Bates
We’re both hawks.
I’m watching Hawk like the proverbial bird, noting every twitch of his eye, the curl of his fingers, and the rise and fall of every uneven breath.
He’s going to snap soon.
I see the exact moment his stunned, vacant stare focuses into a murderous glare, and I lean over to ease myself in front of Lana’s chair. She’s not the one he should be angry at, but he can’t seem to decide which of us he should hold accountable for the betrayal he must be feeling.
“We didn’t fall in love to hurt you, Hawk.”
“You weren’t even in the equation until you picked us up at the airport,” Lana states plainly, before her empowered posture softens and she glances at me. “It was too late by then. For me. I was already love-struck.”
She looks almost scared to admit that — to me, not to her father. She suspects it was too soon to feel so strongly, and she’s worried what I’ll think of her confession. I squeeze her hand, having felt the same about her before she’d left the hotel.
“Me too,” I assure her.
Lana turns to her father. “I can see why you’d want to fall in love as often as you do. It feels wonderful.”
“No, it doesn’t,” Hawk snarls, still glaring at us.
“It opens you up to losing every fucking thing until you wish your heart was filled with hate instead. What the fuck were you thinking, Kelly? You just broke up with Shaniah. Now this? You’re so desperate for babies you’ll do anything to get them?
Like brainwashing a little girl? My little girl? ”
Lana stands with a growl.
“I resent that you consider my mind feeble enough to be swayed by another when I’ve given you no indication that’s possible.
You’ve certainly had no fucking success brainwashing me despite every attempt to make me ‘normal’ over the years.
And I’m not a little girl. I’m an educated woman who has fit three times more learning into my twenty-two years than most of those normal people you love so much.
I know more at this age than some folk ever will, but you wouldn’t deprive them of love because of it.
I also refute the idea that I’m yours. I haven’t been yours since I was three and a half, when you gave up on me and subsequently pretended I didn’t exist for fifty-one weeks of every year thenceforth.
If you wanted me, you shouldn’t have thrown me away. ”
Hawk grips the sides of his chair. He looks as if his heart just got ripped out and tossed into the fire pit.
I want to hug Lana — who’s obviously on the verge of tears — but if I stand, my size is going to add something to this situation that’ll only provoke fear and rage. Sometimes I think life would be a lot easier if I were smaller.
My hand gives Lana’s another squeeze, and while I’d like to pull her into my lap, it’ll only inflame things. I tug her camping chair closer to mine and then guide her back into it so we’re all sitting again.
“Let’s all take a breath.”
Both of them hit me with the same expression, and it would be funny if they both didn’t look so… wounded.
“Okay,” I say keeping my voice steady. “It’s early in the piece, and there’s reason for tension, but my hope is that with some discussion we’ll progress to a place where we can all get along.”
“You can’t fix this, Kelly.” Hawk’s tone is cool and cutthroat, but I shrug it off.
“Won’t stop me from trying, Hawk.”
He tries to maim me with an even more intensive death-glare, but everything seems so calm and clear to me right now. I can see what everybody needs, and if I can just smooth things over, then all will be well.
“Hawk, I respect the fuck out of you, and I value our friendship. I cried the whole way here on the back of your fucking truck because I knew I was going to have to hurt someone I love and I didn’t want to.
You’re my family, and there aren’t so many members that I can suffer casualties. You two are it.”
“You’re insane. You just fucking met her. She’s half your age. She’s… Lana.”
He says her name like it’s unbelievable to him that I could want her — like she’s a consolation prize or some shit — and I see red. A low rumble builds deep in my chest, and Hawk pricks up his fucking ears as my free hand grips the arm of my camping chair so forcefully the metal bends.
“I don’t know what you meant by that last comment, Hawk, but I am getting really fucking tired of the way you talk about our girl without thinking how your words are going to be taken.
Do you know the damage you’ve done after years of that shit?
You’ve had her thinking she’s some unlovable outcast who’s unworthy of your time and understanding — and I have to say, it makes me fucking livid that she came out here believing she had to prove she could be of use to you before you’d accept her, motherfucker.
All she wants is a slice of the love you share so easily with everyone else. ”
“You’re offering fatherly advice, Kelly?
You want to be her daddy? Is that it? You want to lie awake at night worrying about all the shit you know you’re doing wrong when you’ve already made such a fucking mess of things you don’t know what the right thing even looks like?
Fuck you. You have no idea what it is to be a father. ”
“He’s lost a baby too, Dad,” Lana says quietly.
“And I know you’ve tried to be a solid father.
Loss after loss is hard to take, and you dealt with it as best you could.
You had to stay strong for Martha, and you did what you had to.
I get it. I’ve never begrudged you all of your choices.
I’ve just wanted you to see me as someone you’d be proud to acknowledge as your daughter. ”
“I do acknowledge you. And I was proud as fuck before you went and…” Hawk gestures at me and then turns away with a groan that morphs into a retching sound.
