This is going to be a slightly longer AN than usual as there are a few things I'd like to address.
First of all, I'd like to express my immense gratitude for all your reviews. I make it a habit to respond to each and every one of the reviews (I sincerely hope you don't mind me doing it, otherwise drop me a hint and I'll stop.), but I can only do that for signed-in reviews. Since there have been multiple guests commenting this past week, I feel the need to extend my thank-yous here. My deepest condolences to the one guest who lost a parent in a similar way to how Jay did his mom in this story. I'm so sorry you had to go throught that and I hope to God that you have a great support network that helped and/or still helps you get through the grief. It's oh so very important to have people around that are there for you.
That said, I'd like to heed a little warning for this upcoming chapter. A few chapters ago we got a rather lengthy glimpse into Pat Halstead's point of view, where he was made out to be a man who deeply loves his wife and cares for Jay but is unable to express his feelings towards the latter. This one sheds some light on why that is, but it also shows a completely different side of him. I hope it doesn't completely revoke the humanity I've given him in that other chapter. If it does, it's not my intention.
It is, however, inevitable with the topic that I broach here. It's a topic that is extremely personal to me, a topic that is extremely hard to grasp and understand and even though I have extensive first hand experience with it I barely even grasp and understand it to its full extend. In fact, I barely even scratch the surface. A lot in this chapter might not make sense to you, and quite frankly, some of it doesn't even make sense to me. It feels like the chapter is all over the place, but no matter how hard I tried to get it in order, it remained a jumbled mess. Maybe that's not all bad, because it kind of fits: having to live with someone like Jay's father really is a constant roller-coaster of emotions. Believe me, I know. I've been on that roller-coaster for all of my thirty years.
Anyway, I'm procrastinating by writing a ridiculously long AN that I'm sure no-one cares about, so let's just dive into the chapter, which, by the way, is set in 2008.
Chapter Eleven
A Broken Body's Pieces Scattered on A Phantom Road
Joshua James – Broken Tongue
Narcissism was often used as a synonym for an inflated ego or exaggerated self-importance.
Vanity undeniably played an essential part when trying to describe someone with narcistic tendencies, but it was a common misconception that everyone with a healthy self-regard was evidently a narcissist. Reversely, it was an oversimplification to limit a narcistic personality disorder to just this one trait. Narcissism in its truest form ran much deeper than that. It had many layers which wove into an intricate character and often wasn't discernible to the average person, mostly because they didn't know what they were looking for. Even those living or dealing with a narcissist every day sometimes had a hard time finding the appropriate label for what they were going through.
Aside from being infatuated with themselves, one of the trademarks for the disorder was an extreme investment in creating an illusion of a pretense self, an identity that they wanted other people to envy and marvel at. They spent a ridiculous amount of time flaunting the grandiosity that they made themselves out to be. How this outward appearance was perceived by others mattered more than substantiating the image painted for the world to see. To put it simple, narcissists invented and portrayed someone they were not. They put on an act. And they wanted their audience to applaud them for their outstanding performance. Awe and adoration were what they craved for, hence they stepped out on a stage to be the center of attention, constantly bouncing on their heels as they waited for the standing ovation and beamed at every praise and special treatment hailed down on them.
But their greatness had an on-off-switch. In all their thirst for glory, achieved by charming and seducing the people they surrounded themselves with, they had the ability to turn off the allure with a snap of the finger. One minute they tended to shower those receptible to their appeal with words of love and affection, told them how gorgeous and graceful they were to draw them in and put them under their spell. However, if that didn't work or if they were contradicted or rejected in any way, they just as easily felt offended and criticized. It was then that the metamorphosis took place, and they revealed their true nature. Gone was the suave behavior, to be replaced by hurtful and downright vicious treatment. They iced out the person that so rudely dared to refute them. They cold-shouldered them and spat nasty words that aimed where it hurt the most: the heart.
They also played the guilt-tripping, manipulative game exceptionally well.
