Father Figure

by Kichuku Neko, TogaQ

  Father Figure

  by

  Guilt | Pleasure

  Written By: Kichiku Neko

  Art By: Toga Q

  Editor: Mycean

  ISBN-13:978-1-62548-011-8

  © Guilt|Pleasure 2011

  www.guiltpleasure.com

  SUPERIORZ.ORG

  CHAPTER 1

  It started with a letter.

  I wrote him a letter on the Almalfi paper I had purchased years ago in Florence – the laser printer inked neatly inside the embossed ivy border. I wrote only a paragraph, but I read it over and over again, several times out loud to hear the ridiculousness of it. It was ridiculous, but it was also sincere. He would have to appreciate the truth for what it was.

  I folded the letter and slipped it into the envelope of the same paper, decorated with two ivy leaves in each of the four corners. I wrote the first letter of his name in the center in red ink.

  U.

  I stroked it with my gloved finger, smudging the ink.

  I was not there when he read it, but I knew he had. Although it was only October and the temperature rarely dipped below the seventies, he’d begun wearing his long black winter coat. His attempt to conceal himself from the world was pointless, but I found his modesty endearing.

  I let him be for two weeks, and gradually his fears ebbed and he returned the coat to his closet. He had become more cautious though. He’d stopped picking up his landline, allowing the answering machine to pick up his calls and returning them on his cell phone.

  I sent him another letter. Same stationery. The words were different —merely advice:

  Don’t talk to strangers.

  Although it was short, he was visibly shaken by it. His hand shook as he opened and read it by the mailbox slots of our apartment complex. I stood by a nearby counter, pretending to sort through my own mail. I savored the sensation that coursed through me as I watched him.

  Unexpectedly, he crumpled the paper in his hand and glanced around the lobby. He saw me, studied me for a moment, then walked toward the trash receptacle.

  “Something wrong, sir?”

  He froze mid-step and looked at me, uncertainty clear on his already worried face. “What?”

  “You look upset.”

  He shrugged. “It’s nothing,” he said and tossed the crumpled letter into the trash. He watched the flap of the lid swing back and forth until it slowed to a stop.

  “Nothing at all,” he said softly.

  “You sure?” I asked, giving him a concerned look I had perfected from work. “I am experienced in picking up these things.”

  His eyebrows furrowed. “What things?” He was suddenly cautious and took a step back from me. “No worries, sir,” I said, as I fished my wallet from my pocket. The look of concern lingered on his face even as he caught a glimpse of my badge clipped inside. I took out one of my business cards and gave it to him. “I can just sense it when people are bothered by...ot so trivial things.”

  He stared at the badge for as long as I kept it in view. He finally looked up when I closed my wallet. “I see,” he said. He didn’t sound any more relaxed.

  “Is there something I can help you with?”

  He chewed on his lower lip and shook his head.

  “It’s nothing,” he said. “Thank you for your concern.” He looked at the card I gave him.

  “I live in the rear building,” I said, gesturing. “Just give me a call if you need something.”

  He nodded, never lowering his defenses. He put the card in his pocket and held out his hand. “I’m being rude,” he said. “I never introduced myself. My name’s Uriel.”

  He didn’t offer me his last name. I took his hand and shook it.

  “Very unusual name,” I commented. “One of the archangels.”

  He smiled. It was the kind of smile that didn’t mean anything except maybe that he was tired of people making that obvious remark whenever he offered his name.

  “Thank you for being concerned,” he said. “If you will pardon me...”

  I could still feel the warmth of his hand in mine, even after he had ascended the stairs and turned the corner toward the elevator. I gathered my mail and papers from the counter and tucked them under my arm. Before I left the lobby, I retrieved the crumpled letter from the trash and took it with me.

  For most of my life I hadn’t known of his existence. I learned of it from one of the papers Mother had put away in a yellow-and-green box, a box she used to archive yellowed photos of people I didn’t know and of whom she never spoke. That same box had the copy of her car title and deed to the small townhouse she owned, the same one she had passed away in one night in her sleep; succumbing to throat cancer. In that box was a copy of my birth certificate, containing the name of someone Mother had never mentioned.

  Uriel Blackstone.

  By the time of this discovery, I had been in the police force for over four years. I had ample knowledge and means to find this person. The sole biological connection left in the isolated life Mother had given to me. Even at twenty-three, I was excited to have a father again. I used any and all means to find him — uncaring of my own fea r of his possible rejection or his possible anger at the unexpected life intrusion of a son he may not have known he had.

  After eight months, I found him. He had moved to a suburb in a different state. I took leave from my job to find him, to see what kind of person he was, what he looked like – to perhaps find out why Mother had never spoken of him all these years, although she had kept his name as my father on my birth certificate.

  His name was unusual, so he was easy to find. He worked at a small firm that dealt with investments. He wore expensive suits and sported an expensive haircut. He looked prim and unlike his age. There was a silver band on his ring finger, but I knew he was no longer married; I’d found and read the report of his wife perishing in a car accident, the same accident that left a visible scar over his left temple. They had a son just two years younger than me, who had survived the accident.

  I watched him for three days, following him to study his routine. He didn’t have unusual habits: he went to work, took lunch breaks with his colleagues at a local eatery they walked to, then went home in a late model Lexus; he lived in a small gated community called Golden Falls Estates.

