Chapter 8 Fathers
Fathers
Gemiah
It’s raining. Again.
After two and a half winters in Mendocino, I’m still not used to the constant deluge that soaks the coast and turns our forest playground into mud and soggy redwood needles from November to April every year.
“It’s almost six. Soccer practice ended at five thirty.” Josha pushes off the side of the bookstore, reproach clear on his face as Cassidy and I stumble up.
Oh shit. I forgot all about picking up Jeremy. No wonder Josha looks so pissed. My current state—soaked to the skin and half drunk on stolen wine, with Cassidy hanging off my arm—probably isn’t helping.
“Fuck. Sorry. Did you call him?”
“I called Hannah. She left choir practice early to go get him.”
“So…you still need a ride?”
“Not from her drunk ass.” He jerks his chin at Cassidy.
“He drank most of the bottle,” she protests, throwing me under the bus. Josha gives her one of his Merlin stares, ancient wizard eyes in a teenage face, until she shrugs and hands him the keys. “Fine. You drive, then, but I’m not standing around in the rain anymore.”
Neither of us bother to remind her that Josha only has a learner’s permit, and she retreats to the dry passenger seat of her parked Camry without waiting for a response.
“What happened to Mal?” Josha asks me, shoving the keys into his jacket pocket.
I totally did not lose my virginity to Mallory Clark last weekend because I caught her boyfriend kissing Josha behind the library. Josha doesn’t even know I saw them. And he can kiss whoever he wants.
It’s not like I’m threatened or anything.
“She has a boyfriend. And Cassidy has a car.” Instead of heading to said car, I join him under the eaves, leaning against the white Victorian wood siding of the shop. “Sorry I was late.”
“And drunk.”
The rain trickling down the back of my collar is suddenly colder, and I suppress a shiver.
“You’re mad at me.” Except it’s not anger as much as it is disappointment, which is somehow a million times worse.
I bite my lip and peek up at him through my lashes, fighting the undertow of guilt and recrimination with my fascinating new weapon.
Only because I can’t bear his disapproval. Not because I’m hunting that shy, hungry look in his eyes. Or to prove anything to Ethan fucking Carmichael, who’s obviously a douchebag and doesn’t deserve Mallory or Josha, and who isn’t even here.
“Yes, I’m fucking mad.” But he turns his head, and a little shudder runs through him.
Triumph is a sick, guilty flush of adrenaline.
I’m not gay.
I know I’m not. I’ve literally never looked at another guy and thought, man, I’d like to get all up in that.
But…I sort of like it when Josha looks at me that way. Which doesn’t make sense at all, since I get plenty of that shit from girls all the fucking time. And obviously that’s nice, because it makes me feel good and usually means I’m gonna get my dick wet.
But I don’t want Josha to suck my dick, so it’s totally unfair to want him to be attracted to me.
None of the girls I’ve dated or fucked around with made me want to spend less time with my best friend.
There’s no reason to think that him dating someone would be any different because that someone is another guy.
And he already adored me before—well, not before he was gay, maybe—but before he came out to me and I started acting all weird and sort of flirting with him sometimes.
It’s stupid to be scared that the only reason he wants to be my friend is some imaginary crush I’m not in a position to reciprocate.
He wouldn’t replace me.
Can anyone say mommy issues?
“Still wanna make tuna mac and binge Daredevil?” I ask, letting my head fall against the building a couple of times to try and knock some sense into it.
What I really want is another bottle of wine.
Somehow, when I’m drunk or high, my questionable decisions feel like a good time instead of some bizarre insecurity.
“You know you can’t be drunk at my house around Jeremy.”
Right. The unspoken rule of the Garrity household that even Rachael follows. A rule that I’m perfectly aware of but can’t seem to remember when the alcohol is right there, begging to be consumed.
“Rain check, then?” I ask, leaning up to shake my wet hair in his face in the hopes of eliciting a smile. “Sorry I fucked up our night.”
He fishes Cassidy’s keys out of his pocket and flips his cap around to protect his face from the downpour before starting across the street without a backward glance. “I’ll drop you off at the lot on the way.”
