Chapter 23
My phone slips out of my hand, and I hurry to pick it up.
“Dad? It’s really you?”
“You alone, kid?”
“Yeah. I’m in my room.”
“You can’t tell anyone I called. You understand?”
“Yeah. Dad, what’s going on? Where are you?”
“I’m on the road. Not sure where I’ll end up.”
“Brock said you were in rehab, but he wouldn’t tell me where.”
“It was out by Palm Springs. I spent a few weeks there, then got tired of it.”
Which is another way of saying he’s drinking again, and probably doing drugs.
“So you’re not in LA?” I ask. “What about your apartment?”
“It’s gone. I’m not going back there.”
“You could live here. In La Jolla. We could get a small apartment. I’ll get a job to help pay rent.”
“Sorry, kid, but it’s not going to happen. You need to stay where you’re at.”
“Why? I hate it here. Dad, please, let me stay with you. I don’t even know these people. Brock. Braden. Trystan. They’re not even family. Why are you making me stay here when I could be with you?”
“What do you mean they’re not family?”
I hesitate, then decide to just tell him. “I know you were adopted.”
“Who told you?”
“Braden. He overhead Brock talking on the phone.”
“To who? Who was he telling this to?”
“I don’t know. It doesn’t matter. What matters is that Brock and his kids aren’t my family. I’ve never even met them before I moved here, so why are you making me stay with them?”
“It’s where you need to be. It’s what’s right.”
“I need to be with my dad.”
“Kid, you know I’ve never really been a father to you. I took you to the park a few times. Sent you birthday cards when I’d remember. Sent you a gift every Christmas. That’s not a father. That’s just a man who came in and out of your life. You would’ve been better off without me.”
“But you’re all I have left. With Mom gone, you’re all I have left for family.”
“Brock is your family. And those boys of his.”
“They’re not my family! You are!” I pause to calm down because I’m getting really angry and frustrated with him.
“I know you don’t want this, but it’s the right thing to do. Brock will take care of you. Give you whatever you need. Make sure you have a good life.”
“Good life? Are you saying this is it? You’re cutting me out of your life?”
“This isn’t a life. I’m just trying to survive.”
“I don’t understand. Are you drinking again? Doing drugs?”
He sighs. “Don’t ask me that.”
“You are, aren’t you? You’re on something right now.
That’s why you’re acting like you don’t care.
Your emotions are numbed from the drugs.
I get it, Dad, but this isn’t you. Just wait until you come down from it.
You’ll realize I need to be with you, not Brock.
I’m going to talk to Brock tomorrow and tell him I’m leaving.
I don’t care what’s going on with you, Dad.
If you’re drunk, high, whatever, I’ll help you.
I’ll help you get off that stuff, and I’ll get a job so I can get us an apartment. I’ll—”
“Listen to me,” he says in an urgent tone. “I need you to stop this right now. You’re staying with Brock. You hear me?”
“That doesn’t make sense. Why would I stay here with strangers when I could be with my dad?”
“Kid, I wish I could explain, but I can’t. I shouldn’t have even called, but I knew if I didn’t you’d keep looking for me.”
“Did you try to call me before tonight?”
“I did, but the connection was bad. I was hiding out in the desert.”
“Hiding? From what?”
“Not hiding,” he rushes to say. “Staying. I was staying at a motel in the desert.”
But he meant hiding. He wouldn’t have said it if he didn’t mean it. What is he hiding from? Does he owe someone money? Drug dealers?
“Dad, are you in trouble? Is that why you don’t want me staying with you?”
“You gotta let this go, kid. You live in a mansion, go to a fancy school, and can have whatever you want. Why isn’t that enough?”
“I don’t care about that stuff. I want to be with my family. I want to be with you.”
“It’s not going to happen. I’m taking off. Getting out of here. Going someplace where I can lie low. Stay out of trouble.”
Tears stream down my face. “You don’t want me, do you? You never did.”
“Kid, if you knew my past, if you knew what I’ve done, you wouldn’t want to be with me.”
“What do you mean? The drinking? The drugs? I don’t care about that. At least you didn’t kill someone.”
“Kill someone?” he says. “What are you talking about?”
“Brock’s second wife? Falling down the stairs?
You really believe that? And what about that girl?
Andrea. She fell too. You don’t think it’s a little odd that both Brock and Braden were with women who died by falling?
The cops think Braden might’ve killed Andrea.
What if he did? And what if Brock killed his wife? ”
He doesn’t respond, but I hear him breathing hard on the phone.
“Dad, did you hear me? I’m living with two possible killers. I’d take you any day over them.”
“Last call for El Centro,” a voice says in the background.
“What was that?” I say. “Are you at a bus station? Where are you going?”
“Goddammit, kid! Stop looking for me! I’m sorry about your mom but I can’t take her place. You barely even know me. With Brock, you got everything a kid could ask for. Just enjoy it and live your damn life and leave me the hell out of it.”
I’m crying now, feeling like I’ve just lost another parent. Why is he being like this? He’s never talked to me this way. Even when he was drunk, he was never this mean. And he doesn’t sound drunk at all right now.
“Don’t start crying on me.” He blows out a breath. “This isn’t about you. There’s shit you don’t know and never will. It’s how it has to be.”
“Last boarding call,” the voice in the background says over a speaker.
“Could we at least meet?” I ask, sniffling. “One last time?”
“I’m already gone and I’m not coming back. I never belonged there. Never wanted to be an actor. That was Brock’s thing.”
“Then why’d you do it?”
He huffs. “You ever try to say no to my brother? The guy could convince anyone to do anything. When we were kids, I looked up to him. Wanted to be him. So I did whatever he did. Did whatever he told me to. The only time I didn’t is when I went into theater while he was going into TV.
He told me theater didn’t pay enough, but I wasn’t doing it for the money. ”
“Why’d you do it?”
“For the people. I made a lot of friends in the theater. I liked New York. I didn’t want to leave.”
“But you did.” I pause. “Because you didn’t want to raise a kid.”
“It wasn’t about that. I left because Brock told me I’d make millions living in LA, working in TV.
It worked for him, but not for me. And I hated it.
I hated the fake people and my agent always lying to me.
My manager taking all my money. Drugs were being handed out like candy.
Brock could say no, but I couldn’t, and he knew that.
He knew I had an addictive personality.”
“You blame Brock for your addictions?”
“I blame my brother for a lot of things, but it needs to stop. That’s why I need to go. I’m done living Brock’s life. It’s time to live my own.”
“Living Brock’s life? I don’t understand. Your life is nothing like Brock’s.”
“Yeah.” He lets out a humorless laugh. “It sure isn’t.”
“Dad, would you please just let me see you one last time?”
“No. And this is our last phone call. Don’t try calling me back. I’m ditching this phone after tonight. I won’t have this number anymore.”
I wipe the tears from my face. “Why are you doing this? I don’t understand. Please. Tell me why.”
The phone goes silent, and I panic, thinking he hung up. I check my phone and see his name is still on the screen.
“If I tell you this,” he says in a low voice, “you need to promise me you’ll leave me alone.”
I nod. “Yeah. Okay.”
“You also need to promise me this stays between us. Can you do that?”
“Yes.” I sniffle. “What is it?”
“When I say I was never a father to you, it’s not just because I wasn’t around. It’s because I wasn’t. I’m not.”
“Not what?”
“I’m not your father, Rumor. I just pretended to be.”
I grip the phone. “Then who is?”
“The man you’re living with.” He pauses. “Brock is your father.”