Chapter 5 #3
Seth’s tone softened. “Do you think he knew you were gay?”
“Suspected, yeah.” I pulled my knees up to my chest and hugged them, glad my back was to Seth and the room was dark.
Some things were easier to say in the dark.
“He hated gay men. There’s one bar in the town where I lived, Max’s, where the gay guys often go.
Dad and my uncle Hal used to drive out there sometimes, and I think they beat some guys up.
” I remembered Dad washing blood off his undamaged knuckles in the kitchen sink, back before I understood why.
“When I was twelve, the town elected a new sheriff, and Dad was super pissed. He and Hal bitched about how they’d have to be more careful, how Sheriff Breyer would make them coddle the queers. ”
“I’m sorry.”
“Yeah, well, I’m a long way gone now, right? What about your folks? Did they march in parades and join PFLAG?” I regretted the bitchy tone before the words were out of my mouth but I couldn’t take them back.
“It was just me and my mom,” Seth said steadily. “Never knew my dad. Mom would’ve probably been fine with me, but she died when I was twenty, and still figuring myself out. So I never got the chance to tell her.”
That made it my turn to say, “Sorry.”
“I had a good childhood. No call to be sorry.”
“That you lost her.” I liked to think Mom was alive somewhere, happy and free, maybe married to that guy, and that he was good to her. If that wasn’t true, I didn’t want to know.
“Ah. Thanks. Aortic aneurism. She just… died.” Seth shifted around on the bed behind me, like his body was more upset than his voice. “I had a job by then, independent and out of the house. Sounds like you were working too. How did you end up so broke?”
“A seventeen-year-old can’t have a bank account without an adult cosigner. My pay went into that account. I had a debit card, no credit. The day I turned eighteen, it was all gone.”
Seth grunted like someone punched him in the gut. “Your dad? What did he do?”
“He’d pulled every cent out of that account the day before. Reported my card stolen. I had a few bucks in cash, but not much. Who uses cash these days? Even a little town like Dover’s Ridge runs on plastic.”
“He left you with nothing?” Seth’s voice held a hint of a growl.
“He said I owed him for eighteen years of room and board. He looked at me over the breakfast table, warned me not to use the card or I’d get picked up. Told me if I wanted to survive, I had to keep doing as I was told. There was this look in his eyes.” My throat tightened. “Fuck.”
Seth softened his tone. “You don’t have to tell me.”
“I want to.” Somehow, that last time I saw Dad didn’t feel like it could be real. Maybe talking about it would help. “I asked him why he took my money. Those were my wages, over a year of work at a real man’s job. He said, ‘Yeah, but ranching didn’t make a real man out of you, did it?’”
“Shit,” Seth whispered.
“Dad told me I was going to apply to a Basic Academy Training program, and he’d dole out my money when I needed it.
Peace Officer training would fix me up. Hah, what a laugh, calling someone like him a peace officer.
” I dragged in a sharp breath. “I told him no. I don’t think I’d ever said a flat no to Dad before.
I said I had no interest in becoming a deputy and I was going back to the ranch.
He said, ‘No, you’re not. You’ll do as you’re told.
’ I said I was eighteen now. He didn’t own me. ”
“Brave of you.”
“I was shaking. I don’t know where the nerve came from.
I think I knew I had to do it then, get away from him before it was too late.
He jumped up, started yelling at me, foul shit about how I was probably letting this gay ranch hand fuck me up the ass and he was going to beat the queer out of me.
He picked up his chair and swung at me. Could’ve cracked my skull if he’d connected. I ran.”
“Good thing you were able to get to your truck.”
I laughed damply. “No, I didn’t own a truck.
Dad let me drive his car to work. He had the cruiser.
I ran on foot, but Dad wasn’t in as good shape as me.
I competed track in school because it was the only sport I was good at.
He gave up pretty quick, probably figured I couldn’t get out of town with no car and no money. So then…” I paused.
“You don’t have to tell me what you did. Whatever it was, you survived and got away. That’s what counts.”
“Nothing bad. I would’ve, if I’d had to.
I told this gay cowboy I worked with, Joe, that I’d go down to Max’s bar and suck dicks for money to buy a bus ticket, but he gave me his truck instead.
Said I’d be better off with something of my own.
Sold it to me for a dollar, paid for a tank of gas and some money besides, and wished me luck. ”
I should’ve listened when Joe’d said not to run to San Francisco, but tonight, even broke and still hungry, I couldn’t regret my choices. Here in the dark, warm in Seth’s bed, with a man like Seth listening to me, was the safest I’d ever felt.
“Gave you a truck? Were you, uh, together?”
“No, Joe wasn’t interested in me that way.” Sadly. “But he knew and hated my dad, and he was kind of my mentor. He helped me escape.”
I think I like this Joe guy,” Seth muttered.
“Yeah, he’s the best. I hope my dad didn’t find out and give him a hard time.” I sighed, exhaustion seeping into me. “I left my phone behind. Dad had a tracking app on it anyway. Maybe one day, I’ll… I’ll tell Joe what that old truck meant.”
“You do that.”
My body wanted to melt into the mattress, sink deep to the center of the earth. I felt heavy as lead, but my muscles twitched and trembled.
I jumped when Seth’s hand landed on my shoulder. He said nothing, just rubbed my back through my flannel shirt in small, firm circles. Slowly, my twitches and shudders eased. I fell asleep between one shaky breath and the next.