1
Dane
I don’t even know what I’m supposed to write in here. My mom thought it would be fun bonding time for the whole family to hike out to some stupid mailbox. It’s hell. They’re trying so hard to pretend like we’re a perfect family, but I know better. Everyone sitting withing five feet of me is keeping secrets.
Just once, I wish I had a normal family. -P
Somewhere beneath layersof spit-up and other bodily fluids I’d prefer not to think about, I could still see traces of the first man I’d ever loved. Sadly the sentiment had never been reciprocated, but against all odds, Grady and I had remained best friends. He was the one who convinced me it wasn’t necessary to be in a committed relationship to enjoy sex. And now he sat across the living room from me, his infant son cradled in his arms, his beautiful wife in the kitchen working on dinner. Yes, the former self-professed lone wolf had become the picture-perfect family man.
“Dane, I know Jen’s a good cook, but why are you really here?” Grady asked.
I took a long draw from my beer, setting it carefully on a coaster. No water rings on Jen’s furniture. Just another way Grady’s life had shifted over the past year. I’d love to say I’d give my left nut for what they shared, but I wouldn’t because that meant trusting someone with both my secrets and my heart. Some risks in life weren’t worth the casualties.
“Talked to my dad last weekend,” I said, as though that was enough explanation why I’d made the ninety-mile drive to see Grady.
“And?” Grady shifted in his chair, little Pax nestling deeper into the safety of his father’s embrace. How pathetic was I that I was jealous of a tiny human incapable of voicing his needs beyond random grunts and cries? I longed for the innocence of believing everyone in the world lived to protect you, that they’d always be there for you. I prayed that little boy never knew the harsh realities of the world he’d been born into.
“He’s getting out soon.” This wasn’t a shock to Grady. He’d been there the day my dad was sentenced to nine years in prison for his role in a Ponzi scheme. The same scheme, in fact, that’d robbed his family of a significant portion of their wealth. Like I said, our friendship was one that defied the odds.
“And? Seriously, so far you haven’t given me the slightest hint as to why you’re here.”
Pax squawked, and Jen snuck into the room to whisk him away.
“Is he anxious to be a free man?”
I shrugged, not wanting to admit to Grady that we were both worried about how he’d fare on the outside. It didn’t matter that he’d maintained his innocence the entire time he was behind bars; a jury of his peers had found him guilty of the crimes. The job prospects for someone in his shoes weren’t exactly great, which was why he’d made the request he had last weekend.
“Apparently, Dad’s brother reached out to him after years of silence. Now Dad has it in his head he’s going to move down there once he’s released so he can have a fresh start. He’s already put in the request to have his parole transferred. He wants me to go down ahead of him to get to know my uncle.”
There were few things I wanted to do less than meet the brother who hadn’t once reached out to my dad since his parents had shunned him for knocking up the whore from the wrong side of the tracks. They weren’t wrong to tell him she’d never amount to anything, but he’d busted his ass to prove them wrong about how she’d pull him under.
The woman who’d given birth to me skipped out days before my sixth birthday, leaving Dad a single parent trying to work his way through school. He called on the help of his friends, bartered for babysitting services, and graduated with honors. Then, he worked his way from the ground floor to a senior investment advisor position. Life was great—until the day it all went to shit.
The man I’d put on a pedestal, the only person I relied on and trusted with my life, was ripped away from me, arrested for orchestrating a scheme to bilk investors out of millions of dollars. I sat helpless as everything he’d worked to provide for us was stripped away. I learned the shame of walking into the mall, having my credit card declined, and later finding out it was because the authorities had seizedeverything.
I spent my sixteenth birthday in an even darker place than the one a decade earlier. I was completely alone, had recently come to understand trusting anyone to be there was a recipe for disaster, and had nothing to my name.
From that moment on, I’d vowed to keep the world at a safe distance, but now Dad expected me to open myself up to family I’d never met. He was counting on me, and I wasn’t going to fail him the way I had when I hadn’t stopped the courts from taking the house, cars, and everything inside.
“Probably not a bad plan,” Grady said, excusing himself to grab a beer now that he was off kid duty. He returned with two bottles dangling from his fingers, offering one to me before sitting in the leather chair and resting his heels on the coffee table. “Staying around here probably isn’t the best idea for him. Maybe a quiet life in the middle of nowhere is just what he needs.”
I gaped at my friend, wondering how in the hell I’d gotten so lucky. He’d approached me following the sentencing, and I’d squared my shoulders as I stalked away from him. I knew who he was, and he knew I was the piece-of-shit kid whose father was nothing more than a thief. I’d heard it all before and wasn’t interested in hearing it from him too.
When he’d invited me to a diner around the corner, I convinced myself he was smart enough to kick my ass away from the reporters waiting outside the courthouse. When he told me nothing my father did changed who I was, I tripped over my own feet. It took some time, but he eventually agreed with my insistence that Dad hadn’t done the things he’d been accused of.
“Yeah, but this guy is a stranger,” I argued. “I’ve never met him, and as far as I know, Dad hasn’t really had a relationship with him for over twenty years. But now, when it’s getting close to the end of Dad’s sentence, the long-lost brother is suddenly interested in rekindling a relationship with him. Sounds fishy to me.”
“That’s because you’ve learned to expect the worst in everyone.” Grady cocked his head to the side, silently daring me to dispute his accusation. I couldn’t, because it was one-hundred percent truth. “If your dad’s willing to put the past in the past, maybe you need to, too. You don’t know why your uncle didn’t contact him. I say you should take some of the vacation time you never use and see if the Carolina countryside could be a good change of scenery for both of you.”
“He lives at the beach,” I corrected. And why in the hell did he think I’d move down there if Dad did? I liked my life in the city. My studio apartment was modest, but mine. I was within walking distance to most things and a quick train ride from the rest. No way was I moving. If Dad felt like he needed to go down there to rekindle whatever with his brother, that was on him. We could keep in touch by phone, text, and the occasional visit. It would be a step up from how we’d carried on since he was arrested.
“Even better!” Grady had always loved the beach. He used to say he was going to move to Florida someday, someplace like Miami, where he could spend the days on the beach and his nights split between the clubs and over a warm, willing body. “Seriously, what’s the harm in you going down there to check the guy out?”
“Let’s start with the fact I don’t know him. He doesn’t know me other than what Dad’s told him in their letters. What if I get down there and he kicks my ass when he finds out his brother’s bastard child is queer?” It was a real possibility. North Carolina didn’t exactly scream liberal inclusivity.
“That’s not going to happen,” Grady scoffed. “Look, I know it’s been a shit time for you while your old man’s been locked up, but do you honestly think he’d ask you to do this if he thought his brother would hurt you in any way?”
“No.”
