Author's Note: Welcome back everyone! Please let me know what y'all think. The title for this chapter comes from lyrics to the song "Jesus of Suburbia" by Green Day. R&R, and enjoy!
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Chapter 30 - The Son of Rage and Love, Part 1
Erik
Twenty-Two Years Previously, Pittsburgh PA - The temperature outside had barely gotten into the double-digits when Nadir and I touched down, nor did the cold weather improve much more during the time it took us to get from the airport out by Robinson to the city proper. Still, we walked slowly to the Carnegie Library from our hotel several blocks over, remaining outside longer than we might have otherwise. Nadir had never been to Pennsylvania before that day, and as such, he was nearly desperate to take full advantage of this opportunity to see all of the historical sights within Pittsburgh while we were there. But as far as I was concerned, most of his unabashed excitement was incredibly annoying. Personally, I didn't care that much either way about what we saw, or what we didn't see, while we were staying in the city - rather, I was nervous about just being there to begin with, decidedly more so than I cared to admit. And that nervousness was all I could bring myself to focus on from the moment of my arrival.
Because this trip wasn't meant to serve as a vacation between friends, or as a visit to research the local universities, or anything that could be considered even remotely entertaining. The only reason that I'd chosen to come up from North Carolina at all was because my father called me - entirely out of nowhere - asking for me to see him. And it would be a significant visit for us at that - this would be the first time that we'd meet each other. I had never seen my father face-to-face before that day, and I sincerely doubted that he might have ever actually bothered to come see me during my childhood, either. Certainly not for any occasion that I remembered. But even so, in my mind, if he was reaching out to me after so many years of complete silence, then logically there had to be a substantial reason that motivated him to make the attempt in the first place. And although I'd initially been hesitant to accept the invitation, Nadir had eventually convinced me to go ahead with the meeting as planned, doing so with no small amount of effort on his part. Once I finally relented to his appeals, there really was no going back on the decision, whether I liked it or not, thus prompting us to take this trip between the fall and winter terms at our respective schools.
Crows called out overhead from the bare and icy trees that meticulously lined either side of the road. One side of the street gave way to the student union at the University of Pittsburgh's sprawling campus, the other side of the street leading directly to their library and law school - or so I'd understood from the directions that we'd gotten earlier that day. By then, Nadir and I were almost to the grounds of the Carnegie Library where it was situated across from the university, each of us having to walk carefully to avoid skidding on the salt that coated the sidewalks; every walkway that ran through the center of the campus was stained with varying shades of blue and purple from the salt, most of which seemed to have steadily blended with the dirty slush that the sun brought after snowstorms. Altogether, I was uncomfortable there. It wasn't as if I didn't have any experience dealing with the colder climates before then - God knows it was the opposite for me at that point - but rather, there was something uncanny about that part of the city, about all of the aged and looming stone buildings set against the gray sky that left me unsettled.
But I also had to acknowledge once more how nervous I was in general - and that I was overthinking everything about this day again.
"U-Pitt is supposed to have an amazing med school," Nadir said, pulling me from my thoughts and seeming to force his conversational tone. It felt almost as if he sensed my unease, and characteristically assigned himself to be the one to take care of it on my behalf. In any other situation, I would've been grateful to him for the effort, even if grudgingly so. This time, I only glanced at him in return, silently urging him to continue, "I'm just saying, if you're not married to your plan of transferring to Duke next year, then there's still some time to apply here. In case things work out with your dad."
I scoffed, "I'm not going to make that big of a decision and change everything based on one conversation. I don't even know what he wants yet."
"He didn't say?"
Shaking my head, I responded, "Just that he wanted to talk to me in-person."
Seeming to consider the vagueness of my statement, there was a momentary pause before he asked, "Why didn't he come to Durham?"
"Your guess is as good as mine. I don't know him, Nadir. I have no idea."
"Fair enough," he responded with a shrug, unfazed by my impatience.
He wisely let that particular issue lie from there, and nothing more serious was spoken between us afterward. Yet at the same time, I was fairly certain that he still likely believed that I'd all but entirely given up on maintaining any semblance of confidence, at least over forging some sort of relationship with my absentee father by then - nevermind over anything else that probably wouldn't prove quite as life-altering. But Nadir's belief about my state of mind wasn't necessarily accurate, though I was stubbornly unwilling to admit as much, even to my best friend. He would understand my hesitance to explain, I knew that; but regardless, I simply didn't want to voice it, even despite how understanding Nadir could be. Voicing hope of a positive outcome in any form - and to any person, for that matter - would only make the inevitable letdown that much worse.
We crossed the road leading away from the university itself, winding our way toward the path that approached the junction between the Carnegie Library and the affiliated modern art and natural history museums. Nadir had been interested in seeing most of them that day, but though I was interested in visiting at some point as well, I had neither the time nor incentive to go then. And so, as we neared an arbitrary place of separation, he bade me luck before disappearing around the corner, leaving me to wait for my father in front of the grandiose cluster of buildings.