He’s not on the bus the next morning, and he doesn’t answer my increasingly wheedling texts until midafternoon. When he finally responds, it’s with a single word: “Sick.”
Now I feel even shittier about making him wait in the rain yesterday.
Not that my hangover is helping. I drank another half a bottle last night after I got home, hiding from my dad in the ticket wagon, and I’ve decided red wine isn’t my drink.
Maybe I should start sticking to weed like Josha usually does.
“California sober,” Rachael called it, teasing him at the Homecoming after-party.
Hoping he’s only avoiding me because of the flu and not because he’s still pissed at me, I head to his trailer after school. The rain has finally let up, but the gravel squelches under my feet, and the air is rich with salt and evergreen as I pick my way up the drive.
“He’s sick.”
Paul Garrity is more pathetic than intimidating, with his half-empty twelve-pack between his feet and his beer gut pressing into the porch railing, but my steps still falter.
I’m not scared of Josha’s father, exactly.
I’ve only seen him blow up twice—once when Rachael took his car without asking and once when Josha let Jeremy build a massive Lego castle in the living room.
Josha sent me outside with his brother while he crawled around throwing the little plastic landmines into a basket, ears flaming, and his dad raged.
There was that one night when Diana came home while Josha and I were watching movies on his laptop, and she and Paul went at it for so long in the living room that I ended up spending the night to avoid having to walk past them.
But usually, he’s half asleep on the couch, or drinking in the tool shed, and he’s never paid much attention to me at all. It’s more that I’ve always had Josha to act as a buffer, and that I suck at parents in general.
Maybe I’m weirded out because even after two and a half years of friendship, Josha doesn’t talk about his dad that much, except in roundabout ways—“I need to get home early to watch Jeremy” or “My mom’s not working tonight, can I stay in the Airstream with you?”
It’s too late to backtrack and climb through the window, though, which means I’ve gotta respond.
“I know.” I hold up the paper bag I’m carrying and edge closer to the porch. “I brought soup.”
“You’re just like his mama. Thinks I can’t take care of a sick kid. I changed plenty of diapers and cleaned up my share of puke when they were babies, same as her.”
And what the fuck am I supposed to say to that? Looks like you’re doing a bang-up job right now, drinking on the porch? Father of the year shit, right there.
“Yeah. Okay.” The carton of soup is cooling in my hands. Garrity crumples his beer can and stoops down to grab another.
“You fucking my boy, then?” he asks, oh so casual.
What. The. Fuck?
“No.” The forest weeps, a sodden symphony in the stretching silence.
He grunts. “I guess Rachael was right.”
“You asked—” I shake my head. Low embers of outrage kindle at the base of my spine. “Would it matter if I was?”
Another grunt, this time accompanied by a shrug of his heavy shoulders.
“Want a beer?”
Is this a test? No way Josha’s been talking about my drinking with his dad, right?
“No thanks.” Wrapping my confusion in the dregs of my shock, I shoulder past him and let myself into the home.
Josha’s room is full of shadows, discarded Kleenex, and the faint, familiar odor of teenage boy in sweaty sheets. He’s half slumped against the pillow, playing on his phone, when I enter.
“You look like shit,” I tell him, even though he doesn’t. His hair is tousled, his cheeks are fever-flushed, and his freckled shoulders are lean and bare, poking up from under the blankets. He goes even pinker at my comment and slouches further down in the bed.
“Thanks. I feel like shit.”
“If it’s any consolation, so do I. At least yours isn’t self-inflicted.”
“Hungover?”
I search his tone for sympathy and find none.
“That too.” Holding his gaze, I let him see the apology I’m too self-conscious—and too stubborn—to say out loud. “I brought chicken noodle.”
“From Mendoza’s?” He perks up, peace offering accepted.
“Obviously. I can nuke it for a few if you want it hot.”
“That’s okay.”
I hand over the bag and start to slide in next to him, lulled by his forgiveness, even if I had to bribe it out of him.
“Don’t,” he warns. “Germs.”
