Chapter 28
While the rest of the cast and crew caught a connecting flight from JFK to LAX, Patrick hired a car and drove to his parents’ house in New Jersey. He called them en route to let them know he was coming, and an hour later parked outside the four-bedroom he’d bought them in a neighborhood his dad had used to make fun of.
“Patrick!” His mother stood on the porch and watched him walk up the driveway. He gave her a hug, breathing in the smell of her, a combination that hadn’t changed in thirty years: hairspray, cold cream, and a heady cloud of Elizabeth Arden perfume that masked the lingering whiff of cigarette smoke, because as far as Janet Carmichael told anyone, she hadn’t touched those filthy things since the Bush administration.
“I’m making potato salad,” she announced, extricating herself from his arms. Patrick realized he had no idea how long he had been clinging on to her. “Your dad is out in the yard grilling up dinner. Oh, he is so good on that thing. What is it about men and fire, you’re all a bunch of cavemen when it comes down to it.”
Patrick followed her into the kitchen, letting his mother’s words wash over him like a white noise machine as she asked him would he mind setting the table, and telling him about what his various cousins were up to, and wasn’t it just wonderful that Melissa was pregnant again, weren’t babies such a blessing, and no, that wasn’t a hint, but when was Patrick going to make her a grandmother? It all came out like a monologue from some kind of domestic drama, requiring no response or input from Patrick other than the occasional nod and hum. This was the way it had always been. Her chatter was a fortress of defense against awkward silence or, even worse, the possibility of having a real conversation. That was how things went in the Carmichael family. Patrick’s father rarely spoke, his mother spoke enough for both of them, and nobody ever actually said anything.
“Frank,” she called out of the open kitchen door into the yard, “unless you want me to serve those steaks in an ashtray, I think it’s safe to bring them inside now. Come say hi to your son.” She turned back to Patrick. “He is so good on that thing.”
A moment later, Patrick’s father entered holding the heralded steaks on a plate.
“Pat.” He nodded in Patrick’s direction, laying the steaks at the center of the table, in pride of place, surrounded by the potato salad, mac and cheese, greens, and rolls his mother had prepared and that had undoubtedly taken more effort than a few slabs of meat on a barbecue.
“Hey, Dad,” he said in return, hardly expecting any more fanfare than that. It wasn’t like he’d been across the Atlantic working for the last few months. Or that he lived on the other side of the country and only made it home for Christmas or the occasional birthday.
“Eat! Eat!” his mother commanded, and they each took a seat. The kitchen was large, airy, and full of light—a real selling point when Patrick had brought them both to view it after signing his ten-year contract with Wonder Studios—but as they sat slicing and chewing in near silence, he couldn’t help but think longingly of a more cramped kitchen table in Birmingham, where everyone talked over one another so badly it was amazing they had time to eat anything.
“This is all really good, Mom,” he said. “The steak’s great, Dad.”
“Lucky we had enough to go around,” his dad said, not looking up from his plate.
“You gave us no notice!” Patrick’s mother tapped his arm playfully.
“Sorry for just dropping in unannounced,” he said.
He waited for one of them to ask why he was here, but all he heard was the light scraping of knives on plates, and then, eventually, dinner was over. His mother got the men each a fresh beer and made herself a cup of coffee, and then they all went and sat in the living room, a whole new space in which to not talk.
“Did I tell you cousin Melissa is having another baby?” she asked.
“Yes, Mom, you told me.”
“Isn’t it wonderful?”
“So wonderful. I’ll have to send her a present.”
“Oh, that would be nice!” She sipped her coffee. “So nice.”
“I’m really happy for her,” said Patrick. “Happy she’s happy.” He paused. “I don’t think I’m happy.”
“For Melissa?”
“No, Mom. I mean. I’m not happy. I thought I was, for a long time. I loved my job.”
“We’re all very proud of you,” his mom said, almost automatically.
“I thought that was enough,” he said, “but it’s not. Work. It’s just…work. You know?”
“Hard work isn’t supposed to be fun,” his dad said. “Not that I’d call your job hard.”
“I know, Dad,” said Patrick, skipping right on past the dig. “But it’s my job, and I enjoy doing it, and I guess I’m just realizing you need more to build a life on.”
His mother looked at him expectantly.
Here goes nothing, he thought. “I was seeing someone. His name was Will.”
Patrick’s mother took another sip of coffee, looking mildly disappointed, and Patrick wondered what it was she had wanted to hear. His dad gave no indication he had heard him at all.
