45. Chapter Forty-Five
Chapter Forty-Five
Alex
As if enduring the holiday break at the Prescott house isn’t bad enough, I don’t even have Margot with me to make everything better, the way only she is able to. I spend the first weekend at home spending as much time as I can with Drew, playing basketball, watching baseball and even playing whatever auto-themed game he’s into. It’s nice to have this time to spend with him, especially after knowing the effect our time shared has on him.
I guess I should’ve realized that Drew would look up to me. I certainly set a better example than our father at being a nice person. But I never really thought about how much he looks to me as a role model. And the entire time I’ve been home, I can’t help but feel like I’m letting him down.
A text from my father has me making my way to his office. He doesn’t often summon me unless it’s to talk business, of which I was never in the mood, least of all now.
I find Oliver behind his desk, clicking away at his computer, a phone to his ear. He looks up at me when I enter the doorway and puts up one finger, asking me to wait. I haven’t spent a lot of time in this office, it never really sparked a lot of happy memories so there was no reason to want to come in here. As my dad talked to whoever about whatever, I took a chance to look around, notice my surroundings as an adult rather than a child.
His bookcases were full of old-looking books. Merely for decoration, I’d imagine. I’ve never seen that man read a day in my life. There were art pieces on the walls. A globe in the corner. All the things you’d picture in a successful businessman’s office.
The only thing missing was…him. There was nothing in this office that had any shred of humanity. It might as well have been scooped right out off the cover of Bloomberg Businessweek.
I sigh, content to wait outside, until something catches my eye. A picture. The same framed picture that Drew has on his desk. The picture of Mom smiling, holding onto Drew and me. Oliver has it displayed on a bookshelf but I notice it’s on a lower shelf, eye level if he’s sitting at his desk, which he always is.
My dad hangs up the phone. “Hello, Alexander.”
“You looking for me?”
“Yes.” Oliver stands, pushing in his chair. “Care to go for a drive?”
I narrow my eyes. “To where?”
He nods his head toward the door. “Let’s go.”
“Why did you bring me here? A little morbid, don’t you think?”
After asking a few million questions on the way, I slowly started to quiet down once I realized where he was taking me. Parking the car directly next to the bridge, he gets out without a single word, urging me to follow.
We walk down to the edge of the lake, close enough to smell the fresh water but not in any danger of accidentally falling in. I’ve done my time in those germ-infested waters, I have no intention of ever going back in there.
“What’s your last happy memory of her? Of your Mom?”
“Why are you asking me this?” Had he overheard my conversation with Drew last week? My father never talks about my mom. Ever.
“Just indulge me, please.”
For a moment, I’m quiet. Looking behind me, I spot a flat patch of grass and sit down on it, shocking my father who then surprises me by joining me on the lawn, stretching his legs out in front of him.
“A trip to Oceanside. We stayed at some shitty resort, where we all shared one room.” Oliver gives me a glance as if to scold me for my language but ultimately resists. I continue on. “Early in the morning, Mom woke me up and snuck me out of the room while you guys were sleeping. We walked along the beach until the sun rose and she told me about all the things I could do with my life.”
Oliver sighs heavily. “What kind of things?”
“I’m not sure the specifics but I remember some of them being pretty outlandish. Like an astronaut or a king,” I laugh at the memory.
“A king,” my father laughs with me, as if remembering a thought of his own. “Yes, she always had the craziest ideas.”
I fall silent again, sensing that father is not done speaking. In fact, it feels like he’s just beginning.
“Your mother was my greatest joy,” he starts. “And she was my greatest pain.”
He pauses but I know better than to interrupt him right now. I’ll give him as much time as he needs to get through this.
“On her good days, she would radiate positivity and light. Adventure after adventure. She’d dress us all up, drag us around town. She loved showing you boys off to the neighbors. It was like nothing I’ve ever seen, her love for you boys. Brought me to tears more than a few times.
“And that made it all the more difficult on her bad days. Tantrums and shouting. She’d lock herself in our room and not let me in for hours, and I’d pace back and forth hoping to god that she wasn’t hurting herself.
“The day that she…” his voice trails off. “When she died, I felt like a piece of me died right along with her. For years, I collapsed into myself.”
“I know,” I said, unthinkingly. I don’t mean to make him feel bad but I can’t ignore the need to tell him how his reaction affected me and Drew. “We know.”