Standing idly near a decorative water fountain that was shut down for the winter, I lit a cigarette as I looked up at the building's facade, trying to commit to memory all of the names of the classical composers, of artists and novelists and scientists, among so many other influential minds whose titles had been etched into the stone. Then, I caught sight of the words "Free to the People" over an archway, each of the letters written like a beacon over the library's main doors. Students bundled into heavy, distinctly-colored hoodies - each official school color combination indicating that they were from the University of Pittsburgh or Carnegie Mellon or Duquesne - milled about as I continued my wait, every one of them seemingly moving through the courtyard in a rush to escape the cold air outside, and get to the welcoming warmth that the library offered. Taking another deep drag of my cigarette, I was only distantly aware of how much the chill was bothering me then; I was still uncomfortable, and I was growing steadily more impatient as the minutes ticked by, although not strictly because of the weather. I'd determined fairly easily that it was waiting for Nick that was bothering me the most - I had gotten there on time, at least as far as we'd initially agreed upon, and fusing dread with anticipation had never suited me well.
Finally, an unfamiliar voice broke my concentration, "Are you Erik Riley?"
When I turned around, it was like looking into a mirror. For an instant, I was floored, absolutely certain I was seeing myself as I'd be someday, seeing what I would become after years of my life were spent working and living and worrying. If I'd ever doubted my parentage before that moment, seeing Nicholas Riley for the first time effectively erased any doubts that might have lingered in my mind, and then some. After returning to my senses, I tried to approach the situation objectively, even though I still couldn't completely let go of the fact that we looked so much alike. It was impossible for me to dismiss, and equally painful to consider, but it suddenly occurred to me why my mother so often acted as if she'd resented me - especially as I got older - if this truly was the same man that left her with a child she hadn't wanted, that ran away from his responsibilities and broke her heart. In the end, I'd essentially represented little more to her than a constant reminder of what she'd gone through because of Nick.
Noting that, I had to forcefully bite back my own wariness toward this man - I had no intention of condoning his decision of walking out on us, but an ignorant part of me wanted to believe that I'd never gotten the whole story, that I had reason to see the best intentions in this stranger. If I didn't do at least that much, then I was sure I wouldn't be able to speak to him.
So, to be polite, I stomped out my cigarette and extended my hand, responding, "I am."
He shook my hand stiffly, a considerably awkward greeting as he said simply, "I'm Nick," then cleared his throat, taking a short step away as he examined me, "Thank you for coming."
"To be honest, I wasn't expecting to hear from you."
"No, I'm sure you weren't."
"Right...then, what's this about, exactly? I mean, why am I here?" I asked, wondering too late if my voice was sharper than I'd meant for it to sound.
But instead of acting insulted by my clipped tone, he only gestured toward the library, to the expanse of trees beyond it as he spoke, "Have you been to Schenley Park yet?"
Taking him up on the unspoken offer to forget my momentary lapse in decorum, as well as to change locations, I fell into step beside him as we began a slow walk in the direction of the park, answering his evasive question as civilly as I could, "We only got here this morning."
"We?"
"I brought a friend. He's over at one of the museums right now."
"Ah. Well, it was good of him to come with you."
I almost rolled my eyes, thoroughly put-off that Nick was actually making small-talk with me then - but I soon realized that he was just doing so because that was all we had, even if only for the time being. Without the common ground that a typical father-son dynamic should have developed over the years, any conversations that we might have in the immediate future would be starkly limited. With a sigh, I decided that I needed to be more understanding, to play along.
And so, steeling myself, I did just that, "We had the time off from school, and our winter breaks matched up this year…So, since we would've visited each other anyway, it made sense to come here together."
"From Durham, right?"
"I came from Durham. He's still living in Memphis, for med school."
An obligatory nod, then, "That's a ways away. What brought you to Durham?"
"The military brought me there, more or less. I'm in the Army reserve right now. I have been for a couple of years already, actually..." I explained, glancing in my father's direction as I determined that he knew next to nothing about me. It seemed as if he'd only tracked down my phone number and little else upon deciding to reach out to me, and I absently wondered how much information I would be safe volunteering to him in return. This experience truly was akin to talking with a stranger. I didn't think he was necessarily familiar with me, but so many aspects of my life weren't exactly secrets, either - he could've tried engaging with me simply by finding out a few details before this day. It was almost disappointing to think that he hadn't even bothered to learn more about his own son.
In fact, he appeared genuinely surprised by the detail that I had just offered him - giving further evidence to what I'd come to understand - and asked, "Wouldn't you be at Fort Bragg?"
I sighed. I hated this small-talk nonsense - hated every last factor of the circumstances that required it - and as a result, I was steadily losing my already-tentative hold on my patience, "On the weekends. But I'm transferring to Duke in the fall, so - "
" - Duke," he interrupted in a murmur, seeming mildly impressed by what I'd said. Yet at the same time, and even strangely, I felt no pride in his reaction; if he suddenly decided to think highly of me in any way solely because of the university I was about to attend, I couldn't find it in myself to care. Still, he continued to speak, unaware of what I was thinking then, "I have some colleagues that used to work there, you know. It's a fine school."
"Colleagues? So, what, you work at one of the universities here?"
He nodded again, and said with absolutely no trace of humility in his voice, "Here at Pitt. I'm an instructor at the law school, graduates only. I won't work in pre-law."
I laughed humorlessly; it was almost embarrassing to consider that I hadn't known until then that my own father had any affiliation with a major university, though that idea in itself wasn't what had recaptured my attention. Rather, I was beginning to see something of his imperious character emerging then, and I was growing more uneasy with each passing second. When we stepped onto the bridge leading further into Schenley Park, I said distantly, somewhat as a way of changing the subject, "I didn't know you'd even left Memphis."
