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Brooklyn and Beckett often talk about traveling, but they’re just as quick to discuss ideas for a McMurdo Valley business to own together. When they’re in junior high, they decide they’ll buy a restaurant like the one they “operated” as kids. I don’t know if that plan will stick, but the two of them make a solid team.
Brigitte is a delicate little girl with a big imagination. As soon as she can read, she’s always got her tablet nearby. She follows around her siblings, especially Beau. She likes to find a spot to read near wherever he’s playing. As they get older, they often take walks and sit in the garden together. Brigitte craves a quiet life, and I can imagine her remaining content in McMurdo Valley.
Once he’s walking, Buchanan shows a taste for speed and fighting like his old man. No one messes with his people without witnessing his protective temper. As he gets older, he becomes fearless. All those worries I had about Michael falling down the stairs or drowning return with my final child. Buchanan is constantly climbing shit, running full speed, and challenging kids twice his size.
My boy looks, sounds, and acts like me. However, he’ll never be as big of an asshole as I am. For one thing, his mama is too sweet. For another, no one razzes him for being too big or loud.
I’d be a different man if my mother treated me with even half of the kindness Landry shows Buchanan. Though I do raise him to understand the power and responsibility inherent in his size, I never lecture him on being someone else.
In my gut, I know Buchanan will ride with the Steel Berserkers Motorcycle Club one day. I’ll need to find a way to be okay with my kid stepping into a violent life.
That choice felt different for me. I’d found acceptance with my friends. My only skills involved crushing our enemies. Choosing a dangerous life made sense for a lost fucker like I was back then. Buchanan doesn’t need to ride down that road, yet I’ll find a way to accept his choices like my father never could with mine.
Once the six Bennings kids are in school full-time, Landry decides to take online high school classes. Having dropped out in the ninth grade, she has a long road to get her diploma. When Landry struggles, I help her. I’m surprised by how much shit I remember, considering I dozed a lot in class and barely graduated. After she reaches lessons over my head, I hire a tutor.
“I want my kids to be proud of me,” she explains after a particularly difficult assignment when her frustration is palpable. “I want to be proud of myself.”
Landry’s pain in those moments guts me. I want to punish someone for the life she led. Since her parents are dead, I have her aunt set up on a drug rap and sent to prison for a few years. I beat to death the abusive asshole before Neal and knife the evil dickhead prior to him. None of that payback helps Landry, but at least, those fuckers can’t hurt anyone else.
I’ve learned over my life how the small things keep people going. Knowing those assholes are dead makes me happy. Pissing on her parents’ graves during a vacation gives me a thrill. Hanging up her diploma in the home office fills me with pride over how hard my wife worked. Throwing a party at the house so the club and my kids can celebrate Landry’s success reminds me how solitude has its limitations.
That’s why, despite my road name and taste for quiet, I’m a family man and ride proud with the Steel Berserkers Motorcycle Club.
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THE END
