He had news. It wasn’t good.
Chapter 13
“There.” I patted his chest. “It’s very nice.”
Silas looked down at the tie. “I don’t know.”
I was aware that he wasn’t thinking about the knot I’d just perfected or the rest of his outfit, the suit that he’d first worn to Rashelle’s wedding and he was now wearing for his father’s memorial. There wasn’t going to be a church service, since his dad hadn’t been religious, and there wasn’t going to be a viewing or any kind of luncheon or reception, because Silas said that his dad didn’t have any friends. At least, there were none that he knew of.
However, there was a lot that he hadn’t known, like about his father’s life in Toledo. “For all these years, he lived in a regular house on a regular street. He had an edge trimmer in his garage and pile of junk mail. It’s all normal,” Silas had told me quietly when Lyra and I arrived in Ohio. After calling to let us know that his father had died in the hospital, he’d taken the key ring and wallet he’d found among that guy’s possessions (I wasn’t sureif that was strictly permitted) and had gotten a car over to the address on the ID he’d found. We had driven to meet him there, at a very normal house on a normal street.
“All this time, he was about an hour away,” Silas had told me. “An hour away. He could have come to see Lyra whenever he wanted, but he waited until he was on death’s door and then it was too late.” He had been furious but had been trying to contain it, and it seemed to me like he was about to burst. So I had stepped in, making a hotel reservation for the night and starting to make arrangements for his father. I had gotten things straightened out to some extent, but there was more to do.
And a few days later, Silas was still angry. “He doesn’t deserve to have us do this,” he told me, yanking at his tie.
“Probably not, but it’s for Lyra,” I reminded him. We were going to visit the niche that held his father’s ashes and everyone could say goodbye. I carefully readjusted the knot I’d made and then left my hands on Silas’s chest.
“Thank you,” he said.
“I’m getting much better at tying them.”
“Thank you for all of this,” he corrected. “Since I called you from the hospital, you’ve done just about everything.”
“It was nothing.” After dealing with the issues of the death certificate and the cremation, I’d started to figure out how to handle their father’s estate. There didn’t seem to be much because the house had been a rental, but he’d had a little money in the bank and a car we could sell. I’d mentioned using anyfunds we recovered to set up a college fund for Lyra, and Silas had jumped at the idea.
She and I had gone to look for a dress she could wear today, and also for fancier shoes than what she wore to school. In the car, she had asked me if it was ok to tell people about her father.
“You know, that he’s dead,” she added.
“Yes, you can talk about it.”
“Because Silas seems mad,” she’d told me, and after I’d conveyed that to him, he’d done everything he could to hide that emotion from her. It was still there, though, and currently? He was taking it out on his tie.
“You don’t have to wear this,” I said, and undid that beautiful knot. “There’s no need. Here, take it off. Is that better?”
“Yeah, thank you,” he repeated. He took my hands and returned them to his chest, and he left his over mine. I could feel his heartbeat slow and his face relaxed a little. “It was different when my mom died. I was actually sad.”
“How did you deal with that?”
“I got into a fight.” Silas looked at me. “I can’t do that anymore and I don’t know what I feel. I guess I’m pissed at him for hiding from us and I’m pissed that he never let Lyra have a chance to meet him. But it’s probably better that she didn’t. Now, she can imagine that he was an ok guy and she doesn’t have to deal with the truth, that he was an asshole that didn’t want anything to do with her.”
I nodded. Their father had been horrible to both of them.
“I guess we should get going,” he said, but then we heard the knock at the door.
It was Mrs. Alford and Boris. “I heard about your father,” she told Silas, and then inclined her chin at me. “She told me to lay off it for a few days but then I could tell the neighbors, so I did. I’m sorry he’s dead. Larry was a hellion when he used to live here and I don’t like how he treated me or anyone else, but now…well, death is final.”
Silas nodded, because there wasn’t much to argue with.
She held up a foil-wrapped dish. “We brought you a tuna casserole with crumbled cracker topping, my specialty,” she said, and he took it and told her thank you for the food, and also for the condolences. As she and Boris departed, two other neighbors approached.
“You mowed my lawn every other week last summer and you always shovel my walk,” the man said. “Your father grew up in this house and we all called him a reprobate, but you’re a good person.” The lady next to him expressed similar sentiments both about Silas’s help with her yard and his father being a total lowlife. She said that she was also sorry to hear about the guy’s demise, though. She had brought flowers and the man had a box of candy that he said Lyra might enjoy. Silas thanked them, too.
“I didn’t know you were doing so much work around the neighborhood,” I said when they left.
“It wasn’t anything. I’m really surprised by this,” he said, looking at the food and gifts.
I’d been glad to hear that they appreciated him, and also that they didn’t think that he was a reprobate and a lowlife like his father had been. “We really should go,” I said, because we needed to get this over with. We took the new truck but with me behind the wheel. On the day we’d returned to Detroit, I’d helped Silas with the tie and he’d had the hearing about his license. The decision could take a while, but he and his attorney were both pretty positive about how it had gone. That was good news in a horrible week.
