10. Atticus
ATTICUS
Salt wind combs through the royal palms that border my father’s ocean-front lawn, rattling fronds like applause.
To my right, the infinity pool bleeds cobalt into cobalt—the tile melting into the Caribbean beyond.
Crimson bougainvillea vines knot themselves around limestone columns, petals fluttering down like confetti every time a breeze sneaks inland from the Malecón.
Citrus and cigar smoke braid in the air.
Somewhere deeper in the neighborhood, a trumpet practices lazy boleros.
It is, objectively, perfect. A postcard made three-dimensional. Which is precisely why my current mood—flat and brittle—is baffling.
I plant my shoes shoulder-width on a square of manicured grass that Dad calls his “backyard tee box,” square up a glossy white ball, and swing.
The driver meets graphite tee with a click so pure it should ring in Dolby Surround.
The ball sails high, winks in the sunlight, and disappears beyond the reef.
My father whistles in approval. “New flight record, son.”
I nod, but the praise registers like background hum.
Dad gestures for another ball. His board shorts sport pineapples wearing sunglasses. His linen shirt flaps open, showing a tan that says retirement agrees with him. Near the pool, his wives—Julia, Ibara, Lizel, and Astrid—lounge like living jewels on chaise longues.
Julia, statuesque and Dominican, taps something into her tablet while sipping coconut water straight from the shell.
Ibara, Kenyan, adjusts a giant straw hat before handing Dad a chilled towel.
Lizel, Filipina, waves from the shallow end where she’s coaxing koi-colored fingernails through the water.
Norwegian and perpetually sunburned Astrid spreads SPF on the other wives’ shoulders whether or not they ask.
They giggle when Dad poses with his driver. The sound blends with gull cries overhead until you can’t tell which noise is nature and which is contentment.
I envy him that certainty. Envy him enough to foul up my next swing. The ball hooks early, splashes embarrassingly close to shore.
Dad lowers his club. “Something on your mind, son?”
I picture Thalassa—a smattering of freckles like constellation fragments, a laugh that expands any room’s oxygen capacity.
She materializes behind my eyelids without warning.
In a robe on the penthouse balcony, taking her first bite of caviar.
In Colin’s stolen hoodie, smearing hot sauce on her eggs.
In Dean’s arms, standing taller than fear.
She shouldn’t still be haunting me. It’s ludicrous, and I know it. We agreed to a finite weekend—money paid, memories made, clock out. Sugar daddies don’t do encores.
Yet she floats in my headspace like a message in a bottle.
“I met someone,” I say, shocking myself more than him.
Dad’s eyebrows shoot north. “Atticus Montgomery Copeland—volunteering personal information? I hardly believe it.”
I rake fingers through my hair. “She’s…remarkable. College senior. For Thanksgiving, we arranged a fun weekend, just me, her, and the twins?—”
He whistles low. “Another sugar baby? You never bother remembering their names, let alone pining two weeks later.”
“She’s not them,” I mutter, and that defense exposes a vulnerability I didn’t realize was loaded.
Dad hands me a coconut water. “Hydrate. Then start at the top.”
I walk him through the short version. Bored retirement scroll, virgin filter, Thalassa’s uncanny profile, our brothers’ collective bid, first times that felt less like conquest and more like ceremony.
Each detail tastes brighter than it should when I speak it aloud—makes my pulse accelerate even as I try to downplay it.
Dad listens without interrupting, save for an impressed grunt when I confess the fee. At the end, silence cushions us. Waves crash somewhere far below.
“And now?” he prompts.
“Now she’s back at school, I imagine. My days are pastel. I wake, swim laps, tour the estate, count hours ’til evening, sleep. It’s…” I search for a word. “Gray.”
He nods slowly. “And your brothers?”
“Sharing the same color palette, I suspect. But we haven’t said it out loud.”
Dad sets his club aside, folds his arms, and eyes the pool where Julia has coaxed Astrid onto a float shaped like an iridescent shell. “You know my arrangement wasn’t planned.”
Understatement. Four wives across four countries, acquired over fifteen years. Dad remains head over heels for each, yet there’s always been an unspoken vacancy—a gap shaped like my mother.
“I love them,” he says, voice softer. “But none could ever replace your mother. I fucked that up. One wander, one unwanted headline, and she closed the door. Took four women, four love languages, entire oceans of patience to fill the silence she left—and even that? Only patches.”
He watches Lizel hand Ibara a pineapple mocktail with a tiny umbrella.
“Took four women to steady me after losing her, but the math doesn’t add up.