Narcissists often obsessed over their partners in a most unhealthy way, exhibited a fanatic control over the other. They simply couldn't understand that their significant other might want to spent time outside their relationship too, might want to plunge into activities that didn't involve them. It was a foreign concept to them, one that they couldn't acclimate themselves with. As a result, they procured the most scurrile and illogical conspiracy theories, developed a fierce unfounded jealousy and possessiveness of their beloved one. Every time they wanted to spend a minute without the narcissist ended in tiring futile arguments where the partner's devotion was being questioned. And it was often followed by days of not talking. Up until the partner came crawling back, apologizing without knowing what they even apologized for, begging for forgiveness even though they did nothing that needed to be forgiven, assuring that they would do better next time even though they didn't know what 'better' was because they had no idea what they had done wrong in the first place. All that to see that charismatic personality that once lured them in and promised them the world.
It was in all sense of the word a form of abuse. The kind that was so distinct for someone with a narcistic personality disorder, yet so subtle that those looking in from the outside and sometimes even those closest to them didn't notice.
Along with that exploitation came the notable disregard of every emotion someone felt, displayed or verbalized. Narcissists didn't see other people as human beings, as creatures with a heart and feelings, beliefs and values, needs and desires. Instead, they often objectified them. Those around them were merely marionettes. They made them their puppets on a string, and they would sever the threads used to pull them in whichever way they pleased, if the doll didn't bend into their submission. People were only ever of value for as long as they followed around blindly. Narcissists didn't bother with people who second-guessed or doubted them in any way, who couldn't see their specialness, their brilliance, their superiority. If they couldn't enchant someone, they cut them out of their lives; it was as simple as that.
What was probably one of the most debilitating factors of living with a narcissist, was their absence of empathy towards others. People with a narcistic personality disorder were considerably out of touch with their own feelings and were therefore unable to express them. It most likely stemmed from a childhood where they themselves hadn't received the love and attention from their parents that they always craved for. Frankly, it wasn't even their fault that they were lacking compassion; they probably hadn't learnt any different. So basically, their behavior in the present was a way of trying to make up for what they had missed out on in their own upbringing. The shortage of parental affection resulted in them never being able to deal with and make sense of their own emotions, which ultimately rendered them incapable of sympathizing or so much as acknowledging those of others.
If it weren't for the trail of psychological destruction a narcissist left in their wake, one could almost pity them for the pain they had most likely gone through. Maybe that's why their partners stuck around despite the harassment and torture they had to endure. It was undeniably hard to be around a narcissist all the time, but as sad and heartbreaking as it was to watch for an observant bystander, if the significant other wanted to stay that was their choice.
However, it wasn't that of a potentially involved child – or multiple of them for that matter. They were innocent victims in all of this, and they weren't given the opportunity to escape the clutches of narcissism. They didn't even stand a chance. Growing up with a narcistic parent could shape and scar a child in unimaginable ways and cast a shadow over them that persisted into adulthood, likely to remain a constant companion all their life. The experiences, the memories were an invisible claw holding an arbitrary power over every aspect of their existence. A seed planted in those earliest years when children still idolized their parents above all. They didn't understand this concept of narcissism. They believed in the good and fascinating things about mom and dad only – and come to think of it, everything about them seemed good and fascinating from the eyes of a toddler and maybe even those of a grade schooler.
Kids didn't have a reason to doubt anything their parents said or did. Why would they? How could they? And really, who could blame them? They simply didn't know any better. Children were naïve and trusting, just the way they were supposed to be. They yearned for the unconditional love of their parents and in return they rewarded their folks with that same infinite love and loyalty.
Sadly, it was that absolution of love that narcistic parents could so cruelly take advantage of. An unbiased child was the perfect prey to feed on their hunger for adoration and validation. It gave the narcissist the grand opening to swank their bombast. The best way to achieve this, was by teaching them only the things that they excelled in and enjoyed, by pushing them in the exact direction that they felt was right for their kid, leaving no room or acceptance for anything else. So, in all honesty it only suited them. And in all their gullibility the offspring became the ideal little soldier because they learned early on that marching behind their drill sergeant and executing his commands was the way to receive the desired attention from him.
