AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“Among other things,” he said.
“Your childhood is in that closet,” she said. “The good and the bad.”
“Not much good,” he said.
“This bat sure was good and handy,” she said, running her hand down his face.
“You’ve got a point there.” He kissed her on the forehead. “You know what’s in the boxes, don’t you?”
“I wasn’t being nosy,” she said.
“I know. It’s not you. You don’t have to explain.”
“This is probably horrible timing, but why did you keep things that have such a traumatic memory for you?”
He knew she was talking about the video game system.
“A reminder,” he said.
“Of what?” she asked.
“What not to do? What to do. I’m not sure. So many things. My father gave me that the Christmas after my mother died. I think he thought he was helping and I got upset. It caused him to go to his room and get drunk that night. I guess knowing the video game system is in the house reminded me of things not to do to people. Not to assume anything.”
“Cal, you were a kid. You were both grieving. Maybe it should remind you to be gentle with yourself at times. Or how about just being you? Maybe getting rid of it all and not using props from your past to do things that maybe you wouldn’t if they didn’t exist.”
He frowned. “What does that mean?” he asked.
“Cal. Everything you do, it’s for other people. Do you ever do anything for you?”
This felt a lot like the conversation he recently had with his grandfather. “I do a lot of things for me. I’m not sure how you can say that.”
“I know you do. But you’ve said it so many times that you want your parents to be proud of you. I’m positive they are. I’m betting they are angels above looking down daily at what you’ve done with your life. Maybe they are even wishing that you did things foryourather than worrying if it’d be what they’d want or would have done.”
“You just don’t know what it’s like,” he said. He heard the pain in his voice.
“No,” she said. “I don’t. I’m sorry that I don’t, but I want to understand. I think I do. I can’t imagine what you went through, but I want you to know that I’m here if you want to talk about it. Because I think you do.”
He shook his head. “Kind of like I made you talk so much about your past year?” he asked.
“Kind of like that,” she said. “What I see when I look at you is this guy that everyone loves and looks up to. They think you’ve got it all together. You’ve got everything in life. But you don’t. And you don’t want anyone to know that either.”
“That’s wrong,” he said. “Six months ago, I would have thought there was this big hole in my life.”
“What changed?” she asked, grinning at him.
He found it odd they were talking about this right now in the destruction of his home. “You. You made me see everything I was missing.” He decided to tell her about his conversation with his grandfather. “My grandfather told me a lot of what you are now. He wanted to know what I’ve done in my life that was different from my parents.”
“Is there anything?” she asked.
“I said I had a dog,” he said.
“I got you Harley,” she pointed out.
“That’s right. Which means that you could see something in my life that I couldn’t see. That’s why my life is happier right now. And in the past few days, I realized that what Tyler had done to me made me doubt some of my decisions.”
“Don’t doubt anything,” she said. “You can do everything right in life and things still turn out wrong. Didn’t you try to tell me something like that once?”
He smiled. “I did. Sometimes I need to hear my own advice.”
