The question felt shocking because he thought about home as little as possible. Practically never. Home was a void. A blank space that existed behind him and never anything he turned to look at, even as it followed him everywhere.
He didn’t want to answer, but Morgan was looking at him, eyebrows raised. Those blue eyes were watching and waiting, and there was kindness in his expression. As if he already felt sorry for Nimble.
Or maybe he was just curious, as anybody would be, having taken a stranger under their roof. Maybe Nimble should say something about his home life. Maybe he owed Morgan at least that. A short story to entertain.
“Just my folks,” Nimble said. “My two brothers.”
He watched Morgan take a breath as if to ask for more specifics, so Nimble dragged memories to the surface, trimmed them back so he wouldn’t give away too much, and wondered how he’d come to this point. Sitting with Morgan as the storm wound down, living like roommates, at least for a few days.
“Back east,” he said. “That’s where I come from.” He didn’t want to say he was from Lawndale; that felt like he’d be revealing too much. “My dad was—” He swallowed, considering how to put it. “Kind of a jerk. Or maybe I just needed a change, and my little neighborhood got boring.”
“Boring enough to hop a multiton freight with brakes that take a mile to kick in?”
“Read about it, I guess,” Nimble said. “There are a lot of trains back east.” He shrugged, shaking off the memories. “Seemed like an easy way to get away.”
“What about your mom?” Morgan asked. “Even if your dad’s a jerk, surely she’s worried about you.”
“My mom?”
His mom had been the last person in a long line of no one to protect him, to defend him from his dad. Her active nonparticipation in his life after they’d found out who he was had stung almost as much as his dad’s belt.
“Maybe you should call them, just to let them know you’re all right,” Morgan said. “Maybe they’d send you bus fare so you cango home for the holidays. For the winter. I could take you to the Greyhound station in Billings. Be happy to.”
Nimble went still. This was the announcement he’d been dreading, though he’d not realized how much until that moment: Morgan wanted him gone. Maybe not because he was annoying to have around; Morgan had all but said that Nimble was the least annoying person he’d ever met. But that didn’t mean Morgan wanted Nimble there permanently.
Nimble had no right to be there. Morgan had invited him to stay until the blizzard passed. And now it was passing.
“Guess I could borrow your phone,” Nimble said, mentally pushing against the idea of speaking to anyone he was related to.
“You could,” Morgan said. “It’s in the office, plugged in.”
Everyone in the regular world was attached to their phones, and here this guy was, saying his phone was a whole floor away. It was weird, so Nimble focused on that as he shoved his wooden chair back, got up, and went down the stairs on numb feet.
The first floor was colder than the warm kitchen, and still, with only whispers of movement against the row of glass windows. Nimble went into the office, flicked on the light, and grabbed the phone with icy fingers. His heart pounded against his rib cage, sharp taps that felt hard enough to break bone.
His dad wouldn’t want to hear from him.
He hadn’t called or written, nor sent a telegram from the old-fashioned Western Union office near the train tracks in Overland Park, Kansas—though, according to Star, telegrams weren’t a thing anymore. They just wired money or whatever.
Standing there, clutching Morgan’s cell phone, Nimble dialed the number. It was two hours earlier in Montana, so it’d be around eight o’clock in Lawndale. Not too late, right?
The phone rang twice, and then someone answered.
“This is Ben.” His dad’s voice, the words clipped and hard, like he was drinking and trying to hide it.
Maybe Nimble’s mom was with him, and they’d been in the living room watching TV. Or maybe Mom was out with her friends, playing bingo in the Bethel Mar church basement, smoking and talking. Not giving a damn how drunk her husband was, or that one of her three sons had left home and never come back.
“Is anyone there? Listen, buddy, I don’t got time to play games. Gotta check the races at Parx.” There was a clinking sound, like ice in a glass.
Parx was the casino way north of Lawndale where his dad would go to hang out with his buddies, though sometimes he’d use the phone app and make bets that way. Horse races happened all over the world, every hour of the day. There was money to be made on them, though Ben Foxley never made any.
When Nimble had been home, betting on the races had been a weekend event. Now, evidently, it was an everyday thing, and as the memories flickered up inside him like hard, flinty sparks, Nimble clutched the phone even tighter.
“Dad?”
“Danny?” his dad asked. “Or is this Evan? Speak up. Can’t abide a mumbler.”
“It’s Jack, Dad,” Nimble said, his own name rough on his lips. More memories, these ones summer-laced, being called home to dinner because Mr. Bao had left food for them and it was time to eat.Jack. Jack. Come home, Jaaaaaaack.