That wasn't to say that they didn't relish the activities and the time spent with their narcistic mother or father – they probably did. They were however unaware that this was merely a ploy to lure them in. And quite frankly, they didn't care until much later in life when realization suddenly hit them, and when they ended up questioning everything.
As soon as a child discovered their own interests and diverged from the plans that the narcistic parent laid out for them, things were bound to become trickier, more challenging. Because once they reached a certain age, they started looking outside their little bubble and developed their own beliefs and moral compasses. Those of their parents were put under a microscope and ended up quizzed in an oftentimes provocative manner. When puberty rolled around, kids quickly learnt that their folks were not perfect but in fact just as flawed as everyone else. It was this recognition of faultiness that slowly fissured and disbanded a possibly once tight bond between a narcistic parent and their child. The moment a teenager opposed the narcissist, they ended up facing their wrath. It marked the beginning of a rocky road into an adulthood. One that was tarred with insecurity and the constant feeling of not measuring up and not being good enough.
Jay couldn't tell when those first cracks in the relationship with his father had appeared. While he had a few happy memories with him, they had never had the best rapport. Looking back, he could easily see the narcistic traits in the old man's everyday behavior. He could isolate singular incidents in his elementary school days and countless events in his juvenile years, though the latter blurred into one giant mass of messes because there were just so many of them in that time. From a distance he could tell just how his dad's narcissism had slowly damaged his self-esteem and planted a chronic diffidence and self-reproach within him that hadn't ceased much in the four years away from home.
His father's personality had had enough of an impact on him that it had followed him all the way to a war he was fighting halfway across the world. And that influence hadn't lessened one bit. Or maybe it had. But with his mom gone and him once again living under the same roof as his dad, this time just the two of them, the lack of confidence had come back with a vengeance. Being stuck with the man who had nearly broken his spirit years ago, especially now, when he was in a limbo of uncertainty, wedged in between mourning his mother and worrying about his future, he had all the time in the world to reflect on the spectrum of narcissism in his dad's behavior. It was both reassuring and nerve-wrecking to finally understand what had shaped him into who he was today.
The trip down memory lane brought Jay all the way back to his earliest childhood. He remembered the way Patrick used to brag about both Will and his aptitude for sports and learning instruments. He generally used to brag about anything they successfully tried their hands in really. But it had only ever been done when people were around to be impressed by it, and it surely hadn't been done to encourage his sons. The old man had merely wanted to adorn himself with borrowed plumes in front of others, never in the privacy of their home and he'd certainly never praised either of his boys directly. Instead, he saw them merely as an appendix of himself that he could boast about to make himself feel better.
Halstead senior had never much cared about what his sons wanted. Their musical prowess was tolerated only because it affiliated with their Irish heritage and because it was something that Sadhbh had loved. Other than that, everything they'd been allowed to do was done solely for the patriarch's benefit. He'd pushed them hard into sports, more specifically baseball, because it was his passion. And while Will and Jay were athletic and skilled enough to play in Little League, it wasn't their preference. Pat hadn't cared that his oldest had shown more interest in hockey or that his youngest had wanted to try out for basketball instead. Their wishes had constantly been disregarded, invalidated with surface level reasoning: Will was too soft for the brutal game on ice, and Jay was too small and scrawny to ever be any good at shooting hoops. And while their mother had persuaded her husband into at least letting them try, the things the old man didn't approve of had been the first to be eliminated from afterschool activities once money got tight. Which conveniently had been all the time.
Jay' dad had only ever showed interest and offered support when he got something out of it for himself, certainly not to demonstrate love and affection towards his offspring. Will had eventually given up pushing, deeming it a waste of energy. He had just gone with the flow, submitted himself to baseball and whatever else their father wanted. The only time he had fought the old man tooth and nails for something had been his decision to pursue a career in medicine. He'd wisely applied to and deliberately chosen a school far away from home so that Patrick wouldn't be able to sabotage his future. Jay on the other hand hadn't been so subservient in his youth. He'd questioned his dad frequently, stood his ground against him and always stayed true to his firm beliefs. But in all of this, to avoid escalation, he too had tried to appease to his father's expectations.