“You’d have liked him.” Patrick said. He paused and laughed. “Actually, you’d probably have hated him. But I liked him. God, I liked him so much. He wasn’t like anyone I’d ever met. I don’t think I’d ever even met a drag queen in person before the night I met him.” He felt the air pressure in the room shift, but he couldn’t stop. “He was so funny and weird, and he danced like the world was ending, and he had such a beautiful singing voice.” Patrick’s throat thickened. “I fucked up,” he said. “I ruined it all.”
“Language, Patrick, please,” his mother sighed.
“I think I loved him, Mom.” His voice cracked, and his eyes began to sting. “I wasn’t sure. I mean, I’ve never been in love before. How can you tell for sure? How did you know, with Dad?”
“You know what,” his mother blurted, jumping up from the couch. “I bought a key lime pie yesterday and forgot all about it!”
“I don’t want dessert, Mom—”
“You boys sit right here, I’ll be back in a jiff.” She vanished back into the kitchen, and Patrick was left alone with his father. The two of them sat in silence, and would have continued to, but Patrick’s sinuses suddenly stung, and a single sob erupted from him with such violence he feared for the commemorative Niagara Falls plates on the wall. He pressed the heels of his hands into his eyes, ineptly trying to stem the coming tears.
“Sorry,” he said, sniffing. “This is embarrassing.”
“What are you doing, son?” his dad asked, looking at him now. “Crying over some fag?”
“Jesus, Dad. You can’t say that.”
His dad shook his head and shrugged. “You know what I mean,” he said. “You’re gay, but you’re still a man about it. Just look at you. This other guy, though. All that…wearing girls’ clothes…I don’t like it. It’s weird. If you wanna be a woman, just be a woman. They can do that now, right? No need to put on a big song and dance and make us all watch.”
“That’s not…He isn’t…” Patrick felt the sting of tears again, but he refused to let them come this time.
“I’m not homophobic or nothing,” his dad continued, as if that were in any way his call to make. “I just don’t understand why everything has to be such a big deal these days. You do you, just don’t do it in my face.”
Any threat of tears was now gone. Patrick felt suddenly still and cool. Water you could drown in.
“I never rubbed anything in your face,” he said curtly.
“I know you didn’t,” his father replied. “That’s what I was just talking about.”
“Maybe I should have a bit more.” Patrick’s jaw clicked. “I knew you loved me, but that you didn’t have any idea how to talk about me being gay, so I kept my love life completely private. The guys I dated, the experiences I had.” His dad grimaced, but Patrick forged on. “The time I was sixteen and I met a guy off the internet, but when I got in his car, he was ten years older than he said he was, and so I jumped out when we stopped at a red light and ran all the way home. I was really freaked out, and I wanted to tell someone what had happened. I wanted to tell you or Mom, but that felt impossible.”
“There’s a lot of pervs out there,” his dad said, taking a swig of beer, avoiding his eye. “That’s for sure.”
“That’s not what I’m saying, Dad.” Patrick clasped his hands together. “Then, when I was eighteen, I was best friends with Mickey Callahan, remember him? We used to make out after football practice. I thought I loved him. I was so sure he loved me back. And then he took Sarah Costello to prom, and my heart was fucking broken, and again, I didn’t say a word. Because no matter how much pain I was in, my top priority was not making you uncomfortable.” He let out a short, flat laugh. “That’s wild, right? You’re my dad. You were always the toughest guy I knew, but I thought you couldn’t handle a simple conversation.
“I wonder why I felt that way,” he continued. “I mean, I could’ve come to you, right?”
His dad said nothing.
My parents are nice people,Patrick told anyone when they asked. What a detestable word that was, “nice.” A free coffee in exchange for a fully stamped loyalty card was nice. A stranger giving you their seat on the bus was nice. Couldn’t he expect more from the people who were supposed to love him? Wasn’t that allowed?
“Because you knew I was gay,” Patrick said to his father. “I came out to you when I was a teenager, and that’s not the kind of thing you forget about your son. Right?”
His dad’s mouth tightened. Never a good sign. The kind of storm warning Patrick had spent his childhood attuned to.
“But,” he said, “it felt like the moment I told you, it was like it never happened. We never talked about it. If I brought it up, Mom would smile and nod and ask zero questions, and you would grit your teeth like you did when I was six and I’d tell you all about my imaginary friend.”
“What did you want us to say?” his dad asked. “You told us you were gay, we were fine with it, end of story. It’s not like we kicked you out or anything.”