"It's been several years. Maybe nearing ten by now, I guess. I think I accepted the job offer out here around the time your mother passed, actually..."
I grimaced at the memory, "You knew about that?"
"Of course I did."
"I just...I hadn't realized you were involved," I said. But then I paused, mulling over the implication that Nick was close enough to my mother's life - or at least to someone they'd each had in common - to have been notified about her death one way or another. He had been close enough to be told more or less when she'd died, and therefore had to have been informed when I was left alone as a ward of the state as well. Forcing us both to stop walking then and there in the middle of the sidewalk, I nearly demanded, "You knew when it happened, though, right?"
"Right," he answered carefully, obviously the one that was growing uncomfortable now.
Yet I just wasn't willing to be sympathetic to any of the discomfort that this unexpected turn in the discussion had brought him - not when it seemed that something incredibly important was hidden from me - continuing instead by accusing, "Then you had to have known about me. You knew I'd be sent into foster care if you didn't take custody."
He sighed and hesitated, before finally admitting, "Yes, I did."
"But you didn't take me in," I said softly, speaking almost to myself - as if my doing so was enough of a response, in lieu of gaining one from the man I was questioning. Then, taking his weighted silence as a confirmation of what I'd said, I asked simply, dejectedly, "Why?"
Reaching up to the metal railing on the bridge, and brushing his hand absentmindedly over one of the several hundred love-locks attached to the grate above our heads, he shrugged, a distinct tension painting his voice, "Taking you in would've meant confessing everything to my wife. She didn't know about the affair, so she didn't know about you. And I wasn't ready to give up the life I'd built, to give up my career, just to take on a ten-year-old I didn't ask for."
My heart sank with every word he'd spoken then - there was no apology to be found in his blunt terms, not a single trace of remorse for what he'd knowingly done to me, and that truth hurt more than I could say. If he'd been entirely unaware of my existence, if he had never known what became of my mother or of me, then I could forgive him for not stepping in to raise me. But that simply wasn't the case, and there was no way that I could try to deny that now. Resentment followed closely behind that revelation. Even though he was someone I had only barely met, the fact that he knew all about me when I was a child - when I'd needed someone from my family to keep me safe and out of foster care - but still didn't want to bring me into his home sincerely felt like a personal attack. He never wanted me, and his choice turned the course of my life upside down, had taken my youth and destroyed any innocence that survived my mother's household.
All I could do in response was laugh again, a bitter sound, as I snapped, "Thanks for the fucking honesty," then a resigned sigh, "Seriously, Nick. Why did you ask me to come here?"
Clearing his throat once more, he turned away from me to lean against the railing where the barrier was low enough to serve as an observation deck of sorts. From his body language, I assumed that he meant for me to join him there, and so I walked up beside him, keeping enough distance to feel safe with the person that I was steadily beginning to regret coming to meet at all. But I had made it this far, and I wanted answers - to understand the purpose of this encounter.
He didn't look toward me again when he'd eventually responded, "Well, this still has something to do with my wife. A few weeks ago, my father found out about you," he explained, admittedly piquing my interest - although it was against my better judgement - and continued with a scoff, "He's furious at me for not telling him, but he wants to reach out to you."
"What do you mean?"
"He wants to meet you," Nick said, having the audacity to sound put-upon, but then he interjected before I could ask about what this potential meeting might entail, saying, "I don't want that to happen, Erik. If you two meet, I know it won't be long before my wife finds out about this."
"Is this the same wife you cheated on?" I challenged arrogantly. His glare was the only answer I needed to know she was that wife, and so I asked my follow-up question, "What does my seeing your father have to do with you getting caught? She could still find out either way."
"Just...stay out of this. I don't want you two meeting. When he calls, I don't want you to accept any offers to meet up. Please, I don't want this."
"No, you're saying you don't want me."
Another heavy silence, then, "That's right. My affair was a mistake, and I've spent all these years regretting it. You could...complicate things, and I need the past to rest for good."
That was a crushing rejection - because even though I'd told myself repeatedly from the start not to get my hopes up, I needed to admit that a part of me had still wanted to believe that something good could come from this meeting. In that sense, I'd allowed just enough trust in a person that I truly didn't know to overrule my instincts - to overrule a level of judgment within me that had known better than to excuse that trust all along. This was never meant to be a reunion, nor was it ever going to become a chance for any kind of reconciliation between us. And it was my own goddamned fault for not allowing wariness overshadow even the slightest sentiment or optimism that had crept through my mind. But even so, the fact remained that this man was my father, and he'd just told me to stay out of his life, to stay away from his family - from my family. Having to acknowledge any part of our exchange by that point was severely painful.
But I wouldn't give him the satisfaction of knowing that - I owed this man nothing - and so I forced my voice to remain steady, "Why couldn't you have just said this when you called me?"
"This isn't the kind of conversation that should happen on the phone. I thought you might respond better if - "
" - If what? If you took the noble route and disowned me in-person?"
"Erik - "
" - I'd rather you'd have just done it on the phone and had it over with. Really, Nick, you could've saved us both a hell of a lot of time and hassle," I yelled, "I wouldn't have had to pay for the trip, you wouldn't have been forced to meet your bastard son. It's a win-win, right?"
He huffed a breath of frustration, ignoring my sarcasm when he repeated, "Please, just don't meet my father. I don't want the two of you to be in contact."