A futile task. Senior's expectations had oftentimes been unrealistic and sheer impossible to fulfill. Neither Will nor Jay had ever been able to measure up to them. No number of homeruns had ever been satisfying enough. The older Halstead had always compelled them to accomplish more. According to him, ever game lost was the result of his sons not giving it their all: their technique had lacked when swinging their bat, they should've catapulted the ball just a couple feet further, or they hadn't run fast enough to bring their team to victory.
The same ridiculously high metrics had applied to their scholastics. No amount of straight A report cards had ever been good enough either. Just one tiny horizontal line behind the letter had been enough to infuriate Patrick and have him unleash a hail of colorful insults on their intelligence or lack thereof. Just one B had been enough for him to yell at his sons that they would never amount to anything in life. The irony in that? He hadn't even wanted them to go to college, because real men went to work right after school. Both Halstead boys had been smart, but they had also just been kids who had wanted to enjoy themselves occasionally. Nevertheless, their father's anger was a truly scary thing, so the boys had studied relentlessly and tried their hardest to stay on top of their classes, if only to avoid that frightening wrath at all costs.
It had been a blessing that at least Patrick had never really been a violent guy. Or maybe it hadn't been a blessing after all. His vindictive words had always cut to the bone and they had hurt just as much as a fist connecting with the tender skin of an eight-year-old. The only reason Jay could compare the verbal abuse to the physical maltreatment was because he, unlike Will, had been the recipient of his father's uncontrolled rage once. The reason for that nothing as mundane as poor academic performance or a strikeout in an important game but a series of rather untimely events and deficient decision making on Thanksgiving 1994. Sadhbh had put an effective halt to her husband ever laying a hand on either of their children ever again, so the youngest Halstead had no way of knowing if this could have become a regular thing. Frankly, he really didn't want to know. The memory of that day was etched into his mind forever with or without the underlying threat of it happening again.
Jay wasn't afraid of being beaten. Not anymore. He'd seen some of the most ferocious places on earth, some of the worst humans – if you could call them that – had to offer. That alone had numbed him to the blows. He'd survived physical violence, torture, bullet wounds, ambushes, hell even IED attacks. A couple fists thrown by someone with a physique that was mediocre at best didn't scare him any longer. Much rather it was the combination of the hits and the verbal barrage, the psychological minefield of it all.
Essentially, dealing with a narcissist was no different than navigating the Afghan desert with landmines scattered everywhere. He'd had to be on high alert nonstop overseas, had had to carefully contemplate every step he took to dodge those invisible death traps. It was the same with the nemesis dubbed narcissism, especially when that enemy was flooded with emotions that they couldn't comprehend. With grief involved, there were way more explosive devices hidden beneath the sand ready to go off at the most infinitesimal quakes. Maybe that was why from the very first day of military training Jay had been so adept at tactical support and strategical planning: he'd had plenty of practice with it throughout his adolescence. Tiptoeing around and walking on eggshells to sidestep the triggers of an outburst was basically second nature to him.
However, he was no longer a child. He was an adult, currently living in the same house as his father, and in order to survive seeing him every day, he needed to dismantle some of those snares. He needed to set necessary boundaries and secure a safe place he could retreat to. The question was: how?
Amidst cleaning up the remnants of his meager dinner – scrambled eggs and a slice of bread because even ten days after his mother's passing, he had yet to regain an appetite – Jay tried to find a solution to that. But before the ranger could come up with a plan, he was pulled from his thoughts by the trampling footsteps on the front porch. The noise echoed loudly through the hallway all the way into the kitchen. Someone crashed hard into the wooden door, the clinking of metal against metal followed. The muffled thumbs and jingles were familiar by now; the same sad repeat every single night since he had come home from the hospital. It would go on for another minute. There would be a few frustrated curses and a fist hitting the frame. And eventually, he'd hear the telltale scratch as the key was inserted into the tiny slot.