“No, you didn’t. Thanks so much for that, by the way.” Patrick shook his head. “Jesus. Will was right. The bar really is in hell.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
Patrick didn’t know how to say it in a way that would make his father understand. How coming out wasn’t something you just did once. That every time he met someone new, every time he took a new job, he had to decide: Am I safe here? Queer people came out every day, or they didn’t, and either way it sucked, but that was just a part of life.
“I guess I just never thought I’d have to keep on coming out to my parents,” he said, “or that it would be too much for them to be remotely interested in what’s going on in my life.”
“Now that’s not fair,” his dad snapped. “You’re making out like your mother and I are monsters. We fed you, we clothed you, we encouraged you with your acting even though there was a next-to-zero chance you were ever going to make a living from it.”
“You told me at eighteen that if I failed out of college, I shouldn’t bother coming home at all.”
“I said no such thing.”
Patrick could have screamed. Laughed. Punched himself in the face. His father appeared to have gotten hold of the same complex contraption Penny Haven had used to tear a hole in space-time and was now living in a parallel universe where the events of his childhood had unfolded in an entirely different manner. Which made sense, he figured. Nobody wanted to cast themselves as the villain of the story.
“I just wish it was easier for me to talk to you guys about things,” he said. “I mean, look at Mom. She legged it the minute I brought up Will.” As if conjured by the mere mention of his name, Patrick heard Will’s voice in his head. Legged it? You’ve gone native, mate.
“Now, I won’t have that in this house,” his father said, standing. “I won’t hear a word said against your mother. How dare you!”
“I’m not talking bad about Mom, I p-promise.” Patrick’s cheeks grew hot, and he felt that awful, familiar shortness of breath. This was how interactions with his dad always devolved. He became that scared, stammering kid again. “I just. I don’t know,” he forced himself to carry on. “I…I…I was hurting, and I just wanted to come home, and I’m realizing now maybe I shouldn’t have.”
“What is that supposed to mean?”
Patrick paused for a moment, to let his father know that the next words out of his mouth weren’t being said in anger. He reminded himself of Mr. Banks’s advice, to know when to breathe and when to speak. Those hours spent in his room pacing and reciting. This above all; to thine own self be true. Polonius had been right about that. Even if he ended up dead.
“It means…It means…”
“What? It means what?” his father asked, that familiar impatience all over his face.
“It means I’m a f-…I’m a fag, Dad,” he said. His father flinched. “And just so you know, I’m the o-o-only person in this room who can use that word.”
“Hey now.” His dad prodded thin air with his finger. “I won’t be told what I can and can’t do in my own house, Patrick. You’re not in LA now!”
“You’re right, I’m not. But I really should be. In fact, I think I’m g-g-g-gonna get going right now.” He stood up and walked toward the front door. “See you at Christmas, Mom!” he yelled down toward the kitchen, then turned back to his father.
Breathe in. Hold. And release.
“Enjoy your house that your fag son paid for,” he said.
When Patrick got into the rental car outside, he turned on the ignition and then almost immediately turned it off, too angry to drive. He flicked on the stereo, dialed the volume all the way up, and screamed into his open palm.
Captain Kismet had, in total, six different origin stories. They all included the same basic ingredients: the test flight, the wormhole, the princess of a far-off planet. But each version differed in key ways. Sometimes Kismet was stoic and stern; other times he fell instantly in love with Sura. She was both a pulpy, anatomically improbable collection of scantily clad curves and a sensibly attired general. The brutality of the conflict varied wildly.
Retcons were a fact of life in comics; stories were rebooted time and time again, the lore of previous tales overwritten and imagined anew. The next time Patrick Lake spoke to either of his parents, all memory of this unpleasant conversation would have been purged. Previously, that thought might have been a comfort; there would be no consequences for speaking to his father so bluntly.
But now, Patrick found himself wishing for consequences. If he could tell the truth and it was never spoken of again, how could it mean anything?
He shouldn’t have come here. He felt so stupid now, wasn’t even sure what he had hoped to find, but knew that it had been a mistake to look for it in his parents.
Patrick dialed Simone as he bore left onto the turnpike. She answered after just one ring.
“Where are you?” she asked.
“On my way to Newark,” he told her. “I’m coming home.”
Simone said she would have her assistant arrange his flight back to Los Angeles and email him the details. He would be in his own bed that night.
He rolled down all of the windows and hit the gas until the sounds of the wind and engine roared in his ears, drowning everything else out.
“I’m a fucking fag!” he yelled at the top of his lungs.
The only response he got was the honk of a horn as he veered into a different lane.