Page 113 of Puck the Coach's Son
Cold outside. Dry cold, clear sky, the first real evening air of the season. My breath goes white under the streetlight and I watch it for a second like it's a stranger's. My car is parked a block down. I walk fast. I don't run, because running in this town gets you noticed, and the last thing I need is a bar regular remembering the night Maddox Creed tore out of the Boiler like a man on fire.
I unlock the car. Slide in. Hands on the wheel. They're fine now. They're fine because I have something to hold. I flex them once on the leather and they obey. Good. That's what I need tonight. Hands that obey.
I pull out of the space. Merge. Don't speed. I want to speed. I don't speed. If I get pulled over, I don't get to him. I drive like a person who wants to arrive.
Me: on my way. 8 min.
Theo: ok
Me: are you safe right now
Theo: yeah. outside. alone.
Me: did he hit you
Long pause.
Theo: no. he said other stuff.
Me: okay. hang on.
I drive. Stoplight. Drive. Stoplight. The part of my brain that has always known what to do in a fight is online now. Clear. Calm. No adrenaline. Adrenaline is for the first twenty seconds and then it's gone and the guy who can still think is the guy who walks out. I am the guy who walks out. I have always been the guy who walks out. Tonight, I am going to be the guy who walks out with Theo.
There's a version of tonight where I don't drive to him. Where I text back,can't right now,and finish the beer, and sit in that booth with Phoenix, and in two weeks I don't remember his face. That's the version of me that existed mere weeks ago. That version is gone. I killed him somewhere between Theo's first kneel in the shower and this afternoon in the clearing, and I don't miss him, which is the part that should scare me and doesn't.
Phoenix's voice is still in my head.You gotta ask him. What does he want?I'll ask. Tonight. After I get him somewhere warm and listen to what Paul said. I'll ask him.
I think about Paul. I try not to. I fail. I picture his face. He does the thing where he makes his mouth small when he's holding something in. I picture him with that face turned on Theo. Inside Theo's house. With nowhere for Theo to go. I grip the wheel and tell myself, not now. Not in the car. If I get there angry, I'll help nothing.
Me: 4 min
Theo: im sitting on the bench
Theo: i can see the lot
Me: okay
Me: im coming
The reservoir turn comes up. I take it clean. Gravel lot. Two other cars, both empty. Trail people, gone home. I pull in and kill the engine and I can see him from the car. Hoodie. Hood up. Hunched. Both hands wrapped around his phone like it's the only warm thing he has.
I get out. I shut the door quiet. I don't want to startle him. He hears anyway. He turns his head.
His face is wrecked. Eyes red. Lip split fresh, not a hit, the kind you get from biting down on it for an hour trying not to cry in front of someone. Cheeks wet. He sees me and something in his face breaks open and closes again in the same second, which is Theo—the boy who was taught to put his feelings away the moment someone else is in the room.
I walk over. I don't jog. I don't sprint. I walk, because if I sprint he'll think something is wrong that isn't. He needs to see me arriving calm. He needs to see me arriving like I knew I was going to arrive.
I stop in front of the bench. He looks up at me.
“Hi,” he says. It comes out small.
“Hi, sweetheart.” I sit down next to him. I don't touch him yet. I put my arm along the back of the bench behind his shoulders and wait. “Tell me.”
He doesn't, not yet. He leans. He puts his head on my shoulder and he shakes, just once, a full-body shake like a dog coming out of water, and then he's still.
I drop my arm down around him. Pull him in.
“Take your time,” I say.