Wiping his hands on the kitchen towel, the brunette shuffled to the doorway segregating the kitchen from the hall. He leaned against the doorframe, crossed his arms in front of his chest and waited for the fanfare of the lock opening with a finalizing click.
The door swung open and, as predicted, Patrick stumbled through the entrance moments later. His movements were ungraceful, and his body tilted from one side to the other like a dinghy out in the open sea, a clear indicator that he was as drunk as a fiddler's bitch. A cigarette was hanging from the corner of his mouth, ash particles falling from it only to be reignited as oxygen fed to them. Jay watched as the orange glowing specks descended to the burgundy rug and burned tiny black holes into the material. When he raised his eyes again, his sloshed dad was in the process of shrugging out of his jacket and throwing it carelessly in the general direction of the coat hanger. He missed it by a foot, a remarkable feat considering how small the area was.
Jay cringed; his obsessive-compulsive tendencies gained in the rangers immediately triggered by the tardiness. He refrained from saying anything, biting the insides of his cheeks hard. Patrick caught his grimace and apparently felt threatened by his presence. "What'cha looking at?" he slurred as he staggered towards his son, the ferocity in his eyes dulled by all the booze he'd consumed. The younger man pressed his tongue against the roof of his mouth and merely shook his head in response, but his non-verbal reaction didn't satisfy his dad. "Speak up when I talk to you," he demanded.
There was no point starting a fight over this, especially not in the state the older Halstead was in, so the brunette offered a simple, "nothing." He tried his best to keep his voice steady but despite his best efforts he sounded like a submissive, not at all like the Army sergeant that he was. He hated it. Hated that his father still held such a power over him and could fill him with dread so easily.
Pulling himself to his full five foot ten, Jay braced himself for an impending argument. But the older man merely grunted indifferently and pushed passed him on the narrow threshold in the kitchen, bumping into the younger man's shoulder as he swayed on his feet. The brunette went with the momentum to lessen the blow. Pressing his back against the door frame, he followed his father with weary eyes as the older went straight for the refrigerator. His intentions were predictable, and as soon as Patrick held the beer bottle in his hand, the ranger made his calculated move. "I think you've already had enough, dad," he pointed out, voice soft and unthreatening. He took the alcohol from the other, stowed it away and unobtrusively put himself in between the cooler and his father.
Visibly seethed, the older man immediately jibed at his son, "I don't care what you think. Thinking's never been one of your strong suits, has it?" He laughed icily. "This is my house. And in my house, I can drink as much as I want whenever I want to," he continued to bristle through clenched teeth, cig moving up and down as he spoke. "So, get out of my way, you little punk."
But Jay kept a stiff upper lip. "No," he said firmly, dug his heels into the tiles and crossed his arms in front of his chest. It riled the other man up even more. Puffing out an angry breath, the patriarch propelled a lungful of smoke and ash at the unsuspecting ranger. The younger Halstead wasn't prepared and ended up consuming a good amount of the smolder with his breath. Flakes tickled the back of his throat, sending him into a dry coughing fit. He tasted bile, the Godawful acrid taste provoking his gag reflex, but managed to swallow it down. The whole ordeal left him gasping for breath and made his eyes water, though, and for a second he felt like he was all the way back in the burning remnants of the Humvee in Korengal.
Ironically, it was Patrick's sneer that pulled him out of his impromptu flashback. "Serves you right." Through his blurry eyes, Jay caught him dragging on his roll-up and staggering towards one of the kitchen cabinets across the room. He rummaged through the cupboard, shuffled cans and containers until his hand closed around a three-quarters empty bottle of cheap whiskey stored in the back. The ranger could only watch as the other man unscrewed the cap, pulled the cigarette from his mouth and took a long swig.
The indulgence was contemporary, though, because as soon as his son recovered, he was by his side and quite determinedly pried the booze from his fingers. A few droplets of the amber liquid sloshed out of the tilted flask, spilling onto Pat's grey polo as the bottle neck was pulled straight from his lips. The younger man couldn't care less. "I said you had enough," he reinforced his earlier statement, voice raspier yet that much more forceful than before. "And since when do you smoke anyway?" he added as an afterthought, angrily plugging the nearly burnt-down stub from his father's sluggish fingers. He ground it out in the sink and recapped the whiskey with shaking hands, the scarily intimate encounter with the bitter fumes fueling his actions.