"No."
"No?"
"You heard me," I said, taking a step away and preparing to light another cigarette - fuck having to remember my manners, I wasn't in any mood to even pretend to be trying to impress this man, or care whether or not the smoke bothered him. And I can't lie, I felt quite a bit of petty satisfaction in myself when the wind directed the smoke into his face as I continued, "Right now, you're basically telling me that my grandfather wants to meet me, even after you clearly decided to keep me out of this family," I shook my head, "There's no way in hell I'm going to accept that."
"Goddamnit, Erik, will you stop - "
" - Just leave me alone from here on out, Nick, alright? I'm going over to the museum," I snapped dismissively, beginning to walk away, before turning around once more just to spite him and add, "I really don't care what you regret, or what you're still trying to hide. When your father calls me, I'm not going to ignore him."
~oOo~
Present Day, Schaumburg IL - Just under a week after that heated exchange, the call that I'd been anticipating happened, and though I hated to admit as much, even if only to myself, I really was relieved when the phone conversation carried on much more amicably than I'd been expecting, all things considered. And then, almost as suddenly as the opportunity had appeared in the first place, I'd gone on to meet with my grandfather, speaking to him face-to-face and with the promise of honesty from the outset, in spite of my father's direct wishes for me to bow out of this family's affairs permanently. But in the end - and regardless of the upset that followed as far as the details of Nick's indiscretions coming to light were concerned - my going through with the meeting itself at all, then continuing contact when everything else was said and done, proved to be an incredibly important act of defiance on my part. And moreover, it was one that I'd never regretted afterward, no matter how often it turned out that Nick and I would argue about my decision over the years, among the several other causes of bad blood between us.
From the first trip that I'd made out to Tennessee after Gene and I had initially gotten in touch, we were able to cultivate a healthy relationship from almost nothing. And although Nick had protested our time together, unsurprisingly - although he'd made his disapproval known to each of us without reserve - Gene still pulled me straight into his family, determined that I would stay there, simply because I'd belonged there to begin with. In my grandfather's mind, my father had no right to determine that I should be kept a secret, or forgotten entirely. The older man had missed so much of my life, but in turn, he'd sincerely attempted to make up for that wasted time, simply by caring. Very much unlike Nick, Gene had absolutely no ulterior motives in maintaining contact with me - more than anything, he'd said that he just wanted to get to know his grandson, and I was proud to take on that as-yet unfamiliar title in return. Over the years, several people that knew me well enough to learn this specific aspect of my history had asked why I'd never bothered to change my last name, if in fact it was true that my father and I were not on speaking terms, nor would we be in the foreseeable future. And my answer to that was always the same, without fail - my grandfather was the patriarch of a family that I'd nearly lost, without ever getting to know what had been taken from me, and even though I had no interest in following any legacy that my father had built, my grandfather's was worthwhile. I wanted to live up to it.
That one encounter, one long conversation held in his home in Memphis, made all the difference for me going forward. For all that I'd gone through after the fact, I hated to think about how much worse off I would've been if I hadn't belonged to a family somehow, and having one of my own now with Christine had only emphasized that truth for me that much more - I just wasn't the same person any longer, and that was unquestionably for the better. But now my grandfather - the only family member from my past that I'd ever sincerely cared about - was suddenly dead and gone, and to hear that truth spoken aloud, to have to accept it, was staggering. As far as my elder family members were concerned, I was left solely with the man that had actively rejected me from the start, the man that strove whenever possible to prevent the relationship I'd had with Gene. The phone call informing me of his death had uprooted the last twenty-some years of my life in as many minutes, and I was left bitter for it. My grandfather's loss was a painful blow on its own, but the fact that Nick, of all the fucking people, was the one to give me the news had just added insult to injury. I was absolutely miserable in its wake.
Feeling almost disoriented by then, and as I worked to fully process everything I'd just learned, I ended the unwanted call with an aggression and resentment toward my father that - unfortunately - couldn't actually be felt on the other side of the line, before I slid my phone as far away from myself and across the surface of the countertop as possible, and waited for Christine to come back downstairs. As I heard, and then absently registered the muffled sounds from the floor above me of my wife and daughter arguing over Josie's temper tantrum and her resulting time-out, I tried to run the last conversation that I'd had with Gene through my mind. Yet for all I'd attempted to focus on something substantial from those moments, I came up empty regardless.
I'd spoken to him only days before what would turn out to be the end of his life - if even that much time had passed - but still, any of the specifics of what we'd talked about were lost to me now; that in itself hurt badly. I couldn't remember the last thing he said to me, beyond typical words of parting. I couldn't remember how I ended our conversation, if I'd mentioned something about Josephine's progress now that she was officially out of preschool, or if I had explained something ultimately unimportant that bothered me at work...I tried, I genuinely struggled to do so, but in the end I simply couldn't remember anything, because we had always spoken to each other so casually, so used to sharing our company by then; during the time to follow that harsh realization, my regret for not paying closer attention when I'd had the chance was staggering. I wished more than anything then that I could just go back and at least make the conversation meaningful for us both, if only for the sake of each of us being able to say a proper goodbye to one another. Rationally, I knew that I couldn't have prevented the final stroke that had apparently taken him, but still, I could've had us part ways differently. I could've done something differently.
