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I want so badly to be mean, to lash out.
At least, Iwant towant that.
But I don’t.
I can’t fight it anymore. There’s no part of me that doesn’t want him here anymore, even though I want so badly to resent him for landing me in this position. He’s been right about how I knew what I was getting into, how I knew the risks going in. I want to blame him. But I just want him.
Instead of snatching my hand back from him like I usually would, I turn it over and place the palm of my hand on his cheek. At first, he seems wary of this new gesture, but he leans into it quickly, kissing it.
“When was the last time you felt held by someone?” I ask him softly, feeling my own tone change from my guarded, stonewalling self. “When was the last time you felt like someone really cared about you, not just what you could do for them?”
He sighs. “Probably not since after my mom left,” he says in a melancholy voice. “She was the only one who didn’t just value me because I was a boy.”
I’m intrigued. “What do you mean?” I ask, trying not to pry but feeling increasingly curious to learn more about him.
“Before my mom walked out, she was the only one in my family who wasn’t always bringing up my duty to the family name. My father wanted so badly for me to carry his shitty lineage, and that was it. My mother knew my favorite color, my favorite shows, stuff like that,” he confesses.
I squeeze his hand slightly. “What happened after she left?” I ask, letting go of my fear that he’ll get upset with me. He’s choosing to open up to me now. I feel just fine asking about the aftermath.
“She got remarried pretty quick, I heard. It felt like the biggest betrayal of my life. She got married to some guy that she had worked with at one of her college jobs, then she had a kid with him. She gave the kid my middle name, maybe as a way to connect us somehow. But we were never going to be a family ever again,” he says.
“Where is that kid now?” I ask.
He shrugs. “Pretty sure he’s like, fifteen now. I think he goes to a private school in the city, plays for the baseball team. Nice kid, good grades, all that. Has no idea where his mom’s other family is and doesn’t care at all.”
I pause. “You know, sometimes I wonder if my parents should have split up before they died,” I say, watching his face in the soft light as his eyes narrow.
“Why do you feel that way? You got to have a family for as long as they were alive,” he asks, genuinely curious and maybe a little bit upset by what I said.
At first, I struggle to answer. Why would I be so selfish? What kind of kid doesn’t want their parents’ marriage to work out? I’m sure someone like Abram considers that line of logic completely unthinkable.
“I think they both would have been happier leading separate lives. My mom was a much more open, expressive person than my dad. She loved to paint, she wore bright colors, listened to jam bands while she made dinner. He was just... so plain, perpetually bored,” I reply.
“How did they even end up together?” he asks with a small chuckle.
“My mom had been on a losing streak with dating for a while. Drunks, jobless, even a guy without a home once or twice. When she met my dad, he was just some guy really, but he had a job and a clean record. So she declared him the man of her dreams, and they got married a year later,” I say, thinking back to all the stories my mom used to tell me.
“What were they like in normal every-day life?” he asks, growing just as curious about my past as I am in his. I have to admit, it feels really good to see him take such an active interest in me when it’s not just about sex.
“My dad would be watching the 24-hour news when he wasn’t doing work at the factory. It was constant. He never shut it off. It stressed my mom out, so one time she cut the cable to the TV,” I reply.
He raises his eyebrows. “Damn, I would have been pissed if I were him,” he says, scoffing a little at the thought.
“He was. He screamed at her for an hour. She was tired of hearing nothing but bad news all day because she struggled with really bad depression. Her happiness wasn’t important to him at all. She had spent so much time trying to understand, and when she couldn’t, she snapped,” I say, my voice trailing a little.
“The TV was replaced within two days. When she lost her wedding ring in a car accident, he tried to tell her that material objects weren’t a symbol of happiness and that she needed to think of the bigger picture,” I continue.
“Damn, he sounds like a fucking asshole,” he replies.
I can feel myself tearing up at the memories even though I was hardly six when they occurred.
Marcus was older. I’m sure he had to endure the brunt of my father’s impotent rage at the TV incident. Probably everything else too. I never even asked about it, about how it affected him. And now they’re all gone.
Abram pauses for a moment. “We don’t need to talk about any of this. I’m sorry,” he says, stroking my cheek as a tear falls.
I kiss his hand again. “Did Marcus ever talk about my family? Did he ever mention me?” I ask, feeling a ripple in that perpetual nausea about my family that has loomed over me since the day they died.
Abram seems reluctant to talk about it. “I know he really hated your dad. He definitely wanted the best for you, though,” he replies slowly. “He thought your dad was a prick.”