"None of your damn business," Patrick snarled at him as he scrunched up his nose. "Now give me the damn bottle." He lunged at Jay to fetch the scotch from his son's hands, but the younger man sidestepped, causing the intoxicated man to lose his balance. If it hadn't been for the ranger's lickety-split reflexes, Halstead senior would have faceplanted on the unforgiving tiles of the kitchen floor. Instead, his dive was thwarted by his son's strong arm, who in a matter of milliseconds discarded the flask on the kitchen counter to catch the flailing inebriate. Weakened muscles of his left arm flexed and trembled under the sudden stress, so Jay firmly wrapped the right around his father's midsection too.
It made for an awkward pseudo-embrace, the proximity extremely uncomfortable for both men, but the brunette refused to let go so long as the other wasn't steady on his feet. "Let go of me, you little bastard," the old man growled as he struggled against the tight hold his son had on him, though he stood no chance against the trained Army Ranger.
Jay couldn't help but chuckle as he realized his father's faulty use of the word. Driven by the adrenaline, he felt brave enough to call him out on it. "You should really do your homework before you throw insults like that at me, dad," he advised, unable to hold back the smug grin. "Because if you had you'd know that I'm not a bastard, not even by a long shot." He barked an amused laugh. "Even if I were, the insult would fall right back on you."
As soon as the words were out, he knew he should have kept his mouth shut. The fury was written all over his father's face, the old man clearly outraged by the fact that his son dared to correct him. The drunkard temporarily stilled in the ranger's arms and Jay waited for a volley of expletives to be hurled his way. He didn't, however, expect a physical onslaught. So, when Halstead senior buckled against his grip and flung himself sideways, the older man had the element of surprise on his side. He broke free from the younger man's interlocked arms, fist swinging. The left hook didn't land anywhere near where his dad wanted it to, but it was enough to throw them both off-balance. They landed in a heap on the floor, and Jay couldn't squelch the yelp as his left knee of all things took the brunt of the tumble.
For once, the ranger was thankful for the padded brace he was still forced to wear. The gooey substance embedded in the material cushioned the fall enough to prevent what would otherwise have been a harrowing acquaintance of his kneecap with the unforgiving stone slabs. Nevertheless, the unexpected twist and strain was enough to shoot a brief searing pain through his leg was enough to shoot a searing pain through his leg. It was somewhat masked by adrenaline and his last dose of pain meds still in his system, but the brunette would have been a fool to think that the tumble wouldn't have consequences. Tendons and ligaments were still unstable, muscles too weak to protect the joint enough from blunt force. Even a minor plummet like this had the power to cause a setback.
But Jay couldn't think about that now. There were more pressing matters at hand here. He allowed himself all but a small reprieve, resting his forehead on a balled fist and squeezed his eyes shut for no more than a handful of seconds, waiting for the pain to abate to a dull ache. Once he felt safe to move again, he scrambled over to the kitchen unit, desperate to put some distance between him and his father. Using the sturdy ledge of the counter for leverage, he pulled himself onto wobbly feet and leaned heavily against the furniture.
Eventually, the brunette hunched over a bit, braced his arms on his thighs while gaging his surroundings, all the while favoring his knee. His dad was still on the floor, muttering a disgruntled "damnit" as he listlessly tried to get his limbs under him. He failed miserably, partially because one hand grabbed his head the entire time. Senior must have hit it on his way down. Though Jay hadn't been the one to cause the altercation, he was immediately swarmed by apprehension and misplaced guilt at the prospect that his father had gotten hurt. Experience told him that the old man too would blame him. In a way he was right: he had started the argument after all.
Anxiety eventually spurred him into action. "Are you okay?" he asked cautiously, slowly approaching the older Halstead, one hand stretched out and held up in front of him placatively. The other huffed in response. "Let me see," Jay asked calmly while his heart thumped like mad. He half-squatted down next to his dad, mindful of his throbbing knee, and gently pulled the coarse fingers away, checking for a possible injury. A tiny trail of blood seeped from a wound that barely even qualified as a scratch, but a bump was already forming.