My dad runs a hand down his face. “None of this was supposed to happen. She was supposed to love me and you boys. She was supposed to take care of us but instead, she let her demons get the better of her.
“And I…I did the same. I pulled away from you. I let you raise Drew because I didn’t know if I could do it properly without her. I pushed you toward a career with me because I thought having you at work would bring us closer. Bond us. But I know you don’t want that, Alex. I’ve always known.”
Oliver looks over and for once it’s like he’s looking at me rather than through me. It’s the most honest we’ve ever been with each other and I hope beyond hope that it’s a turning point in the right direction.
“Why didn’t you ever tell me that?”
“It’s hard for me to talk about her. To talk about the ways I failed you.”
“You haven’t failed me, dad. I understand. I was going through it, too.”
I want to reach out and grab his hand or pat his back–something to let him know I’m here and I’m listening–but I keep my hands folded on my lap. This seems like a breaking point, the most emotional we’ve ever been with each other. I need to speak up. If I can’t speak up for myself and push back against my father’s control, then I couldn’t possibly be the man Margot needed me to be, anyway. If I can’t have a say in my own future then I don’t deserve to be a part of hers.
It’s now or never.
“Dad,” I start, taking a very deep breath in. “I don’t want to work at Prescott Cars.”
“I know. You don’t want to work with your old man.”
“Is that what you think? Dad, it has nothing to do with working with you. I have no interest in working in an office at all.”
He looks at me, his inquisitive brow perked. “What do you want to do, then?”
Looking back at the lake, a ray of sunshine glinting off the water catches my eye. “I want to work in fitness. I want to be a trainer or own a gym or something like that.”
It is the first time I said it out loud to anyone other than Margot. And I am saying it now to the last person I ever thought would want to hear it. Oliver is quiet. For a while the only sounds we hear are the birds chirping in tree tops above. Suddenly, after a sharp breath in, my dad breaks a decade long silence.
“You’re a man now, Alex. You have every right to make your own decisions about your future.”
“Are you saying…”
“Your mom would’ve wanted you to be happy doing whatever it is you’re happy doing. I want you to be happy, too. So, go. Do what makes you happy. For both of us.”
A tear threatens to escape my eye and I let it. “Thank you, dad. You know I’ve missed Mom all this time, but not half as much as I’ve missed you.” Dad reaches across the empty space between us, gripping my neck and pulling my head over for him to kiss roughly before releasing me.
“I’ve missed you, too, kid.”
“Not that I’m not happy about this breakthrough but, where is this all coming from?”
My dad gives me a coy look. “Margot called me.”
“She–”
“She called me and boy did she give me a piece of her mind,” he laughs.
I’m in shock. Not only that she would call him but that he would even speak to her. And he’s laughing about it? Have I stepped in an alternate dimension?
Shaking off the weirdness, I picture Margot calling him after that brief conversation we had at the end of speech class. Did she tell him that we weren’t together anymore? She must not. I need him to tell me every single detail of the conversation but I can’t seem too eager or he’ll catch on that something is off.
“What did she say?”
“She’s a stubborn one, your girlfriend.” Keep it together. “She told me that I’ve been holding you back from being the man you were meant to be. Or something to that effect. She said you had your own passions and none of them included working at a ‘car factory’.”
Oliver Prescott is a very proud man. He does not take kindly to disrespect. But when I look in his eyes, there’s a playfulness there that I don’t think I’ve seen since I was a child.
“She didn’t really give me much of a chance to respond. She told me to watch some of that podcast if I really wanted to ‘get to know the real Alex.’ Direct quote.”
There was never a doubt that I am still very much in love with her but the feeling is intensifying tenfold.
“So, I watched a random episode. And then another one. And then I went back and watched them all from the beginning. I just…it was nice to see you like that. Happy. I haven’t seen you like that in, well, seems like years.”
I can only nod in response. I was my happiest doing that podcast with Margot. But that’s gone now. She’s gone. Don’t dwell. Take this moment for what it is .
We sit in companionable silence for a few more minutes before the honk of a passing car breaks us from our reverie.
We head toward the car, both of us feeling much lighter than we were before. Dad opens the driver side door as I slide into the passenger seat.
“I guess I gotta put out an ad for an intern to fill your spot for this summer,” he mutters.
“Actually, I had an idea about that.”
When my dad looks at me, I’m smiling from ear to ear.