Shaking my head at that particular succession of thoughts, I was dimly aware that I was near tears once again, dimly aware of my voice finally breaking completely when I told Christine about what had happened. But otherwise, I went completely silent as she approached my place at the eating-bar, my throat tight when she voiced her pain and disbelief at the loss and held me close to her all the while. She had loved Gene, admitted that she'd felt as strong of a connection to him as she had for her own grandparents, but she also understood my position, understood what exactly about it had made the loss all the more painful; I had appreciated her comforting words, her sympathetic gestures, but only in more of an abstract sense than anything else. For the time being, it was so much easier to grow progressively numb, to allow myself to remain distant while I sorted through my emotions.
~~oOo~~
The following afternoon, after we'd had some time to ourselves to face the first waves of grief, we told Josie that her great-grandfather had passed, to which she responded with mingled sadness and confusion typical of her age.
Then, in just a matter of days afterward, Christine, Josie, and I made the long trip down to Tennessee, the journey requiring an earlier start than I would have preferred for the sake of taking time away from work and our other daily responsibilities, which Christine and Jo would fly back home again for in lieu of driving. I hated every minute of it. We had made that same drive so many times over the years, always looking forward to the trip to see Gene and enjoying making our way to him, but now, the road to Memphis only brought an equally shared yet isolating dread for what would happen at the end of it; on the whole, I wanted to simply turn around and never look back. On the surface, it would have been easy to do so, to be honest. But I was the one in charge of handling funeral arrangements - nevermind the estate that had yet to be sorted out, nevermind everything else that came with being the only next of kin that Gene trusted to handle his affairs after he was gone. I'd agreed to take on the role years before, when the idea of him dying was distant and unlikely even in spite of his declining health - but now, I regretted my promise, because it meant keeping my head high while everything was taken care of. And, worse, it meant having to deal directly with Nick during the process, and neither of us was looking forward to those fast-approaching experiences, necessary though they were.
From the few discussions we'd already had - ones mercifully cut short by the 'end' option on my phone when I'd lost my temper enough to hang up on him altogether - I knew that my father felt slighted that he hadn't been appointed as Gene's executor, regardless of the fact that he legitimately was the one of us that was actually well-versed in the legal aspects of managing an estate. Unfortunately, and to my own immense annoyance, I suspected that he was only offended because he'd missed the opportunity to show off his skills and to network, and that absolutely no monetary gain was coming his way, rather than helping his late-father in any form, and once again my resentment for him was founded in evident circumstances rather than blind emotion steered by our troubled past. I didn't want to see him, plain and simple, didn't want to have to deal with all of the negativity that he presented on top of everything else that I needed to contend with. As it stood, my stay in Memphis would be extended over a span of weeks, rather than just days, and I would be by myself after the funeral; it was unreasonable, not to mention impossible, for Christine to be able to take that much time off work just to hold my hand, and neither of us wanted Josie away from her routine for that long, especially when she was so close to getting ready for kindergarten orientation.
So I'd be on my own, and quite frankly, the thought was more terrifying than I would've expected; the idea of being by myself and left to my own devices in my present, admittedly very bleak state of mind wasn't appealing, and however small for the moment, a part of me wondered how bad it would all get before anything got even remotely better. But I bit my fears back almost forcefully; there truly was nothing I could do for the immediate future, as far as I knew, nothing at least beyond attempting to be mindful of my grief and holding to my responsibilities, and I tried to remind myself of that much and little else for fear of further distraction as time went on, as the miles passed us and we crossed the state lines into Tennessee, crossed the city limits into Memphis proper and made our way through the old city. Once we were there, everything happened fairly quickly, if not in a relatively unremarkable manner, compared to what else was going on then - we checked into a hotel and settled there, the same one where I'd be staying alone once Christine and Josie flew back to Chicago, and from that point on we simply functioned around one another for those first few days, taking in a Memphis without Gene as I sorted out funerary matters and fielded increasingly more aggressive phone calls from Nick.
One of very few of my breaks from him came the morning of the funeral, though, some hours before we were supposed to go out to the mortuary to set the occasion into motion, and I'd spent much of my time at the small table in our hotel room talking on the phone with the funeral director while Christine got herself and Jo ready for the day. From there, while I finally started to wrap up my decidedly stiff phone call, Christine wrote a note to me saying that she was going out for Starbucks, clearly opting for the higher-quality coffee option over any brew that came from the older-model machine that was included with our room. I nodded in silent agreement to that, indicating that I'd heard her follow-up comment when she said she was leaving Josie with me, and that was the end of that simple exchange. As I alternated between speaking and listening, as if the director and I were working from a script, Josie's attention drifted between me at the table, whatever cartoon was playing at a low volume on the television, and the few toys she had strewn around her bed, but for the most part she'd seemed uninterested in anything I was doing, and I felt confident in returning to the close of my call without interruption.
Apparently, though, she'd heard at least enough of my conversation with the director to pique her interest in the end, prompting her to walk up beside me once I had set my phone down, rest her arms on the tabletop, and ask, "Daddy, what's a viewing?"
Absentmindedly turning my wedding ring in circles on my finger, I answered, "That's what it's called when people go up to Grandpa to say goodbye."
"But you said he died."
"He did."
"If he's dead then he can't say goodbye."
"Right. He doesn't. We talk to his body," I said, adding flatly, "Hence, a viewing."
