All I wanted was to have my son Craig back in my life. I sat around my house, so quiet now without him. My anger was gone. I'd fucked up. That was true. But I could make amends. I could get him back.
Days went by so fast, turning into months, threatening years. I'd call him on the phone and felt nervous, felt it in my stomach, the twisting. This was my son and I was nervous and scared to even call him. And he'd be on the line, a coldness inside of his words, the loaded way he said "dad". The pause before he said "I love you,"
I could look over my sins. I'd been cold and hard and unrelenting. I'd hurt him in every way imaginable. I'd taken that belt in my hands and just because it would feel so good for that one second I crashed it down onto his back and his thighs and his arms. I saw the look of fear but I was beyond that. I could console myself by saying I wasn't myself then, but that wasn't true, that wasn't owning responsibility. I was myself and I had fucked up.
Could I rebuild our relationship like a house that had fallen down, rebuild it brick by brick? I thought I could. I had to believe that I could.
So I went to anger management classes. Anger had always been one of my downfalls. I had to learn how to manage this anger, how to deal with it in a way that wouldn't hurt me and everyone around me. Had life failed to teach me this lesson? How could you learn this cramming for the medical boards while your wife was sleazing around town with used car salesmen? How could you learn this when your son just could not seem to listen and obey your reasonable requests? How could you learn this when the pressures of your job built up like steam in a weak teapot, and everything was just ready to blow?
But I had to learn it. The cheating wife was dead and gone. The insolent son was living with her husband. I rambled around my big house like some lord in red velvet robes, drinking expensive wine from crystal goblets. What good was all of this just for me?
I was nervous about going to his school at the end of the year, but I knew he'd be there. I knew so little about his life anymore, I didn't really know where he went or what he did. I didn't know his friends. So I drove there, feeling my heart trip hammering in my chest, feeling the rebound of blood in my ears. The car provided a smooth ride and I glided to the school and waited for the kids to spill out of its front doors.
I saw him, still looking pretty much the same in clothes I'd never seen before. New jeans and new sneakers, but the same cracked leather jacket. He was talking to two kids, a boy and girl. A punk looking boy and a goth looking girl, a witchy looking girl. I swallowed hard, resisted the urge to think that those weren't the sort of kids he should be associating with. More and more it was his life now. I had to remember that. I had to remember so many things.
"Dad? What…what are you doing here?" There was no pleasure in his voice or his expression. There had been a sharp bright look of fear for just a second, but that had crumbled and gave way to this look. A look just short of anger.
"I wanted to see my son," I said simply, truthfully. That was all. I'd wanted to see my son.
"Meet his friends," I said, and the girl stepped forward and smiled at me beneath her dark charcoal eye shadow and dark red lipstick.
"Hello, Dr. Manning," she said, and I heard the respect in her voice at that, Doctor. That cache goes a long way, all those late nights studying by one lamp and a pot of coffee, absorbing pages of dry text. All so some goth chick teenage girl can say the title with awe and respect? I took her offered hand, draped in the black cloth of her medieval outfit, the nails sharp and painted black, "I'm Ashley Kerwin,"
"And you are?" I said to the punk boy, but he glared at me and spit. But I knew who he was. Shawn.
"Do you need a ride?" I said, dismissing his friends, and I saw the play of emotions on his face. Confusion, uncertainty, anger, fear. Craig had always been very expressive.
"I, I live with Joey now," he said, and I heard the almost stutter, the way he repeated words. When I would be beating him and just after that stutter was bad, and it made me feel bad. Stutters are weird things and I knew trauma could trigger them.
"To Joey's then," I said, and he smiled, shook his head. Such a curious smile, all nervousness, like his inappropriate laughter. He'd always laughed at the worst times.
"Maybe we could go out for dinner," I suggested, hearing the desperation in my voice. He was looking around, behind him at the blank glass doors, at the blank gray sky. The smile faded.
"I, uh, I can't," he said, smiling again, his wide smile, but it didn't touch his eyes. He wanted me to leave and I would oblige him. I'd go.
"Another time, then," I said, trying to let him know that I wanted to rebuild this house. Trying to let him know that I was sorry.