Before he had a chance to inspect it any closer, his father angrily slapped him away. "Get your hands off me," he growled, and Jay instinctively took a step back to avoid the clumsily flapping arms, weary of being caught off-guard again, only advancing once more when his arms flopped to his side, alluding to Pat's seeming defeat. But as soon as he reached out, senior swatted at him again. The younger man anticipated it, therefore firmly grabbed his wrists, glad that high levels of alcohol and the knock to the head had shot the other's coordination to hell.
"Are you done? Are you done fighting me now?" Jay checked carefully, breathlessly, when the older Halstead's arms flopped to the side. His father sneered, nostrils flaring in disgust, but other than that he remained still. "I take that as a yes," he mumbled under his breath, releasing the hold on his dad. Standing up with a wince, he extended a hand to. To his surprise, he took it without reluctance and, with the help of the ranger, hauled himself to his feet. Once vertical, he swayed dangerously. The brunette propped him up against the counter for much needed support, holding onto his arm with one arm until he was sure the other wouldn't keel over. For a minute, they stood side by side, one holding his pounding head, the other flexing his pulsing knee.
Not trusting the momentary peace, Jay observed the older man. The lines of defiance had smoothed over a bit, leaving a disgruntled and disoriented look of someone who had taken a cup too much but lacked the energy to fight the bartender for yet another drink. It was the calmest he'd seen his father all night, probably all week. He didn't want to disturb the ceasefire but at the same time this might be the only chance he had to talk some sense into Patrick. Despite his better judgement not to, he wet his lips nervously and gathered all his courage. Even if he failed, he at least failed knowing he had tried.
"Listen dad," he started nervously. "I don't know how long this has been going on… Drinking yourself into a stupor every night, smoking," he trailed off, taking in a shaky breath. "I, I know you loved mom," he nearly choked when he mentioned her, the grief too fresh, too painful to really talk about her. His breath hitched but he forced down the lump that clogged his throat. Now was not the right time. "I know you're grieving…"
This time it was his father interrupting. Fury blazed in his eyes as he roared, "like hell you do!" A shudder rippled through Jay as the patriarch's voice reverberated from the walls, and an undesirable feeling of dread percolated. A dread he had felt so often when in a quarrel with his old man but also countless times in combat, recognized it as the premonition of losing a battle that was never his to win to begin with. He closed his eyes, waiting for the inevitable. "How dare you?" Patrick spat in disgust. "How dare you mention her, when this is all your fault in the first place?" he bellowed, raising his volume even more.
Jay's eyes snapped open. "My faul-… what?" He gaped at Halstead senior; utter disbelief written all over his face. Of all the things he had expected his father to blame him for, this was the one accusation he had hoped not to hear him say out loud. Blinking rapidly against the tears pricking behind his eyes, he tried to get a handle on his emotions, unwilling to make himself even more vulnerable to the other man's slander. As much as the words pained him, he wasn't ready to admit defeat just yet. "You, drowning your sorrows in a bottle is my fault how exactly?" The brunette was faintly aware of the pronounced quiver in his tone and that it was at least an octave higher than usual, adding a desperation that he hoped wouldn't be so apparent. "How," his voice cracked as he continued in a shaky whisper, "how is mom dying my fault?"
A sharp, humorless laugh came from Patrick's mouth, echoing in a malicious canon that cut straight to the core and made Jay cringe. "You know damn well how," his father thundered. "She worried herself sick over you, you ungrateful brat. All because you decided to play war. She wasted all her energy on you instead of fighting for herself," he laid into his son, ripping the wound open even more. "You're the reason she died. You and your selfish pipe dreams."