Her eyes widened, genuine shock painting her expression, and realizing my mistake, I immediately regretted my bluntness as she whispered, "We're gonna talk to a dead body?"
"No, not...Ah, you don't have to, honey," I said in a softer tone, knowing that everything I said to her then needed to be age-appropriate and gentle; I wasn't the only one mourning a significant loss, even if my daughter didn't yet understand the gravity of that loss. So I continued with an easier voice, "Don't think of it like talking to a dead body. We're saying goodbye to his spirit, his body's just there so we have something familiar to talk to."
"His spirit, like a ghost?"
"No...Kind of..." I shook my head, feeling entirely lost and inexperienced as I tried to traverse this unfamiliar territory with my child. Despite his age and risk-factors, we certainly hadn't seen Gene's death coming, or at least hadn't wanted to consciously accept the possibility as being on the horizon, and it would help absolutely no one for me to wax philosophical when the other party barely had an idea of what I was trying to say to her, "It's not something to be afraid of, though, and you don't have to look if you don't want to."
"What if I want to?"
"Then you can. Mom and I will be right there with you."
Josephine pursed her lips, a reluctant sort of dubiousness mingling with all-out curiosity in her expression, and although she didn't seem eager at all just then to continue the discussion from there, I suspected all the same that this wasn't the end of her questioning, either. At some point that day, I was sure that we'd have to have another serious conversation about life and death; I hated that we had to have that conversation to begin with, but that was just the way of it. And so I just sighed when she turned away from me and sat again with her toys, though her attention was now far off from any form of entertainment in front of her, and her mind more than likely trying to contemplate her great-grandfather and spirits and goodbyes, all the things that were as-yet beyond her years. It physically hurt me to see her go through that, but still, selfishly, it somehow hurt less than to dwell in my own mind, and so I let my focus remain on making sure that my daughter was handling her emotions without any major crises along the way.
We stayed in that wordless state until the distinct sound of our hotel room's card-key pulled me from my thoughts, and in the next moment, Christine was setting two familiarly decorated cups of coffee on the table in front of me, before passing a cake-pop over to Josie, who smiled widely at the surprise. But I ignored my drink - without looking at my wife, without speaking, I pulled her close to me until she was all but completely in my lap. She understood what I needed then, and it was in that position that we stayed until the clock ran down and we absolutely had to leave for the day.
After the viewing and the service, a wake was held at Gene's VFW post, and it was during that particular event, more so than those preceding it, that I realized how truly well-liked, how sincerely respected my grandfather was, if the sheer number of attendees and kind words indicated anything substantial about the man. But even as my pride for him grew, so did the feeling that I was wholly out of place there, yet almost constantly gawked at all the while.
Because even though Gene appeared to have spoken of Christine and Josie and I fondly and often, there was no hiding the fact that I was that grandson, his first and only, the one that was the living proof of Gene's estranged son's affair so many years ago, and that I had most certainly not spent my entire life with my grandfather. It was another unfortunate reality of my situation, and one that I suspected would never leave me entirely. But not for the first time that day, I had to remind myself to respond to questions and comments as graciously as humanly possible, all things considered. Still, it didn't escape my notice that Christine, always with Josie's timid form in tow, had to grip my hand more than once to pull me back to level-headedness, because whether Gene was well-liked or not, human-nature is what it is; there were definite moments when it was nearly impossible not to feel that I was alone under a microscope courtesy of Gene's friends, and I wanted to lash out at whoever it was in any given instant that had decided it was their place to put me in that position at all.
As it stood, Nick wasn't moving mountains to welcome his only son to the final send-off of our dearly departed, either, and somehow that only made me feel worse, made me feel all the more rejected in spite of that fact that I already knew where we stood. It wasn't as if I was expecting anything different now that Gene was gone. Far from it. But even so, the experience was one that I could have gone my entire life without having. Christine knew without my having to say so outright that I was feeling terrible, that this day wasn't getting any easier as the hours passed, and I was grateful for her presence. In being perfectly honest with myself, I wasn't sure that I would've been able to keep my composure without her, much less get through the funeral and other traditional services without very seriously considering walking out before it was over, so long as doing so meant that I wouldn't have to deal with reminders of my pain any longer.
~~oOo~~
Several days after an exceedingly painful goodbye at the airport with Christine and Josie, during which time I'd been having increasingly more trouble handling myself on my own and found the solitude beyond the estate lawyer's office to be suffocating, Nick asked for me to meet him at the bar of a local restaurant near the hotel; and although I'd made my best effort to convince him to pick another location - to choose one decidedly less tempting for a recovering alcoholic than a fucking bar - he was insistent about his decision, likely because of convenience and familiarity, and in the end I simply didn't have the energy to fight with him over that point. It was a relatively small detail, or so I told myself, and at any rate, he didn't know why I'd wanted to go elsewhere. He didn't know that I was an alcoholic at all, and I intended to keep him in the dark on that detail indefinitely. I'd be fine - I silently repeated that I would be fine there, so long as I kept my focus and remained calm with my father. Seeing him for the first time since our strained encounters at the funeral, after I had made the short walk over to the restaurant, however, I felt my resolve begin to crumble, and the implications of that made me more nervous than I already had been at the start. As such, it became difficult to maintain the focus I'd intended, and I saw how quickly, how easily my mind seemed to want to wander as a result. It was jarring...it was all too much.