Sure. Germs. Nothing to do with the way he’s started to avoid all casual contact with me. Like I’m gonna be offended if I catch him sniffing my hair or freak out if our shoulders bump against each other while walking down the street.
Or like he doesn’t trust me.
Instead of forcing the issue, I settle on the floor and lean my back against the bed at his hip.
“Saw your dad on the way in,” I say, tilting my head to catch his expression. The plastic spoon stalls halfway to his mouth.
“Did he…talk to you?”
“Not really. He offered me a beer.”
His shoulders relax with a rueful shake of his head.
“He used to do that all the time when I was about ten.”
Maybe it’s the fever, but I swear he sounds almost nostalgic.
“You been a secret lush this whole time?” I tease.
“Hardly. My mom found out and totally freaked. I never liked the taste of it, anyway, but as a kid, it made me feel special. Stupid, right?”
“Not really. He’s your dad. Makes sense that you’d like it when he paid attention to you.”
“He’s the one who got me started on Marvel movies.
Bought the subscription to Disney+, even though my mom said we didn’t need any more streaming services.
We’d hang out on Sunday afternoons and make popcorn and watch Iron Man and Thor while the twins were off at rehearsals, or whatever they were into. ”
“That sounds pretty cool. My parents dragged me out to cafés while they drank wine with their friends. If we watched a movie, it was usually some French flick. Or a documentary.”
“He used to be fun when he was drunk,” Josha admits, shame curling off him in dull waves at the confession.
I hope he thinks I’m a fun drunk, but after yesterday, I doubt it, so I don’t ask.
I am glad not all his memories of his dad are crappy.
“You know what’s funny?” I ask. “Nobody gives a shit about kids drinking in Europe. First time I was drunk, I was eleven at the Circolo wrap party with three other kids. None of our parents noticed until it was time to take us home. It’s only this year that my dad’s started acting all concerned if I come home smelling like alcohol. ”
“He’s worried about you.” Like I am, he doesn’t add.
“I’m fine.” I’m a disaster. “He just doesn’t have anything better to obsess about with my mom and Milla gone.” My dad tries to act like he doesn’t miss them, but I’m better at faking it.
“You know you’re lucky to have a dad who cares.”
“You know you’re lucky to have a mom,” I retort, because I’m that kind of asshole.
“You have a mom. She calls you all the time.”
“Don’t try to tell me it’s the same.”
“No…I’m not. But…should we arm wrestle for who has the worst parents?” He’s humoring me, because it’s not really a contest, but I love him a little more for letting me pretend.
“I would totally kick your ass.”
With a snort, he tosses the empty soup carton onto his nightstand. “Only because I’m sick.”
“Keep telling yourself that, Rocket.” I flash my guns at him.
Flopping back into the pillow, he grins at me, and the room gets a little brighter.
“You gonna be back in school tomorrow?” I ask after a few minutes of companionable silence.
“Why? You miss me?”
“Nah,” I tease. “I’m asking for Penny.”
The mood shifts, and I mentally kick myself for poking at a spot I know is vulnerable when I’ve finally got him playful and relaxed.
“I told Penny two weeks ago,” he says, and I sit up sharp to turn and stare.
“About…you?” I shouldn’t be startled, and I definitely shouldn’t be hurt.
It’s his life, not our secret. His gayness doesn’t have anything to do with me, and it was never mine, anyway.
Plus, Josha is a good fucking person, and she was his best friend before I came into the picture.
The only surprising part is that he didn’t come out to her before now. “How did she take it?”
“Mostly relieved. Means it wasn’t about her, you know?” He scrubs a hand over his face. “Rightfully pissed that I waited so long.”
“Sounds about right.” Twisting around, I tick off names on my fingers. “So, Penny knows, I know, Dickhead Carmichael knows…”
He ducks his head, blushing, and I poke him in the ribs.
“You might as well come out in Morning Meeting, because the whole school’s gonna know by the end of the week.”
“Maybe I will.”
He won’t. Big declarations aren’t his style, but since I’m still a little salty for absolutely no good reason, I can’t resist one last jab. “What’s next? A big announcement at family dinner?”
“Oh god,” he groans. “Don’t even joke about that.”