Between the Lines 3
Eddie stepped through the doorway of the familiar café and ordered his usual drink, sitting at his usual table. The café would close soon, but he always stepped in for a little bit. He couldn't understand why he felt the need to watch her sing after getting into a fight (even if he could call it a fight) with her just hours before, but he would give up his soul to hear her sing just once. He knew she saw him in the audience every Tuesday, but they never talked about it. It was sort of nice, like their little secret. Having this secret, just the two of them, warmed him up quicker than nursing a cup of tea.
Patricia soon said good night to the crowd and stood up. Rather than pack up and leave as usual, she stepped off the stage to greet someone sitting at a table in front. He hugged her a tad too long and even gave her… a bouquet of lilacs?! Who was this guy? Even worse, Patricia accepted them gracefully. Gracefully! Spotting Eddie, Patricia beckoned him over.
"Eddie! Eddie, this is Ben Reed; Ben, this is Eddie Miller," she quickly introduced them.
"Oh, you're Eddie?" Ben asked, poking Patricia.
"Yeah, I'm Eddie," he responded uneasily. Ben quirked his eyebrows.
"American?"
"Yeah," he responded, taking a sip of his latte. "But I go to the boarding school a couple blocks away."
"That's funny," Ben said thoughtfully. "My dad works there."
"Stop trying to brag that your dad is the headmaster," Patricia chided him. Eddie choked on his drink. "You okay, Eddie?"
"Sorry, did you say Mr. Sweet is your father?" Eddie asked incredulously.
"Yeah," Ben confirmed sheepishly. "I would love to attend that school, but, you know, it would be a conflict of interest, right? Plus I live close enough to commute, anyway." Eddie had stopped listening by then. He had a sibling?
"Uh, odd question, but when's your birthday?"
"The seventeenth of May?" Ben's familiar blue eyes frowned. The room got stuffy, the heat was suffocating, and the fireplace across the room threatened to char Eddie's clothes.
"What year?"
"1996… Why do you keep asking me these questions?"
"Eddie, are you okay?" Patricia waved a hand in his face and then touched a finger to his jaw, trying to turn his gaze from Ben to her. She frowned when she felt the tension of his teeth grinding together.
"Sorry, I- I have to go," Eddie muttered, storming out into the October night. Patricia made to follow him, but Ben's gentle arm held her back.
"Didn't you want to go somewhere?"
She sniffed her flowers. "Yeah, let's go."
Outside, Eddie's thoughts were swirling and drowning as he sped down the road. If Eddie's birthday was in February and Ben's was in June… that meant that someone was busy. Eddie resisted the urge to punch the brick wall of a pharmacy he passed by. He clicked on his phone to check the time and noticed two text messages from Patricia. He ignored them; he could talk to her later when he was a little more… sane.
It was nine PM. Nine minus five was four, making it four in the afternoon in New Jersey. He decided to call his mom.
"Hello?"
"Hi, Mom."
"Eddie! How's England? Are you doing well in school? What's going on with Eric?"
"School is fine," he sighed into the phone. "Um, did Dad ever tell you why he, uh, left?"
"He just left without a word. You know that." Her cheerful tone had disappeared. "Why?"
"Do you know what he's been doing since then?" Eddie tried to stop his voice from cracking. "Has he gotten remarried?"
"I don't think so," she replied. "We technically weren't even divorced until this year. Is something wrong?"
"I think I know why Dad left," he grumbled dangerously. "Mom," he leaned against a wall at school, "I think I have a half-brother. I think Dad cheated on you."
"What?"
"His name is Ben. I met him through Patricia, and he has Dad's eyes. And you know what the worst thing is? He said that he would go to my school but doesn't because his dad would have a conflict of interest with him since he is the headmaster!" He scoffed in a derogatory fake British accent.
"How old is he? And who's his mother?" She asked shakily.
"Mom," Eddie said gently, "He is only three months younger than me. And I'm not sure about his mother, but I think Patricia said his last name was… Reed? Yeah, Ben Reed."
"The nerve of him!" Eddie had never heard his mother curse in such a venomous tone before. "If he was born in June, that would mean that his conception was in September or possibly August. Right when he started his new job at this fancy-schmancy boarding school!" He heard her heave but knew that her anger wouldn't last long. His mother was never the type who could hold grudges for long; she was always telling Eddie to turn the other cheek. Be the bigger person. Wonder if someone was acting foul because she had a bad day. It was part of the reason he had such a smoky temper- he was tired of making excuses for other people. "No wonder he got the principal job so easily," she continued hotly. "She was the principal before him!"
"Eddie?" Patricia was walking up the path toward him.
"I gotta go," he said into the phone. "Will you be okay?"
"Yeah, don't worry. Go get her," she giggled.
"Mo-om," he groaned.
"Sorry, love you!" Patricia sat beside him, leaning against the brick wall of the school. The flowers were curiously gone.
