My brothers looked at each other, a silent conversation between them, until Nash, always our spokesperson, began talking.
“Why would you want to go and see him?”
I knew that this would be the first question they’d ask. He was the last person that they’d want to see, so it was obvious that they wouldn’t understand why I would.
“I need answers,” I told them. “I want to know why he felt he could steal from us and think it was okay.”
“Because he’s cold and mean and manipulative,” Gunner offered. He pinched the bridge of his nose. “I know we’ve talked about this before, Wild, and I get why you feel the need. Just don’t expect any great revelations.”
Nash narrowed his eyes on me. “I didn’t know you’d spoken to Gunner about it.” He reached to place a comforting hand on my forearm. “Why didn’t you come to me too?”
“It wasn’t some great talk we had. I just mentioned to Gun that I wanted answers.” The questions had been running around in my head for months, years. It might have even been before Dad got sent to prison. All the years he was dismissive of us as kids. That he barely looked at us and we constantly irritated him.
“What do you need to know?” Nash asked, wringing his hands together. “Maybe I can answer them. Me and Gun.”
“You think you can tell me why he was such a shit dad?”
“He’s not just a shit dad,” Gunner said. “He’s a shit person. I know what you’re thinking and don’t.”
“What is he thinking?” Nash asked.
Gunnersighed, his shoulder’s sloping. “That Michael Miller is a crap dad because he was a bad kid.” He pointed at me but had his eyes on my brother. “He’s done such a number on him, Wilder thinks that he’s to blame.”
Nash scoffed. “No fucking way, Wild. You were a great kid. You’re a great man. Don’t let that man’s inadequacies make you feel anything less than you are.” He gripped my arm with his big football player’s hands. “If you need to ask him then do it, but do not take any of his bullshit on board. He even implies that it’s not his fault you get up and you walk out of there. You hear me?”
I nodded. “I hear you.”
“He will blame everyone but himself,” Nash added. “It’ll be my fault for not making the NFL, Gunner’s for getting a two-week suspension in tenth grade. It might even be yours for breaking Mom’s favorite vase when you were five. But,” he said, slamming his fist down on the table, “none of those reasons are true. He’s a rat-bastard because he was born that way.”
“Nash is right, Wild. Hewasborn that way. He managed to hide it from Mom somehow, until he couldn’t and then she decided to divorce him. Too damn late, but at least she realized before she was killed.”
It was pretty ironic. Mom decided to divorce him and then ended up in a road accident before she had time to get the papers signed. He hid that from us as well as her will which didn’t leave him a penny. He continually stole from us and from the ranch, hence why he was in prison in Sterling.
“I still think I want to go,” I told them. “I want him to look me in the eye and tell me why my whole life he’s made me feel like I’m a punishment of some kind.”
“Fuck, Wild,” Nash groaned, “why didn’t you tell us.”
“That is not what you are,” Gunner cried. “He’s the fucking punishment.”
“I know that, but it’s how he’s always made me feel. I’ve always been the naughty kid, the one who he sees as a joke. The one he looks at with disdain.”
“And I’m the one he hates with a passion because I didn’t get him his dream,” Nash retorted.
“He hates me, too.” Gunner pointed a thumb at his chest. “I just didn’t excel at anything that he cared about. Anything that would make him money.”
“Which is ironic,” Nash scoffed. “Since you bill people fucking thousands to train their million dollar horses.”
Our matching gazes looked at each other. I was sure we were all contemplating how lucky we were to have each other. To have this family. This land of promises and life. But I had to find out the truth behind the eyes of the man who never really tried to be a real father to us.
If I was ever going to move forward, with anything, with anyone, I had to stop carrying around the weight of never being enough.
Chapter 18
Numb – Linkin Park
Wilder
The chair scraped against the linoleum, probably screaming at the fact that it had to be there.
