“I have been gearing up to own the bar since I was a teenager,” I say in a low voice, trying to not shout at him again or seem like I’m whining like a child. “How exactly am I supposed to walk away when it’s all I’ve known or wanted?” Shit, my eyes are stinging at the thought, and I take a deep breath to stop the tears from coming. His face softens.
“Gage, the bar is your passion, but I can’t leave it to you if it’s going to be your entire life. You need a home life, someone to love, someone to go on adventures with. The bar was my life and look what happened to my marriage. I refuse to let my boys make the same mistake. Your brother found Gina, or rather hurricane Gina found him. I’m setting the condition because when this Parkinson’s eventually gets me, I want to know that my two beloved sons are situated both at work and at home.”
Well, now my eyes are not just stinging. The rage I’m feeling is mixing with the sorrow I’m hearing in his voice ina whirlwind of emotions I am not prepared for. A tear slips free.
“It’s still manipulating me into doing something I don’t want to do, no matter how you try to sell it. You’re giving me the choice of walking away from owning the bar I love, whether I still work there or not, or pulling some woman out of thin air who would be willing to marry me.”
My dad laughs without humor.
“Pull some woman out of thin air? Gagey, women would love to marry you, you just never give them a chance. There was that lovely woman Stephanie you brought around that one time, but as soon as she wanted to get serious, you bailed. You broke up with that other perfectly nice woman Alyssa because she left a toothbrush at your place. I’m tired of seeing you push away these women, hurt them, all because you’re too scared. It’s not right. Your grandmother would be so disappointed.” His words are a gut punch.
“Really laying on the guilt trip by bringing up Abuela. So this is all to teach me a lesson about how to treat women? I never mean to hurt them, Dad. I always make it very clear from the start that I’m not in for anything serious.”
“It’s not a lesson. It’s an incentive to get yourself together and break a bad pattern. You’re an adult, and I’ve sat back and tried to let you figure this stuff out on your own. It’s time I give you a push. I didn’t raise you to be a commitment phobic heartbreaker, I raised you to respect and revere women,” he tells me firmly, stabbing a finger at my chest for emphasis.
“Jesus, it’s not like I’m sleeping around and trampling hearts all over the place. I can’t even remember the last time I brought someone home. I do revere and respect women, isit so bad that I just don’t want to be with one permanently when they’ll probably just leave?”
My dad’s eyes turn sad and regretful as he clasps my shoulder.
“It is to me when I’m the one who made you feel that way, and I’m trying to correct that. I think you have the impression that I regret your mother, when nothing could be further from the truth. Every minute I got to spend with her was a gift, even though it ended badly,” he says, his voice catching like it always does when he talks about her.
My mother is this almost mythical figure that’s always in the background of my life, but never seen, like a phantom haunting our family. I know so little about her, partly because I don’t care to know, and partly because it’s a painful subject for us. From the stories I’ve been told, her name was Adriana, she was extremely beautiful, vibrant, and high spirited, and loved to sing. I have the vaguest memories of her voice as she sang me to sleep.
“By ended badly, you mean she abandoned us. How do you not regret her when she did that?”
My tone could not possibly be more bitter at how she simply up and left her husband and two sons like that. It’s been twenty-six years without her, but the wondering never stops. Why were we not enough to make her stay? Did I do something wrong that she never looked back or tried to contact me and Wayne? Was her life that miserable that she had no other choice?
My dad sighs heavily.
“Because I abandoned her too, in my own way. Neither of us were blameless. Please, Gagey. Give a serious relationship and marriage a chance, and you can have the bar. Like you said, I’ve got some time before I’m ready to completely give the bar over to you. This doesn’t need to happenovernight, and I’m not saying you have to stay married if it doesn’t work out.”
“It’s really that important to you?” Everything in me wants to rebel, like I used to as an emo teen. I don’t like the way he’s forcing me into this. I also know my dad, though. If I learned anything during my idiotic rebellious days, it was that he usually ended up being right when we argued, even as I thought I knew absolutely everything. He worked so hard to make sure Wayne and I turned out ok and always had everything we needed in spite of our antics.
“I want to see you well loved and happy more than I want to see you do anything else,” he affirms.
“Is this some sick bid to get grandkids out of me soon? Ava and Braden aren’t enough?”
The way he dotes on Wayne and Gina’s kids is pretty freaking adorable, and I know he’d probably love to have more grandkids to fawn over. He rears back, as if offended, shaking his head vehemently.
“No. Having a serious relationship and getting married is one thing, because it’s not irreversible if it goes badly. Having kids if you don’t want them is a disaster waiting to happen, as you well know,” he says sadly.
Yeah, Wayne and I do know all about that.
“Why are you pushing marriage so hard then, if you’re not hoping I’ll have kids to carry on the legacy?” I’m so confused and conflicted, my mind whirring like a tornado.
“I already told you, you need a kick in the ass to find a partner. This commitment phobia of yours is getting ridiculous, you deserve someone who will love you forever, and you’ll love forever right back. Going through life alone is not the end of the world, but you’ve never even given love a chance. That ends now, son.” I take in his mulish expression and sigh.
“I’ll think about the getting married thing. I’m still pissed as hell you ambushed me like this.” He pulls me into a hug, slapping my back hard.
“You have every right to be, but I still stand by doing it. You never know, son. The most incredible woman could come into your life and knock you off your feet. If she does, you can’t be so scared of what may happen that you lose enjoying the wonderful moments with her.”
The minute he says it, I think of Celeste and how she knocked me off my feet the first time I saw her. Am I being a coward by ignoring the effect she has on me? The pull I feel anytime we talk? Every instinct in me wants to shy away from getting shattered the way my dad was by my mom. I’ll never understand how Wayne made the leap, as amazing as my sister-in-law Gina is.
It’s a non-issue anyway, because the one woman I am even remotely interested in is just starting to put her life back together. If the way she turns down every guy in the bar who approaches her is any indication, she’s not interested in seeing anyone right now. So I have to put it out of my mind.
My dad and I say our goodbyes, my thoughts still churning the whole way home about what he said. I never, ever, want to hurt anyone, especially a wonderful woman who deserves much better than my bullshit. What I saw as cutting things off with the women I dated before we both got in too deep is now reframed in my mind as me being a shitty partner who runs away. Apparently all of that is going to have to change if I want to have my beloved bar, because I know my stubborn dad isn’t going to budge. It looks like I’ll be getting married in the near future if my dream of owning El Abrevadero is going to come true, whether I want to or not.
Whether I want to or not is where my thoughts are getting snarled into a knot. My dad is not going to magically make me believe that marriage is worth it, but for the sake of getting the bar would it really be that bad? It’s not irreversible, like he said, annulment and divorce exist. I could try it out for his sake to make him stop pushing, get my bar, and then go back to how things are once it all settles. Maybe I’ll even shock the hell out of myself and not hate marriage as much as I think I do.