Since the funeral, I'd been adamantly avoiding in-person contact with Nick, but now that we were sitting next to each other, now that we were talking face-to-face once again, I couldn't help noting that we still looked so much alike, and that alone was unsettling. Very little of my mother remained in me, almost none of her had passed down to Josephine, and a part of me considered that a shame - my mother's life had been cut short, and more of that life seemed forgotten with each passing year. There were so few stories I could tell my own daughter without sugarcoating the events of my childhood or even outright lying to her, and without some kind of legacy, like the one I could share of Gene with Josie as she grew up, I was fairly certain that my mother would vanish altogether one day. Sitting with Nick now, I blamed him for that as much as I blamed myself. I could have done a better job of keeping her memory alive, I knew that, but while she was alive, Nick had pushed her and pushed her until she finally gave way completely. I wondered if he ever thought about that, about her, or if he spent the brunt of his life simply trying to put it behind him. The latter was the most likely, and that made me question whether or not Gene would face the same fate from his son. I couldn't say; Nick and I looked alike, and now each of us looking pretty worse for the wear, but we weren't the same. It would be generous to believe that he mourned his father the way I did. But then, I just didn't know him well enough to be sure.
But it wasn't worth considering for much longer than those initial moments together anyway. When we met each other at the bar and exchanged a tense, halting greeting, any and all thoughts related to his humanity - to any single part of him or my family - vanished entirely, replaced once more by the anger that I believed I would never stop harboring for him. His demeanor only justified my anger that much more; he didn't look any more thrilled to see me than I was to see him, and I knew from the outset that this exchange would be no different from the ones we'd shared in the past, recently or otherwise. Better to get down to whatever business he had in mind and get it over with. I'd already felt on edge, buried by emotions that I was having trouble managing combined with that steadily growing sense of isolation, and sharing company with my father was only making it worse. I realized then exactly how bad I was faring. Unconsciously, I knew I was very near my own breaking point, but stubbornness married with all-out fear of the known elements of my past made me hesitate to act in my own interest. For what had to have been the thousandth time in my life, I ignored the symptoms of a major backslide and pressed on for the sake of maintaining an outward sense of composure, hoping all the while that it would be enough and knowing damn well that it never would be.
And I still did nothing, spending the interfering weeks ignoring my problems.
Rather, for the time being, I invited Nick to speak, distantly wondering what was left to say by then. In a practical, legal sense, there really wasn't much, if anything that needed to be passed on or discussed between us; Gene's old house had been cleared out years ago when he went into his assisted living facility, and any heirlooms or keepsakes that he had wanted to stay within the immediate family were now solely in my possession. Even then, none of those items were of financial value, certainly not in the way Nick would consider such value, just volumes of books, some furniture and photo albums and the like. But Gene still hadn't wanted Nick involved by that point in their relationship, and so Nick had stayed away from the issue at the time, uncharacteristically accepting the request for distance from his father and son, and presently, there wasn't much he could do about Gene's assets, real or imagined, even if he wanted to. Money had gone into a trust for Josephine's education, or for however she chose to manage it when she was an adult, and the house itself was set to be sold off as the main part of the estate, which also went to the trust. There was nothing else to consider, nothing beyond simple means. Everyone involved already knew that Nick was pissed off about that particular set of circumstances, and so I couldn't quite understand what he'd had left to harp about.
To my continued annoyance, it took him a moment to circle around to his point at all, starting with a simple, "What'll you have? I'll buy."
"Just water," I responded, taking off my surgical mask in preparation for the order as I spoke, "I don't drink."
Largely ignoring that, he spoke to the bartender for his own order, then to me only after it had arrived, clearing his throat and saying, "My wife and I have to go back to Pittsburgh soon."
"Fine," I replied, frowning inwardly at the brand-new memory of that unpleasant woman, my would-be step-mother in another life that hadn't said a word to me, but rather eyed me with distaste at the funeral and VFW gathering. Resigned to the bitterness of this stranger, I just asked, "How soon?"
"Couple of days."
"Well, I've got everything taken care of here," I said, my voice tight, "So unless you have some great revelation you've been saving up, we can part ways here and probably not have to see each other again until some other assorted family member dies."
"There's no need to be glib, Erik. I'm just trying to talk."
That was surprising, but I was immediately suspicious of the aim behind the noticeably charged casualness, nevermind the clearly feigned hurt in his words. Over twenty years of interactions, albeit staggered, with this man told me that he didn't share his company with someone he previously claimed to dislike, even hate, depending on the conversation, just to sit around and shoot the shit for fun with that same person. He was a lawyer, and an arguably good one from an objective standpoint, and so he knew how to turn discussions of any degree in his favor, to whatever end that might meet, and I didn't like how nonchalantly he was trying to interact with me then. Every instinct in me screamed to be wary of him now, and to stay wary. Every instinct screamed that something wasn't right at all, and, having learned long ago to trust those instincts, I immediately followed suit with the warnings, forgetting for the moment everything else I was upset about before. I needed to be careful with him.
So I asked with forced evenness, "What do you need to talk about?"
"Josephine."
There it was - and I didn't like where this conversation had turned. Every nerve in my body tensed at that as I ground out, "What about Josephine?"
"I'd like to see her more. I need to."
I scoffed, believing only for an instant that I could win this argument, that it would be easier to talk my way out of than I'd initially assumed, and went on, "You don't need to do anything. You haven't been involved with her for a minute since the day she was born, there's no reason to start now."
