Chapter 2
CHAPTER
AS NASH FINISHED GETTING READY, he thought about his mother and the breast cancer that had taken her five years before.
And long before Nash had been born, Agent Orange in Vietnam had gotten its miserable clutches into his father, filling the man with carcinogens that had, for decades, wreaked havoc on his once powerful body.
His father’s first wife had killed herself for reasons that had never been explained to Nash.
He had married Nash’s mother when he’d been thirty-seven and they’d had Nash a year later.
As an Army brat Nash didn’t have to move around much, because by the time he had come along his father was navigating the downhill portion of his enlisted ride to a full military pension.
They had come here when Nash had turned three, and he had been here ever since, except for when Nash had left to attend college.
When Nash was a child, he and his father had spent a great deal of time together, doing things that fathers and sons normally did.
Years in Little League baseball where, due to his clumsiness brought on by growing too much too fast, Nash played outfield and his father called out advice nonstop, or else screamed at the coaches, the ump, and other parents, sometimes throwing fists as well as insults.
They had gone canoeing a few times and camped out once, but not for long as poison sumac waylaid Nash and nearly sent him to the hospital.
By the time he was thirteen his father had taught him how to shoot like a pro and handle firearms exceptionally well.
Nash, though, had absolutely refused to go hunting with his father.
He could never see himself killing another living thing.
They also attended sporting events together where his father sucked down beers and Nash a soda.
His father was the sort of fan who shouted and gesticulated no matter how well or poorly his team was performing.
During these times Nash ate a hot dog and cheesy fries, and thought of other things.
For the most part those times had been good; his father had been a fun, willing participant in the important moments of a little boy’s life.
As a child Nash had attended his father’s military retirement ceremony. He had experienced great pride during the ceremony as he watched his father in his full military regalia, his chest brimming with hard-earned ribbons and medals, being celebrated by other brave, tough, and strong men.
He’d also seen, when they would go to the beach on vacation, the permanent wounds grafted onto his father from his combat days. He had felt proud of his dad and sorry for him at the same time, that he’d had to go through that and suffer so.
These blissful times had ended when Nash had opted to play tennis instead of the manly sport of high school football.
It had been for a simple reason: While already over six feet at age fourteen, Nash was very thin and underdeveloped, and he didn’t want to get his head knocked off.
Playing a sport that could damage your brain for the rest of your life, for no compensation in return, had never struck him as a productive or intelligent use of his time.
His father, who Nash knew had been a football legend back in Mississippi, had completely changed toward his son after Nash had made his decision not to pursue football.
There were no more fun times. No more father-son outings.
There was only a wall between the two that Nash had never really understood because he couldn’t believe something so frivolous as choosing one sport over another could have such drastic and inane consequences.
Then high school was done, college had begun, and then Nash had married, become a dad at a young age, graduated with high honors with a degree in business, and begun forging his identity as a husband, father, and businessman extraordinaire.
His widowed father, who had lived only eight miles away, in the same little vinyl-sided house in a hardscrabble neighborhood where Nash had grown up, had not spoken to his son right up until the day he had died.
He hadn’t even allowed Nash to come to hospice to say his goodbyes.
He had never even told his son he had been taken to hospice.
In fact, Nash had only heard of his father’s death from the man’s elderly neighbor.
So today was here and goodbyes would be made, and then what exactly?
His black dress shoes polished, his hair combed, and his slender jaw set as firm as he could manage, he walked out the door to join his family. Then they would drive off to pay final respects to a man who, for decades, had not respected his son in the least.
He was actually looking forward to tomorrow coming as quickly as possible. Then it would just be another day at the office where he could be reasonably sure of what to expect, for Nash was a man who, for the most part, loathed surprises.
And another day of his predictable life left on earth would be checked off to be followed by another day that was pretty much a facsimile of its predecessor.
Or so Walter Nash thought.