When I turn back to Drew, he’s squatting and playing with Grace, who licks his face happily. I remember how dogs always loved Mack. The charming fucker even won over the animals. Maybe his kid got some of that, too.
Drew smiles, eyes half-closed, while Grace licks his cheek. He looks silly and contented.
I realize I’m smiling, so I rub my hand over my mouth, wiping it away.
“You want anything?”
Drew tilts his eyes up. “I want a dog like this,” he says, then laughs, petting her while he stands. “She’s such a good girl.”
I grunt, then cross my arms over my chest. “Beer?”
“Water?”
I turn to the kitchen, grateful that I have a second to compose myself. Hearing that Mack died has messed with my head. All the old memories are coming back, the good ones and the shitty ones, too.
I try to shove them back down in the hole where I buried them years ago, but I’m struggling.
And fuck if it isn’t the good memories that really hurt. I was never a wide-eyed, naïve kid, like Drew seems. But I wasn’t always this shut-down, either.
I pull a beer from the fridge, open it, and gulp. When I get back to the living room, Drew is staring at a few photos, framed to the wall. I walk up behind him, and when he turns, I hand off the ice water.
“That’s my old man,” I tell him with a nod to the photograph. My father is hunched over at the shop, working as though the camera isn’t there. His big beard falls down his chest, and his body fills the studio space, just like I do. “He’s not around anymore, either.”
Drew meets my eyes. I’m not sure what made me share that with him, but the hazel disarms me enough that I stand there speechless before I get my senses about me again and snap my eyes away.
“I’m sorry to hear that. He was a tattoo artist, like you?”
“He started the shop. I took it over when he got sick.”
“Oh.” Drew’s breath is soft across his lips. “You must have been young.”
“It was a long time ago.”
“My mom died a few months ago,” Drew says, the words spilling out quickly. “She had a shop, too. A stationary store. I guess it’s mine now. She’d been sick for years.”
We stare at each other. I realize that’s why he hasn’t said much about his life and probably why he doesn’t have a job he has to hurry home for.
My heart goes out to the kid. I was around his age when I lost my old man, and even though we had a tense relationship, it still hurt like hell. Taking over the responsibility of a business on top of everything else just makes it more complicated.
“Sorry to hear that,” I tell him, and although I want to reach out and rub his shoulder, I don’t let myself. It feels so fucking inadequate. I have a real sense of what he’s going through, but Drew doesn’t want an old fart like me trying to tell him how to feel. He’s here to learn about Mack, and that’s something I can actually do.
“It must have been nice, learning to tattoo from your dad.”
Instead of answering, I turn to the hall closet, then dig around for the old shoebox. “Most of my photos are just of old work,” I tell him, changing the subject instead of whining about my old man, “but not all. Should be one of Mack in there.”
Drew apparently accepts my abrupt redirect. “Anything. Just seeing a photo of him would be amazing.”
I join him on the old leather couch, then toss the box on the coffee table. I guess some part of me thinks the kid has a right to know about Mack. It’s his dad, for fuck’s sake, and just because Mack was a shitty person doesn’t mean the kid should be denied knowing about him.
Hell if I’m not still cleaning Mack’s messes up even after he’s dead.
I start shuffling through the photos. Drew leans forward, and his knee presses to mine. It hammers at my desire, and I have to grit my teeth to stay focused.
“I used to think there must be some amazing story to his life. Some huge reason he couldn’t be there for me. But I guess that’s not true, is it?”
My breath feels rough in my throat. “Sorry, kid,” is all I can manage.
Now I have to go and ruin his sunshine, spoil the world for him. But I’m not a liar, and if he deserves to know, he deserves to know the truth.
