Chet took Shawn to a truck stop outside of Baltimore. Shawn thought it was an odd place to get dinner, but Chet seemed to know the owner. "Amy Sue!" he greeted the waitress, "is Merle around?
"Sure thing, I'll go in back and get him. You boys want the chicken-fried steak?"
"You know it."
When Merle came out, Shawn thought that he reminded him of the guy from ZZ Top.
"Merle!" Chet stood up, "I want ya' to meet my boy Shawnie."
Shawn shook Merle's hand.
"Shawnie's the one I've been telling you about who got that big fancy job with the advertising agency."
"Keller-Marsden," Shawn explained, not sure how much reason Merle had to trust his father, "we do those Apple commercials that say 'think different.'"
"Those were Shawnie's idea," Chet said. Shawn realized that, maybe for the first time in his life, his father was proud of him.
They both knocked back a few beers to force down the chicken-fried steak (Shawn wasn't sure what kind of meat it actually was, and suspected that he didn't want to know), and Chet introduced Shawn to the other regulars. Shawn noticed that Chet's description of his job included a minimum of distortions.
Finally, the truck stop emptied out, and they drove home. If he had been sober, Shawn would have worried about his father's ability to drive, but as it was they simply careened down the highway with Exile on Main Street playing at full volume.
Miraculously, they made it to the apartment intact. Chet got out of the car and hugged Shawn. "Can I come up?"
"Um…you know Jack doesn't really like you coming up there."
"I know, and I know I haven't been a very good father to you, and sometimes, I, well, I lose my temper. But you turned out good, Slim Jim. You turned out real good."
"Thanks, Dad."
Shawn happened to open the door to the apartment just as Jack was leading a girl out of his bedroom. Jack said his goodbyes and then turned to Shawn with an accusatory stare. "He got you drunk."
"Yeah, we had a good time."
"I'm assuming he drove you home drunk."
"Look, just let me have this night, ok."
Jack put a friendly hand on Shawn's shoulder. "Alright, but tomorrow I'm going to be a real asshole."
Jack kept his promise by turning on every light in the apartment and playing Dave Matthews Band, which Shawn hated, at his stereo's full volume as soon has he woke up in the morning.
Shawn stumbled, hungover, into the living room. "You want to turn that down a little?"
Instead of complying, Jack walked over to Shawn, timing his movements so that he and Dave could shout "MOM IT'S MY BIRTHDAY!" extremely loudly in Shawn's face.
Shawn went over to the kitchen and poured himself a cup of coffee. "Is this an attempt to teach me some sort of lesson?" He glared at Jack, but it was more of a hungover glare that what Jack had come to think of as the 'scary-Shawn glare,' so he knew he hadn't gone too far yet.
"Indeed it is," Jack said, a little louder than he needed to, "and the topic of today's lesson is…the DANGERS of ALCOHOL abuse."
Shawn took a sip of coffee. "You've never had a problem with me drinking before."
"Yeah, because you've never been this irresponsible before."
Eric, having been woken up by all the noise, walked into the kitchen.
"Shawn's irresponsible?"
"Not so much Shawn as his FATHER, who last night decided to take his 16-YEAR OLD son to…where did he take you?"
"A truck stop outside of Baltimore."
"Oh, ok. Baltimore, an HOUR away, where he got his, again, 16-year old, son, shitfaced DRUNK, and then DROVE back, presumably drunk himself, at THREE O'CLOCK in the morning."
"Look, we had a good time, alright" Shawn protested.
"And how long do the good times usually last?"
"A couple of months."
Jack sighed. "Alright, I get that you need to have some sort of relationship with your father. But you've got to be careful not to let him drag you down with him."
"So does this conclude my punishment?" Shawn asked.
"Not quite," Jack pointed to Shawn's mug, "that coffee's decaf."