“You call me Goose,” Lana says with fire in her eyes that has no chance of being extinguished by the tears that are building there.
“I’m an odd fucking duckling, so I’m a goose.
I get it. I’ve always understood. I’m not a duck.
I know people see a goose. But I’m trying so fucking hard to be a swan, Dad. Bates makes me feel like a swan.”
Hawk’s eyes shine in the firelight, along with the tracks running down his cheeks. He nods and swipes the tears away.
“Yeah. Kelly’s a real nice guy. He makes everyone feel like the best version of themselves, and you can talk to him about anything without an ounce of fucking judgment. I’m going to miss that, Lana. Things won’t be like that anymore, and I want to blame you, but I know it’s my own fault.”
He throws his hands in the air. “We agree on that much, right? I did such a shit job being your father that I drove you into the arms of the first guy who was nice to you. I can see that it’s my fault, Lana.
I already understood my role in the daddy issues you told me you had, and that it’s my problem to fix.
I want to fucking fix it, but I can’t ever do shit fast enough to satisfy you.
You take my delays as inattention or misunderstanding — but I understand it right to my shitty core, Lana.
You don’t have to keep showing me. I didn’t need a fucking demonstration with my best fucking friend. ”
He wipes the spittle from his mouth and sits back down, having risen as his temper had.
“Okay,” he says more calmly. “Goal achieved, Lana. You found the perfect way to pay back your father for his inadequacies. He’s sorry he didn’t do better. The debt is repaid. Go check it off your list.”
“Dad, that’s not what this is,” Lana pleads. “I didn’t plan this.”
“You plan everything,” he mutters, staring at the fire.
“Not this,” I say through my teeth. “It had nothing to do with you. We were two strangers who acted on an instant connection. You were… the next day’s unexpected hangover.”
“Wow.” Hawk nods. “A guy can’t hear enough that his daughter wants to make babies with her one-night stand. Do neither of you see the problem with that?”
“Harper’s mom was your one-night stand,” Lana says coolly.
“Of course you’d bring that up,” Hawk cries at the sky. “I guess I was hoping you’d learn something from my mistakes other than how to repeat them.”
“Are you calling Harper a mistake?” Lana bites back, protecting her little sister as fiercely as a mother bear defends her cubs.
Hawk groans and covers his face. “I can’t fucking win with you.”
“It’s not about winning.” Lana fires back.
“Both of you stop,” I command in my firmest tone.
“You’re off-topic. Turn around and face the real issue so we can make the hard decisions before the rest of the crew starts turning up tomorrow.
Hawk, I love your daughter, and she loves me.
We’re together. It’s more than a one-night thing.
We make each other happy, and I’ll take care of her until I die or until she says I have to stop.
Those are the parameters. Where do you stand, and can we salvage any scraps here? ”
“What’s to salvage? Intentionally or unintentionally, you both betrayed me.”
Lana crosses her arms and turns away. She’s trying to appear angry, but the quiver in her chin before she disengaged betrays her true emotions.
Her dad’s pushing her away again instead of listening to her explanations or her needs.
Granted, he’s pissed as a snake tied in knots, but still.
He’s wedging more space between them, distancing himself so he doesn’t have to feel the sting of the loss.
“I’m sorry you feel that way, Hawk,” I say with a sigh.
“No, you’re not. You don’t give a shit. If you did, you wouldn’t be fucking my daughter — right under my nose. You might as well shoot me in the back and spit on my carcass.”
I sigh again. “That’s a tad dramatic.”
“Fuck you. If I thought I could be done chopping a big fucker like you up by morning, my axe would already be hacking at your legs. Who seduced who? Ugh, never mind. It fucking stings either way, but I’ve had it coming, haven’t I, Lana? You’ve always fucking hated me.”
“I don’t hate you,” Lana says quietly as she stands and collapses her folding chair.
“And I can’t keep sitting here listening to it, Dad.
You decided a long time ago that I was too hard to love.
I believed you to an extent, but I didn’t want to accept it, so I’ve badgered you.
I know I have. But I’m done. It’s regrettable, but I know a lost cause when I see one.
Trying to gain your approval is a waste of time, and I don’t need to do any more calculations to prove it. I give up. I’ll leave you in peace.”
“Lana, wait.” I grab her hand before she can walk any further, then I turn back to her father.
“The thing was already done, Hawk. Nobody planned anything. It just happened, and it shocked the hell out of all of us. We’d love to do the right thing by you, but it’s the wrong thing by us.
I love your daughter. Our future together is a certainty.
I would like to keep you as a friend, but I understand and accept your thoughts on the matter.
If you want me to leave, I will. It won’t change anything between me and Lana, but you have the power to decide right now how things will be between you and her.
We both love you and would like for things to be okay between us. Everything else is up to you.”
Hawk stands, folds his chair, and walks away — not even bothering to look at us as he delivers his parting words.
“Hope you didn’t unpack. Martha’s driving you both back to Dawson tomorrow.”