Chapter Twelve #2
In the truck, my headlights flip on just as the first raindrop splashes against the windshield.
It’s like a permission slip for my nervous system—the sky and I both split open, and the rain comes down in sheets.
I stare myself down in the rearview, pitying every stupid tear racing the others down my cheeks as the storm turns my truck into a snare drum.
It beats down like it’s been saving up for this moment, waiting for right now.
Over the rattle, I can still hear my dad whistling at the rain, saying, “It’s been dry lately.
We really needed this.” And maybe I needed this, too.
The tears stop before the rain does, and I’m back on the road, feeling like I’d rather feel nothing at all.
I want to opt out of this moment, skip the hurt and heartache and escape from my head.
The urge is almost primal. Strong as ever, even after three years sober.
I could drain a fifth of liquor or a double bottle of wine.
Any old mind eraser would do. I remember the leftover hard seltzers I bought for Gin, all huddled together in the back corner of my fridge, and just the impulse, the thought of it, relaxes me.
I know it shouldn’t, but it does. There are only five hard seltzers.
They have to go somewhere. No one would have to know but me.
My phone chirps at me to turn down my street.
Then the destination is on your left: home.
I watch my hands on the steering wheel. They don’t budge.
My phone starts rerouting, but I’m not following my directions.
Something else is steering, and it knows where we need to be.
It’s a quick drive, and my eyes are set straight ahead, ignoring the voice chirping At the next light, make a U-turn. There’s an empty parking spot right out front of Tweedy’s, my favorite bar. Like they knew I was coming. Like a warm welcome back.
I don’t go inside, but I don’t drive away.
I just idle in the spot, stalling in the in-between.
In the window of the bar, the neon lights smudge like watercolors behind the diagonal rain.
God, there’s so much rain. Just when I’m sure we’ve made it through the worst of it and summer has carried us into the clear, the storm comes again, reminding me I’ll never get too far.
Real life isn’t a Palm Springs vacation with 350 days of sunshine a year; it’s a Midwestern summer—rain one minute, sun the next.
The highs and lows happen all at once, and somehow, we’re meant to feel it all.
A tap on my driver’s side glass breaks the spell.
Through the water droplets, I spot a cherry red raincoat.
Two worried blue eyes. I don’t roll down the window; I unlock the truck, and Renee sidesteps through the gap between my front bumper and the car parked ahead.
She slips into the passenger side, a plastic bag from a nearby drugstore crinkling in her lap.
I’ve caught her on the way back from a snack run—or, I guess, she’s the one who caught me.
“Hey,” Renee says, gently. That’s all she says.
It’s silent aside from the rain on the roof of the truck, then the swish and crinkle as she tears into a bag of barbecue chips.
Wordlessly, she offers them to me, and we stay like this for a long while, snacking in silence, staring at the lights of the bar.
When we’re down to the crumbs, Renee claps the orangey-brown powder off her fingers and pushes back the hood of her raincoat, splashing a few raindrops onto the center console.
“So,” Renee says. The second syllable out of her in…how long? Ten minutes? An hour? It feels like a lifetime has passed while we’ve been sitting here, idling in the rain. Her eyes find mine, cool and blue, then shift back to Tweedy’s.
“I’m not going in,” I say, defensive.
She nods. “Okay.”
More unnerving silence. “So…I should probably go home, huh?”
“Is there booze at home?”
Yes, I think. “No,” I say.
“Are you sure?”
Silence again. Too much of it. My kick-drum heart pounds a heavy rhythm.
“Okay,” Renee whispers. “You’re staying with me.”
Hey Dad. Remember when I asked you about whether you see everything that’s happening here on Earth? Right now I have to assume you do and that you already know about this because I can’t be the one to tell you about this. Because it really fucking sucks.
I probably told you this when I was little or drunk, but Kurt used to be my favorite member of The Handful (other than you, of course).
It was probably just that he was always single and would play rock star with me while the rest of the guys were busy with whatever wife or girlfriend they had at the time.
Kurt was fun and weird and patient and he could make a fart sound on like nine different parts of his body.
Did he ever show you that? Anyway, I don’t know how that guy could be dating my mom.
Not that Mom isn’t fun and patient, too, but she’s your wife.
Or she was. I guess “till death do us part” means that at death… it’s splitsville, baby!
Sorry to joke, but I have to. I know you understand that more than anyone. If I don’t I’m worried that I’ll burst into tears on Renee’s couch and then she’ll come out here and I’ll have to talk about it.
I don’t know, Dad. I wish you could come back, even if just for a second.
I’m not sure if you would’ve had the right things to say about Renee or Mom and Kurt, but I know you’d have a good joke that would make me feel better.
But I think the real reason I wanted to write to you tonight was because I was thinking about you when I was parked outside of Tweedy’s.
I kept thinking how good it would feel to not have to feel this way, if I could have a few drinks to sand down the edges of the hurt.
It’s the first time it really clicked for me that you probably felt that way too.
I can’t imagine how awful it would feel to find out that you’re dying, but I wish you would’ve felt it.
Maybe then you would’ve done something about it and tried to stick around.
I miss you so much, Dad. I’m angry with Mom. It’s so much harder to be angry—really, REALLY angry—at someone you love. Are you mad at Mom and Kurt, too? Can you even get mad after you die? Maybe feelings are reserved for the living because we’re still invested.
Love,
Your Dallas Alice