"How'd your date go?" he drawled.
"What? No," Patricia scowled back. "Look," she hesitated. I was hoping you'd come with me somewhere."
"Why don't you take Ben?" He raised an eyebrow.
"Would you stop acting so ridiculously illogical? I was going to ask you to come with us but then you stomped out like a maniac!"
"So now you want me to go with you… alone?" He leaned toward her. "That important?"
"It's… my dad's birthday," she mumbled.
"I thought you'd said he left," Eddie said with a frown.
"Would you just come?" she huffed.
"'Course I will."
As they stepped out of the cab, Eddie reached into his pocket. Patricia shot him a warning glance, but he only revealed gummy bears, not smokes. At the sight of the colorful candy, she started to laugh so hard she cried.
"My dad used to love gummy bears," she sighed.
"Used to?" She just grabbed his forearm and led him to the backyard of a small house. "Where are we?" he asked.
"This is my house, but my mum is probably out working and my sister is in another boarding school." She sat crisscross applesauce in front of a rock decorated with flowers. Lilacs.
"Patricia? You said your dad left you," he said slowly. A tear sliding down her face, she nodded. It wasn't just a rock; it was a tombstone. Kneeling next to her, he added, "And the 'stupid letter?'" Wordlessly, she pulled a paper out her pocket, soft with age and fraying at the folds.
THE WILLIAMSON FAMILY
We regrettably inform you that Captain Richard Williamson has passed away during his service. He was an incredibly valuable asset to our team and will be sorely missed…
"And before you tell me that dying doesn't count," she choked. "He was at the end of his deployment when Mum told him she was pregnant, and yet he still enlisted the following year. He was convinced that he was protecting his country-"
"Then he died a hero," Eddie interrupted.
"After leaving his family suffocating in the dust, barely living on his military income, while he risked his life every day for people he didn't even know!" Patricia admonished, ripping the grass in frustration. 'My father died a monster and a coward," she sighed.
"How could you say that about a man who had the courage to protect his people, every single day, no matter the cost?" Eddie threw up his hands. "Plenty of people would be honored to know such a person!"
"Because the cost was me!" Patricia shouted. In the background, frightened crows flew off the barren trees. Her pale green eyes matched the dying grass; the tears that threated to spill competed with the rain in the gutters to see who would fall first. "My mother, her children, his sister, our grandparents. Everyone who loved him watched him fall-"
"Okay, now just because you don't agree with war doesn't mean-"
"-by his own hand. Can't you listen, Eddie?" She begged. "Everyone who has ever heard of a military family only hears about how proud they are of their courageous soldiers, their hardworking and honourable pawns. But no one ever knows the stories of those who suffered. He turned into a monster when he came home- always yelling, often violent, very temperamental." Eddie cautiously took her hand, relieved when she tightly gripped back. Leaning against the stone, she sighed, "I spend every other day of the year hating him, but now I can't help but wonder what would have happened if I had been a better person."
"None of this is your fault," Eddie told her. When she didn't look at him, he dragged himself up and tilted her cheek toward him, dry grass sticking to his pants. "You hear me? None of it," he said firmly. In any other moment, being so close might have caused them to blush. Or scramble away from each other. Or creep closer and closer…
Patricia shook her head, "I could have helped him; all I did was tear him down…" Her icy eyes settled on his face but were unseeing, trapped in the distance.
"He was taken from you, and I'm sorry," Eddie whispered. He twirled a strand of her hair between his fingers, trying to get her attention. He was melting in front of her, breaking down in the face of her despair. He wished so desperately to put her back together.
"He left me," she repeated.
"He had no choice." Forgetting all pretenses of personal space, Patricia and Eddie crowded into each other's lines of vision, neither truly seeing the other.
"The choice was his," she insisted.
"How could getting killed in war be his own choice?" Suddenly Patricia sat up, the space between them smaller than physically possible. They were closer than nose to nose. "Your dad died a hero," he growled. "Mine is a cheating asshole-"
With hands on either side of his neck, Patricia forced Eddie's eyes to lock with hers. "He didn't die in war," she whimpered. "He killed himself." They stared at each other, heart-shattering green on soul-melting brown. She could have walked away, but for the first time in years, she took a chance. After moments of painstaking, emotionally charged tension, she let herself fall, crumpling into his chest, willing him to catch her. When he did, she somehow felt at home for the first time in years.
They sat like that for an infinity. Finally, Patricia whispered, "My dad can never come back, but as long as yours lives and breathes- even if every single second is spent prolonging his abandonment- you still have a chance. Promise me you'll take it, even if it means ten years from now. Promise me you'll let yourself stop holding a grudge. Take the chance me and my dad will never have."
Staring into her eyes and boring into her soul with an emotion she couldn't quite read, he said, "Promise."
Woah, plot twist, much?
Try to guess what comes next!