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Murray
My dad’s eyes were on me. He’d been watching me all day, which said a lot for a man who was currently half-blind.
“What?” I groused, flipping the channels on his TV.
“Why are you here?”
Brow furrowed, I turned my head to look at him. “To help you. Remember that little spill you took a week ago?”
Dad rose from the couch, more spry than a man in the midst of an MS flare had any right to be. Actually, he’d been doing better for a couple days, since his doctor started him on a new med. We were both holding our breath, waiting to see if it stuck.
“I know why you were here in the first place, and I appreciate you taking me to my appointments and helping me recover, but why are you still here? All you do is sit on my couch and stare at your phone. I know you think you’re standing guard, but what you’re really doing is annoying the shit out of me.”
Throwing down my phone and the remote, I shoved my fingers through my hair, getting stuck on a mess of tangles. “Are dads even allowed to talk to their beloved sons that way?”
He placed his hands on his hips. “We sure are, especially when their sons are acting like eighteen-year-old stoner losers.”
I cocked a brow. “I didn’t see you passing on that blunt last night.”
“That’s medicinal, you little shit.” He shot me a crooked grin. “I’m ready for you to go home. I’m good.”
“Yeah, well…” I stood, yanking up my baggy sweatpants, “I’m thinking I’m going to move in here.”
The look he gave me could have brought down an army. I’d been waiting to bring up my intentions, knowing he’d have this reaction, but he couldn’t be surprised.
“No, you’re not.” He stood firm, staring me down
“Dad, come on. There’s no way I’m going back to my place knowing you could be on the floor unable to call to get help. I can’t do it.”
He brought his finger up, jabbing it at me. “Am I dead? Do I have dementia? Am I incapacitated? The answer is no to all those questions. Until the answer is yes, then I have complete say over what goes on with my body and who lives in my apartment.”
I waved him off. “You’re being obstinate for the sake of it. I’m not going anywhere, but I’ll stop sitting on your couch all day if that makes you feel better.”
His eyes narrowed on me. “Aren’t you supposed to be recording an album then going on tour? Are you going to bring me along in a stroller, pop a binky in my mouth when I get cranky?”
Black closed in on the edges of my vision. I’d been putting off thinking about the album as much as I could, but Dad wouldn’t let it slide, not with the mood he was in.
“That’s all on hold for now,” I said.
His nostrils flared. He looked to be about two seconds away from either charging at me or slapping the shit out of me. My dad wasn’t a violent man, and he rarely raised his voice, but he was losing it.
“What the motherfuck, Alexander? You better not be telling me you put your band on hold indefinitely for me.”
I flinched at his use of my given name. That was the big guns. I was in trouble now.
“Mo and I haven’t talked, so I don’t know. Maybe they can get someone to fill in for me.” Those words tasted like chalk in my mouth, but I had to face up to reality sooner or later. Mo wouldn’t keep me in the band, not after everything. And I got it. I wasn’t even sure I wanted to stay in Unrequited—not with how things were now.
“Why haven’t you and Mo talked?”
As luck would have it, my phone started buzzing from where I’d left it on the couch, and wouldn’t you know it, Mo’s big, beautiful face filled my screen. My dad’s eyes were shit, but even he could see who was calling.
“Gonna answer it?” he asked.
“Nope. We’re in the middle of something.”
The buzzing on my phone died down, only to start up a few seconds later, Mo’s face like a beacon.
“Get that. It must be important if he keeps calling,” Dad said.
