“Hey, kiddo.”
“Pop.”
He nods toward me. “New hair?”
“Yes.” I reach into the fridge and grab a cider, quickly twisting the top off and throwing it in the trash before taking a slow sip. “That okay?”
“Seeing you blond felt like seeing you as a scared little boy again,” Pop says, voice a little shaky. I freeze in the middle of the kitchen, cider gripped loosely between my fingers. “You know, we knew you were ours from the first moment we saw you. You were sitting on a bench at the park, staring at the other kids playing, feet swinging to and fro. The social worker had warned us what you’d been through, but none of that mattered when we saw you. You were always ours.”
“Pop,” I say quietly, not sure I can take this story all over again.
“I sat outside your room for weeks, even after the three night-lights we installed that helped you sleep. Just in case you needed me.”
“I know.”
Pop nods just once. “I want you to stay here for as long as you need. There is no rush to go anywhere. And if that man keeps bothering you, you tell me. Understood?”
My heart sits in my throat. “I understand.”
Pop presses a kiss as soft as a butterfly wing to my forehead as he passes by to return outside to the porch where Dad eagerly awaits him, blissfully ignorant of the emotionally charged conversation his husband and son just had in the kitchen.
I remember my mother in fragments. A glass thrownagainst the tiled kitchen floor—where it shattered into sharp pieces—with an inhuman scream. Dirty-blonde hair gone too many days without a wash skimming over my cheek late at night. Glassy eyes in the morning when I asked for a cup of milk because I’d gone days without eating. Time has a way of turning memories into pearls. Small snapshots that seem inoffensive now were moments that took me away as a child.
I remember my fathers in large batches of kindness. Band-Aids on scraped knees. Teaching me to swim. Putting three night-lights in my room when the shadows overwhelmed me. The smell of the marsh wafting through the windows late at night during a spring storm. Comfort is how I know them, and comfort is what they are now as they slowly heal my fractured heart again. This is what family is and should always be. Kindness wrapped in love. A hearty welcome home after many years away. A reprieve in a raging storm that refuses to quit.
No matter where I go, or how far I run, this is my home.
I endup walking the entirety of Stilcott Lane, which only took thirty minutes. Not too bad when the sun is lower in the sky, the ocean breeze passing gently over me. I close my eyes and tip my head back to soak in the salty air. Charles’ house comes into view as I round the corner. The house is still as large as I remember when I rode my bike by it as a lonely child. Mr. Manchester used to give thebestHalloween candy.
The house is still bright white with light green shutters, a little colonial-style house against the ocean. Large trees dot the front, with marsh up to either side, the ocean just barely breaking through the dunes behind the house.
A dog bark rents through the air when I knock hesitantly at the front door.
A few seconds later a hushed “easy, Cupcake” reaches my ears, and I try not to flush at the comforting sound of his voice. Lucky dog. An hour in his presence a few weeks ago had been awful. Aren’t jocks supposed to be assholes like Anthony? Instead, Charles had been sweet, even attentive, and he’d listened to all my suggestions regarding the guitar. Even at dinner with my parents, he’d been kind despite my attitude. I don’t even knowwherethe attitude is coming from.
I hike my guitar case up higher on my shoulder just as Charles opens the door.
He’s wearing fucking gray sweatpants. Jesus H. Christ. My gaze gets stuck on the little strip of skin between his ratty old athletic shirt and the sweatpants, but my gaze quickly snaps to his eyes when he clears his throat in question.
“You walked?” Charles questions, leaning forward to look past me.
“Only a thirty-minute walk,” I say as I push past him to step inside. He moves back to let me in, a furrow between his eyebrows. “It’s not a big deal.”
“But now you’ll have to walk back in the dark.”
“I’ve walked that road in the dark thousands of times since I was a kid. Trust me, I’ll be just fine. Are you ready to start?”
Charles frowns like he wants to argue but thankfully thinks better of it. It also seems he just noticed my hair because he freezes, gaze stuck on the light pink hair at the top of my head. I have to fighthardto not reach up self-consciously. Those days are long gone. I’m me again, and I don’t care what anyone thinks about what I do with my body. I’ll never care ever again.
“Well?”
“Sorry,” Charles says as he shakes himself loose of whatever spell my hair put him under. He lifts a hand and touches his slightly overgrown brown hair. “Your hair.”
“What about it?”
“It’s fun,” Charles says softly.
Fun.
