No one has the audacity to say out loud that my father is an angel now.
I wander upstairs to the bedroom Glen and I shared. There’s only one bed in it now, pushed up against the wall, neatly made. I stare at the cherry wood frame and try to remember if it was his. Or mine…
See, I just left early one morning without leaving a note or telling anyone.
Just like that. Gone.
I thought about it beforehand. I thought about what would be the best way. I thought about leaving behind a letter addressed to my folks and Glen and maybe a private one to Jimmy. I could leave it at his grave. I started to write it one afternoon, but my pencil kept smudging and after only two sentences I couldn’t think of another single word. They’d want to know why, but I was sure if I offered them an answer, they’d try to search for me. And that wasn’t the point. They weren’t supposed to. No one was ever supposed to search for me.
So I didn’t leave a letter. I didn’t leave them a crumb.
I lay awake the whole night before, listening to Glen’s snores. I lay awake, clutching the covers, and wished there was another way besides the bus station and endless roads. I wished for it, another answer, all the way up until it was time to leave. Both my father and Glen would be up at dawn, so I only had a small window of escape.
I had that duffel full of clothing, Christmas money, and a composition book, in case I changed my mind about writing to anyone. I walked out the front door, letting the storm door fall quietly into place. I walked all the way to the road.
I didn’t look back.
Didn’t turn my head even once.
I have never regretted something so much.
I step into my old room and try to find some piece of me still here. My clothes in the closet. My shoes by the door. Anything. But there’s nothing but Glen.
I’ve come home all tainted and poisoned. Living a life that if my mother or brother knew, they’d demand I leave. Each time I step into the house, it’s like I have to hunch over and hide, my body making an involuntary cover around me. The very walls know; they can see. My father died and what was I doing? I was fucking this guy I caught spying on me, doing him practically in his aunt’s backyard, leading him along and leading him astray. I could have been writing my father, telling him how sorry I am that I never said goodbye to him, that the last time we ever spoke it was over the dinner table and all I said to him was “please pass the rolls.”
I sit on the front porch after supper and think about it, all of it, my pack of cigarettes beginning to dwindle, a cloud of tobacco dissolving in my lungs.
I hear the storm door slap closed behind me and Glen’s there. I glance at him and feel a shiver of uncanniness. He’s very Jimmy-like around the eyes and in his stance. From a distance, I bet I could make an unsettling mistake.
Glen sits in the rocking chair next to me. My great-grandfather made them. He went out into the woods and cut down two sweet gum trees. He did it the old-fashioned way, with an ax, and sanded and stained until they were perfect. He set them on this porch and they haven’t moved since.
We sit in silence for a time, rocking in the chairs like two old men who’ve never known another place but this. I finish my cigarette and light another. I finish that one and light another.
Glen says, “We’re thinking about planting pumpkins for the autumn.” He scratches his chin. “Let the kids in town come to a pumpkin patch.” He shrugs. “Dad talked about it enough, but never did it. About time we did, maybe.”
I take a drag. Exhale.
“Pumpkins and some squash.” He leans forward, elbows on his knees. “There’s plenty of space for it. It just takes a lot of time.” He pauses for a few seconds. “Last couple years, Dad’s been really tired, you know? He’d talk about things. Make all these plans. Then he would sleep through breakfast and we’d just let him. He was so tired. Mom made him go into town, see Doc Winters and Doc Winters said he had to take it easy. He could have a stroke. And, well…”
There’s no malice in Glen’s voice. No irritation. No reason to think he’s telling me this to make me feel worse than I already do. But it’s the fact that he’s talking to me so normally. As if the last ten years were a torn seam sewn up by the last few days, patched and good as new. I don’t deserve it.
“Pumpkins will be nice,” I say, my voice like a plateau. “And the squash.”
“Lorianne and I are thinking we can buy more horses. Have a horse-riding business. Just for fun. Nothing like all that equestrian jumping and stuff.”
The mentioning of horses makes me stiffen, but it’s mostly the fact that he’s going to bring his bride home. Here. Because who else would take care of all this? Planning for a future that I was never to be a part of. The family he’ll create. The life he’ll build. It was all going on and on without me.
“More horses will be good,” I say.
He glances at me. “It’s been real nice having you here, Ash.” He pauses and turns away, looking out at the north pasture where the evening sun grazes the landscape like a painting. “I’ve missed you.”
It’s not an easy thing to say. I can tell by the strain in his voice and how he’s turned away from me. I want to offer him something in return, but I stay silent like a fool.
“I know it’s”— he shifts in the rocking chair— “I know it’s…strange for you. Being back home. I always wondered how you were. Always kind of hoped you’d come back.”
I close my eyes. “Glen —”
“No, it’s all right.” He’s talking to the empty space beside him. “I don’t need anything. I don’t need to know why. I just…”
