Kindred5
1973
I was so focused on shooting baskets into the hoop over the garage door that I didn't notice the car pulling into the driveway until it was halfway to the house. Uncle Pete was halfway out the door by the time I turned to look. I saw Aunt Cindy on the other side of the car, and ran to her.
Aunt Cindy hugged me. She always smelled faintly of roses, and to this day, the scent of roses reminds me of Aunt Cindy and her house outside of Atlanta.
"Mason, we would have been here sooner, if we had known."
I didn't say anything. My father had not called my mother's older sister until after her funeral. I wasn't so young that I didn't know that that was wrong, but I did not want to speak against my father.
Uncle Pete came around the side of the car; I could hear his footsteps on the rough concrete. I turned to him. He reached out his hand to shake mine; I liked that. He treated me like an adult, and not a child.
"Son, we would have been here for you." I loved listening to Uncle Pete's soft southern voice.
"I know." I lowered my eyes. Of course they would have. Aunt Cindy and Uncle Pete had no children of their own, and had always taken a great deal of interest in me—and in Marcus, when he was still alive.
"What's going on here?" Uncle Pete asked, pointing to the new 'For Sale' sign in the front yard.
"Dad's selling the house."
"I see that." Uncle Pete looked at Aunt Cindy in the way adults do. He thought I didn't see it or wouldn't know what he meant, but I knew they both disliked and disapproved of my father. I disliked him, too, for other reasons, but I never spoke of that to anyone. I didn't dare. It might get back to my father.
"Mason, what are those suitcases for?" Aunt Cindy asked.
"Oh. Dad's sending me to a school someplace east. We'll be leaving soon for the airport."
"O Dear God," Uncle Pete muttered softly. Clearly he did not approve.
I startled at the sound of the garage door opening behind me. I knew it was my father, and I didn't want to see his face when he saw my aunt and uncle. He did not care for these people. I was not sure why. They were always good to Mom and to me, and visiting them was always a good time. Uncle Pete owned a successful and expanding chain of hardware stores in Atlanta, and always had the neatest new gadgets installed.
"Cindy, Peter, you should have called. I wasn't expecting you until tomorrow."
"We changed our minds and drove all night, Conner. We don't want to be any bother. We just want to pick up Marilyn's things."
"Well, all of her rubbish is packed in boxes over there." Dad wasn't going to bother even feigning civility. He probably figured he was done with these people, and my mother wasn't around to tell him he'd been rude and shamed her.
"What's this about Mason going to a school?" Uncle Pete asked.
"I don't know what to do with a boy, Peter. I've made plans to move, and Mason can't go with me."
"Isn't this awfully soon after losing his mother to throw him into an unfamiliar environment?" Aunt Cindy asked.
"Mason's tough. He'll be fine." Dad paused. "I have to leave now if he isn't going to miss that plane."
"We'll take him to the airport, Conner. That's give us a chance to talk. We haven't seen him for months."
This possibility was almost too good to be true. Uncle Pete and Aunt Cindy were my favorite people in all the world. I didn't think Dad would let anything that good happen, and I didn't want it to show in my face how much I wanted to be with them.
"That gives me an idea. Why don't you drive my car, and while you're gone, I can load yours."
From anyone else that would be a generous offer, but from Dad, everyone knew he just wanted to be rid of everyone. Dad was like that.
"I'll do that. Do you have the boy's plane ticket?"
"Right here. I'll pull my car out to the end of the driveway, and pull yours in."
"It certainly doesn't look like much," Aunt Cindy observed.
"I gave her clothes to charity days ago."
Uncle Pete started to walk towards his Oldsmobile, then stopped and turned around. "Conner, you will be here when we get back, won't you? I have an idea I want to discuss with you."
"I'll be here. There's a lot to do."
The two cars were shuffled, Dad put my two suitcases into the trunk and handed the keys to Uncle Pete.
"Drive carefully. Goodbye, Mason." Dad turned and walked back into the house.
The three of us stood for a moment, each anticipating more of a goodbye from my father, but clearly, that was not going to happen.
"Get in the car, son. We'll talk on the way."
Was Dad really going to dismiss me and send me away with no more emotion than my leaving to go play with Jim Lytton over on Copper Kettle Drive? As Uncle Pete pulled out of the driveway, I looked back towards the house, hoping—without much real hope—that my father would come back out of the house, tell me to do well at my new school, make him proud and make a lot of new friends.
But Dad had never said things like that to me. Dad just let me know when I had done something wrong or failed him. He seemed to have all the time in the world to tell me when I disappointed him.
Aunt Cindy turned to face me. "I'm sorry, Mason. That's just how your father is."
Aunt Cindy was right. Facing that truth hurt, but she was right.
"Mason, listen to me." Uncle Pete sounded serious. "We have to put you on this plane, but when you get there, write to us or call me collect at my office. Cindy, give him one of my business cards. Mason, how would you like to come and live with us?"
"For good?"
"Well, until you go to college."
"I would, sir."
Aunt Cindy smiled. "You could have the room you always stay in."
I smiled. These two were my favorite relatives.
"We'll talk to your father and then I'll talk to my lawyer about legally adopting you. No reason for you to go off to a boarding school when we'd like to have you."
This possibility sounded like something out of a dream. The only way it could have been better would have been if Marcus was still alive.
"This could take awhile. You'll have to be patient, Mason. We won't give up, and I don't want you to give up, either. We'll call you every week.
And they did.
Aunt Cindy and Uncle Pete talked to Dad when they returned to the house for mother's things. Dad agreed to their plan, they said. Knowing him as I did, he was probably pleased. I'm sure he did not think very long about giving me up.
Aunt Cindy wrote me letters. When Thanksgiving approached, they invited me to spend it with them, which also meant extended family from all over Georgia. Uncle Pete sent me a plane ticket.
I'll never forget that dinner.
I'll never forget the phone call that came two Tuesdays later. Aunt Cindy had cancer, a dangerous, fast-moving kind. I had never heard Uncle Pete sound like he did during that call. Christmas, of course, was out of the question.
I spent Christmas with a handful of other boys who had nowhere else to go. I tried calling my father, but the phone had been disconnected and I realized I had no idea where he was living.
I sent Aunt Cindy a card every week. When my first term grades were released in January, she wrote a letter telling me how thrilled she was, saying the kind of things Mom used to say. But her handwriting was almost unrecognizable.
Aunt Cindy was dead before Valentine's Day.
Uncle Pete wasn't a blood relative, but he swore he'd go ahead and try to become my guardian. He said Aunt Cindy had wanted that. He tried, too, right up until the day a heart attack killed him.
There were other relatives, but I didn't have their phone numbers or addresses, and I didn't know any of them very well, either.
I still did not know where my father was, either. For a while, I did not know what would happen to me at the end of the term because I didn't know if the school knew where to send bills.
Maybe Dad knew about Uncle Pete dying. I'll never know. My tuition and board were paid in full and on time for every term, but my father never wrote and never called, no matter what I achieved, no matter what I accomplished, no matter what honors I won.
I learned to meet my own standards, and to expect encouragement and praise from no one.
I never saw my father alive again.