What little fight Jay had left, disappeared upon hearing those words. He flinched hard, his heart constricting painfully, so painful that he feared his was either having a heart attack or a knife plunged into the large muscle. "Dad?" he wheezed out. Dizziness washed over him as all air was sucked from his lungs. Panic rose within him. The kitchen counter became his life line as he held onto it with a white-knuckled grip. The accusation repeated over and over in the youngest Halstead's head as he desperately forced himself to take steadying breaths.
His father was drunk, he reminded himself. It was just the alcohol and the grief talking, not the man himself. By repeating that like a mantra, Jay hoped to convince himself. His dad didn't know what he was saying. He was just intoxicated. But deep down, he knew that wasn't true, and they merely resonated what he himself had been thinking ever since he had left for his first deployment. That he was killing her, had killed her, albeit slowly, by putting that weight of worry on her shoulders. Deep down, he had already known that his dad held him responsible for his mother's passing as well, but there had been this naïve sliver of hope that maybe he didn't. Now that hope was crushed too, and the youngest Halstead wondered if there was anything left for him to cling to, a piece of driftwood to keep him afloat in the rapid current.
Nevertheless, he held onto that one clear thought, "you're drunk, dad," swallowed past the ever-growing lump in his throat and inhaled deeply. He closed his eyes and counted to ten in his head, as he brushed the overwhelming emotions aside and forced his face into an impassive mask. "You don't mean what you said," he rationalized, his voice toneless. "C'mon," he urged softly when Patrick swayed on his feet again. He slung senior's arm around his neck and steered him towards the hallway, gently suggesting, "let's get you to bed," whilst guiding him up the stairs.
Despair reached impossible heights underneath the surface as the old man cried out, "she's dead, she's dead because of you," but on the outside Jay remained frighteningly calm. "It's all your fault. You killed her," the patriarch hauled the spiteful words at him, but the youngest remained silent, took every single one of them and let it feed his immense guilt. Patrick trashed weakly against his son's hold as they ascended the last steps, his feeble attempts almost bringing making them crumple, but the ranger stayed steady.
"Almost there, dad," he coaxed him the rest of the way, hoisting the man's legs onto the mattress once he'd stripped him of his shoes. He reached for the blanket, hesitated as his eyes fell on the ornamented light grey and green sheets that his mother had sown. With an aching heart he covered his near passed out parent with it, fingered the soft flannel as he tugged his father in ever so gently, his resolve almost breaking. "Get some sleep dad," he whispered to the already snoring man, tears welling up in his eyes. He tore his gaze away, stumbled into the adjacent bathroom, grabbing a glass of water and two tablets of Advil from the cabinet to aid the head-splitting hangover senior was sure to be sporting the next morning. It was the least he could do.
Leaving them on the bedside table, he closed the door and migrated to his own bedroom. Jay plopped down on the edge of his bed, physically and mentally depleted from the harrowing events of the last hour. His knee pulsated in sync with his heavy heartbeat, a painful reminder of everything that had just transpired. Rolling up his sweatpants legs and removing the knee brace, he assessed the renewed damage to the joint. The tissue was already swollen and sensitive touch, making it hard to flex and bend the extremity all the way. He'd elevate it overnight and check again in the morning, but he already knew that this would necessitate a check-up with Dr. Oakes, a visit he dreaded as it would be the first time, he'd set foot in the Godawful place since his mother had died.
Jay's breath hitched, the imputation of his father's blame replaying in his head. His dad most likely wouldn't remember their conversation the following morning, but he undeniably would. He was entangled in the faulty spinning web of doubt of self-blame, unable to pull himself free from the sticky threads. Soon to be cocooned by the black widow watching and waiting for the perfect moment to ambush him from the corner of the room. A suitable analogy for the fucked-up reality the ranger found himself living in ever since he'd come home, though if he were completely honest with himself, the web had been spun a long, long time ago, and he might not ever have a chance of escaping.
That's it for what was probably the hardest chapter I have ever written up to this point. I kind of feel relieved now.
Updates will be less frequent from now on since there are no more pre-written chapters at the moment but I hope to at least give you a new installment every other week or so. I hope you'll wait around and continue this journey with me anyway. I hope to God that you stick around because you guys are amazing!
Take care, and as always: stay healthy!