, won't you? Everybody else had to go home to deal with family problems, it's not like you could have helped it, right?" I pace as I talk, every word spoken louder to drive in the point.
"What? No. Dad, that's not what I'm doing. I'm trying to narrow down these women, but I hold a place for each of them in my heart," he says.
"One more woman gone, and America's still there." I grab his jacket and rip it off, followed by his shirt. "You! Will! Not! Allow! America! To! Win! The! Selection!" I shout, punctuating each word with a whack with the cane. At that, I finally get a whimper out of him. He tries to stay sitting up but fails and lays down gingerly. Blood wells up on one of the cane wounds and slides down to the blankets.
"But I love her," he says. And now I do punch the cabinet, bloody knuckles be damned. My lips rise in a sneer and I use both hands to cane his spine. He yelps and it gives me some satisfaction, but not enough, not nearly enough. His loudest scream wouldn't be enough.
"I do," he says, still defiant, and I bring the cane down again, because I fucking know what love means. I know how Porter and Abby were so deeply in love that they would shout at each other loudly enough to wake me all the way in the Prince's Suite and I would hug my pillow and hear them make out not five minutes later. No boy of mine will go through love. I bring the cane down again and again.
"I love her," he says. I know what love means. Love means wishing you could do everything for a woman and instead breaking a vase and cutting her hand. It means scaring her to death when you destroy a room even though you know she has health issues.
No boy of mine will go through love. "It's for your own good!" I shout, bringing the cane down again, and I can see the tears now, the tears he will never admit to. He's so confused when he sees others cry. He wants to comfort them, I know, but all he can think of is what's happening now.
"No it's not. I love her!" he says, and I beat and beat and beat with the cane. I know what love means. Love means having a son you would do anything for, and then hurting him like this and later drinking and promising yourself you never will again, that you will be better than your own fucking parents, but then he does something like eliminate Natalie and down comes the cane. And the last thing I want is for him to go through love, because I know what love means, and I know the feeling of a cane on your back is a hundred times better than the feeling of hurting those you would do anything for.
He doesn't speak up again. He lays there with his eyes barely open, breathing ragged breaths.
"You will not choose America," I say, most of my energy gone and the cane lying on the floor. "She has no political influence, and you need to marry somebody with political influence. She is a five, and you need to marry somebody with social standing. I suggest Elise or Celeste."
I walk out the door, leaving him to think about his actions. Leaving me to think about how I hurt my baby boy, my miracle child after two failures. Will he hate me?
I suppose it's better than him loving me.