“What,” I had said, “are you jealous or something?”
“Kinda,” he had responded, at that moment. But I think Niall came to terms that Hughie would never feel right calling him Dad, or some variation of it. He would always be Uncle Niall.
I do think he’s still a bit jealous about it.
Hughie’s two bags are overflowing, which is partially both my and Niall’s fault. We bought him so much shit for this trip that he probably would never need. It makes me think about how light I packed coming for Dublin, and that was for a whole year.
He’s staring at his, what we call, murder board.
“I can’t believe you’re going to the States for a semester, and for this of all things.”
Hughie turns and gives me one of his looks. “You know you love it as much as I do.”
One day I had come home, I think it was two years before Hughie started university, to him watching a documentary on Netflix. I had been preparing dinner when I overheard some crazy details.
“Kid. What the hell are you watching?”
Hughie paused the television. “It’s this documentary calledWild Wild Country. It’s about this cult from the 1970s and 80s in Oregon. They tried to essentially take over this county and poisoned the town water supply with salmonella.”
“What…did they put a bunch of raw chicken in the water?”
Hughie pats the couch next to him. “I’ll restart it. It’s only six episodes.
So, from that moment on, cult documentaries became one of our things.
Which Niall never could understand.
“That seems like some creepy fucking shite for a child.”
I patted his shoulder. “He’s almost off to uni Niall. ‘Fraid he’s not a kid anymore.”
It was this past winter when he brought his laptop over to me. Hughie was in the third year of his undergrad, towards a degree in psychology. His goal was to become a therapist who specialized in helping survivors of cults and extremist religious groups.
Part of me had expected him to go into helping those with addiction issues, given what happened with his mom. Eventually we had told him what happened to her, not too long after Niall and I married. He wasn’t mad at us, and seemed to understand why we protected him in that moment.
I think he had directed all of his anger towards her. I guess I could understand maybe not wanting to work day in and day out with those just like her.
“You will not believe this cult I’ve come across. Or who was part of it.” He sets the laptop down in front of me, pointing to the title of the article.
“James Diaz: Survivor and Super Bowl MVP.”
James Diaz had hit the game winning field goal in the Super Bowl this year. It was amazing for us as a family of Colts fans. It was also amazing because Diaz is one of the very few out gay professional athletes. And, shockingly, was overwhelmingly supported.
Although, staying up to watch the Super Bowl in Dublin was a lot. I made the executive decision that we all got the day off that Monday.
I hit play on the video under the article title.
“Hi. I’m Khari Fontaine for ESPN. Tune in tomorrow night at 8PM on ESPN+ for an exclusive interview with James Diaz, who’s coming off a big Super Bowl win last week. We’ll talk what it means to be the first kicker to win Super Bowl MVP, the pressures of being an out athlete in today’s environment, and how Diaz overcame surviving a cult to be where he is today.”
“Diaz was in a cult?”
“No, not quite,” Hughie says, scrolling down the article. “His mom was dating the leader of the cult, this guy Ralph Dursten. His cult was called Wishing Well. People originally thought it was small, in Rhode Island. Hey, we went there. Right?”
“Yup. Went to Newport.”
“Well, turns out it was all over the country, like little pocket communities. It seems like it’s either died out or gone quiet, but Ralph’s been missing since the day Diaz’s mom stabbed him.”
“Diaz’s mom stabbed who? Ralph?”