"She's my granddaughter, I have the right. So does my wife," he said, and if anything about this exchange was different, if this was another person that I knew and cared about, I might have believed the pleading tone he'd added to his voice - but this was Nick, and I knew better. I knew his aggression, "We want this. She's my granddaughter."
"She's your granddaughter in the same way that I'm your son," I snapped, not caring who around us might have heard or decided to listen in, and in that instant Nick's calm facade broke entirely; I could see all of the anger and resentment that I'd held for him returned to me in his eyes, but I didn't give a damn. Regardless of what might happen from here on out, I wouldn't give in to this absurd and abrupt request, and I didn't intend to stay in his presence long enough to see what other arguments he planned to make for his case. It was bad enough having to lose Gene, but to add that to the prospect of my daughter having to share time with my father was beyond enough reason for me to feel hostile. Another insult to injury. Whatever motivated him, I didn't care - it was insincere, of that I was entirely sure, and I didn't trust him whatsoever. There was no way in hell I would force my daughter to spend time with him just to satisfy his own sick need to have a family. Too little, too late, as far as we were concerned. He'd lost that chance a long time ago, and I wasn't going to lie back and accept his bullying or appeals to emotions. His credibility with me was shot, and so I stood up and got ready to leave.
But I wasn't prepared for the next words he leveled at me, "I'll fight for visitation. I'll take you to court over it, Erik," he said when my back was turned, "You know I can, and I will."
"You can't," I moved to face him again, and from there, everything escalated quickly, "You don't have any grounds for it."
"That's what you think. But I'll do it."
"You're bluffing."
"Are you willing to take that risk?"
"Do you really think threatening me is going to help your situation any?"
"I just want to know my granddaughter. You owe me that much."
I laughed incredulously, actually laughed that he'd had the audacity to say what he just had, then demanded, "I owe you? How do you figure?"
"I asked you to stay away from Gene, all those years ago, all I wanted was to save my marriage - "
" - She would've found out about me some other way, Nick - "
" - But you went and did what you wanted anyway, and it's been hell for me ever since. We couldn't have kids, Trish and I, you're the only one I've had, so you need to make this right and give me my family back."
"You don't have a family for me to give back. The only Riley that was my family is gone now, you're just an unfortunate side effect of being part of this lineage."
He said nothing to that, and with his silence, my suspicions were confirmed tenfold. This wasn't about forming a relationship with his granddaughter at all, or anything even remotely like that. It never was, I was right all along, and his words now only made it that much clearer to me. Twisting my wedding ring around rhythmically once again in a failing attempt to ground myself, I considered the notion. His motivation was spite, was the bitter result of the years of animosity that had existed between us - he was simply retaliating, using my family against me in order to do so. Any stranger could see that much clearly, and I determined not to play this game with him.
Still, after seemingly regaining his composure, he went on, "How long have you hated me for keeping you away from Gene? Are you planning on doing that to your own daughter?"
"If you were anyone else, I'd at least acknowledge the logic there. But I can't trust you. Any argument you try with me is void, is that clear?"
"It's wrong, and you know it."
"No, it isn't."
"Then I'll fight you for it. I will."
He kept pushing - I knew he would, he'd keep going until I either gave in to his demands or caused a scene, only serving to give him more fodder against me. And it was then that I broke, I panicked. In the seconds following his brusquely given words, I didn't want him to see how anxious I was getting - there was no way that he was above exploiting any sign of weakness on my part. We had played this game countless times already, and I needed to settle down to come out of it successfully. So, almost without thinking, just barely feeling the coming effects of what I was about to do, I turned to the bartender and prepared to order something strong for myself, at least strong enough to take the edge off my agitation. I hardly considered what I was doing as it was happening, hardly considered the very real consequences of this decision. Even after years in recovery, making sure that I got that drink was almost second-nature. In my mind, I had to get through the argument first and foremost - anything else simply had to wait until I saw this night through to the end. Conscious and unconscious somehow merge during this kind of a situation - in the past, I've always been aware of what I was doing, aware of the fact that it would come back and attempt to destroy me, but I've never actually been able to tamp it down, to stop it altogether. Without the will to do so, I seem to make every movement going forward slowly, and that's exactly what happened this time around, as I prepared to burn another bridge behind me.
To the bartender, I began, "Can I get a Bourbon - "
" - I thought you said you didn't drink."
Ignoring Nick, I continued to the bartender, "Cut it with water, thanks."
"Josephine is my granddaughter," Nick continued as I took a long pull from the glass that was set in front of me; the familiar burn brought me back to the present, but in the worst way possible. I hadn't wanted this to happen at all, but before I knew it, I'd let myself go down this path once again, and I hated myself for it, yet somehow that still wasn't enough to consider this wrong. It was strange, so familiar and so terribly real. Still, as I justified, this was a matter of survival, of protecting my family, and I needed all the liquid courage I could get. I would handle the repercussions later, but for now, I needed to stand my ground. And so I took another drink as Nick went on speaking, "I have a right to see my granddaughter."
"She isn't yours, Nick. Josephine is nothing to you, no more than I am," I said when I'd finished my drink, standing this time with the intention of leaving no matter what else he responded with. By then, I just wanted more of an escape than the Bourbon was offering me - everything else could be addressed in time, I just needed to get the hell out before I did something else I'd regret.