I’m happy. Yes. They’re wonderful people, each with their own gifts and quirks.
” He swallows, eyes distant. “Still, the ledger shows a deficit only one person balanced.”
I know the story. Mom, brilliant and unforgiving.
She left when we were in high school, tired of paparazzi pictures captioning Dad with whichever hostess smiled closest. Dad attempted grand gestures.
She countered with iron boundaries. We kids got two holidays a year, alternating custody, and a therapy stipend.
I don’t blame her. He humiliated her for years before she finally called it quits. I respect her for leaving. But it still sucks.
“So,” Dad continues, turning back, “if one woman lights you up enough to make paradise feel dull, pay attention. Don’t let hubris or convenience bulldoze that signal.”
I toe a divot in the turf. “Not exactly singular. Dean and Colin are tangled up in this too. I think.”
Dad barks a laugh. “Well, you three have shared empires since teething. Why not affection?”
I flush. “This isn’t a locker-room bet. She might be open to more than one partner. That’s not the issue. The issue is I can’t figure out where lust ends and something weightier begins, and the uncertainty is…unsettling.”
“Uncertainty,” Dad echoes, tasting the word. “The birthplace of discovery. You retired to explore a new life. Looks like a new life found you first.” He claps my shoulder. “Experience it.”
“But what if I’m just chasing novelty?”
Dad points the shaft of his driver at me. “Novelty fades within forty-eight hours. You’re on hour three-hundred-plus and counting.”
He glances at his wives again. Julia waves, and he waves back, affection rolling off him like sunlight.
“I love each of those women differently. Julia is storm strength, Astrid is empathy, Lizel is laughter, and Ibara is ferocious logic. If I lost any of them, the mosaic would fracture. But I’d trade their combined radiance to undo my betrayals and keep your mother. Old age means telling harsh truths.”
His gaze lands on me, steady. “So, Atticus—if you see a chance at one woman who steadies all your pieces, don’t assume you can replicate that ROI with substitutes. Markets don’t work like that.”
Finance metaphors. That’s Dad-speak for don’t screw it up .
A pause drifts in. We soak in sensory wealth.
The thud of a mango dropping somewhere in the garden, distant laughter echoing off curved stucco, the lazy lap of pool water against tile.
Even the sunlight feels flavored—hints of lime and sugar cane.
I sip my coconut water and taste salt on my upper lip.
Paradise saturates every synapse, yet a phantom taste of Thalassa’s body edges the drink, reminding me this isn’t where I want to be right now.
Dad wipes moisture from his glass. “Remember flying to Zurich with me?”
“Yes. You let me taste barley wine, swore me to secrecy.”
“Do you recall the rooftop view that first night? How you said the city lights looked like circuit boards?”
I nod. The memory glitters.
“Next day, we toured chocolate factories, castles, and snow peaks. Yet what’s etched clearest for me is not the tourist grandeur, but your face—young, curious, alive.” He taps my chest, right over the heartbeat currently slamming against my ribs. “It’s never the scenery. It’s the company.”
The wives call us for lunch—grilled snapper, papaya salad, microgreens that taste peppery and sweet at once. We agree to wrap up our drives and head in.
Dad shoulders his club. “The first time I kissed your mother, the room smelled of rain and cheap coffee. I could afford Versailles by then, but that scent outshone Versailles. Your brothers and you”—he smiles—“were born from that coffee-rain universe. Never forget how small a thing can redirect an empire.”
One ball remains. Dad motions for me to take it. I square up, inhale ocean iodine, exhale. Thalassa’s laugh loops, syncing with gull shrieks. I swing.
The strike sings truer than any today, the ball a perfect comet heading sunward.
Dad laughs, claps. “That’s the one you bottle. Momentum for whatever comes next.”
We walk toward the veranda. The wives arrange plates under a pergola, sunlight dappling their shoulders. They wave me over, urging taste tests. Their warmth pulls a tentative smile out of me. Despite the storm in my brain, I feel seen.
Dad pauses at the step, turns, delivers the coup de grace, “If one woman stirs you better than a Caribbean breeze, hold tight and never let go.”
He leaves the driver leaning against a palm and strides toward Julia, who’s holding out a forkful of snapper like an offertory. The moment freezes—sun haloing them, laughter layered over the sea’s hush—and I finally grasp what paradise can’t provide on its own.
I follow him inside, heart lighter than when I arrived, yet heavier with decision. Hold tight, says the cautionary tale disguised as my father. My hands flex at my sides, ready to test their grip.