  I resigned from my post after I came back from leave and asked to be transferred. I wanted to be close to my father. Of course, I could not tell my supervisors that. His existence mattered only to me. No one else needed to know.

  Before that year ended, I was a new officer in the very town Father lived in and was a new resident of the Golden Falls Estates. I insisted on a particular apartment that was across a small courtyard from Father’s building. I could see his living room through my bedroom window. I was happy. I got up early each day to see him prepare for work, walk out of his apartment and slip into his black sedan. Soon after he left each day, I would be ready to go to work myself, filled with thoughts of him.

  I hadn’t planned on writing to him until a Friday I didn’t see him return. Then on that Saturday afternoon, he came home. There was a woman with him. I was enraged. My anger continued to flare as I watched him walk the woman up the stairs to his apartment. From my window, I could only catch scant glimpses of them passing through the living room. I came to a decision about what to do when the woman stayed through Sunday. Father had to be warned about the dangers that came in the company of strangers.

  But first, I needed to be sure. Although I was quite certain he was my father, I needed to be absolutely sure.

  I knocked on his door one Saturday morning. He had just woken, I could tell by the rumpled look he had with his tousled hair and wrinkled t-shirt he had slept in. He must have pulled on a pair of denims when I k
nocked on his door.

  “Yes?” he said, his sleepy face trying to pull up a smile when he recognized me. He leaned against the door that he held ajar.

  “Somehow, I got your mail,” I said, as I proffered an envelope. It was something I had written myself that morning, same as the letters I had sent him before. He looked at it without taking it. He knew what it was.

  “Please throw it away,” he said. “I’m sorry you came all the way up for it.” I frowned. “You know what this is?” I asked.

  He let out a sigh and ran his fingers through his hair. “Someone’s been harassing me for some time,” he said finally. “I am not sure why or who it is.”

  I nodded. “I would like to help you,” I offered, tapping the envelope against the palm of my hand. “Can we talk?”

  He looked uncertain, uncomfortable. “You can trust me, right?” I said.

  He gave me a forced smile.

  “Of course, come on in Officer,” he said, stepping to the side and letting the door open wider for me to enter. “Let me make us some coffee and we can talk.”

  While he was in the kitchen turning on his coffee maker, I studied his living room. He had a few pictures on display – all four of them framed in similar straight-edge silver frames. One had a woman posing in soft lighting, smiling happily with a bundle of flowers on her lap. Another had a young man in Marine dress blues – he looked like him. Yet another picture had the three of them set in a faux-sky background – taken at a studio. The boy was young, perhaps ten when the picture was taken. The woman was also younger, but positively the same person as in the other frame. Father, standing behind both of them – looked almost the same as he did now. The fourth picture was of him receiving a framed certificate from someone I didn’t know, but the presenter looked important.

  “It’ll be a few minutes,” he said, emerging from the kitchen. “Can you excuse me for a bit also? I’ll change into something less embarrassing.”

  I nodded and he padded past me, going into his bedroom. I went into the kitchen and looked at the percolating coffee. The drip was slow although the entire apartment was already aromatic with the rich, nutty scent. I pulled from my pocket a small vial of Rohypnol that I had taken from the evidence room. I emptied it into the pot that was collecting the brewed coffee.

  I returned to the living room and looked out the window. I could see hints of my bedroom from the half-open vertical blinds. I stood there and watched my own apartment until he came back, wearing a button-down white cotton shirt that’d been tucked into his jeans. He had taken time to brush his hair – taming the unruly locks that had been sticking up. He looked more awake, fresh and alert. He asked me to take a seat while he went into the kitchen to fetch the coffee.

  He came back with two mugs; the logo of the company he worked for printed on them. He shifted two round cork coasters that were on the glass cocktail table and set the mugs on them. He took a seat to the left of me and pulled one mug toward himself. He gestured to mine. I slid that one closer to me.

  “I read the letter,” I said, patting my pocket where I had folded and stuffed the envelope.

  He picked up his mug and held it in his hands. He leaned back in his seat and just stared at the coffee. “I don’t understand why anyone would bother me,” he said. “I don’t have any enemies that I know of...”

  I picked up my cup and just held it, letting it warm the palms of my hands.

  “What about your wife?” I suggested and nodded at the wedding band he still wore. His warm smile didn’t fade even as he shook his head.

  “She’s no longer with me. She passed years ago.”

  I gave him a sympathetic look as I said an apology. “What about the people you’ve dated?” I asked.

  He took a sip of the coffee and shrugged.

  “No one comes to mind,” he said. “No angry exes that I am aware of.” “Why didn’t you report this?”

  His fingers strummed the side of the mug, appearing to think about his answer carefully. “There’s nothing specifically threatening in the letters,” he said. “The police can’t do very much with it.”

  I nodded. “I am actually new in the area. I moved here from California a few months ago.” He drank his coffee, listening attentively.

  “I am not certain what you expected from the police here, but I can assure you that I care, Uriel. If it’s enough to concern you, then it’s an issue.”

  His face lit up and he smiled – he looked absolutely handsome when he did. The culmination of his charm and sense of self all came to the surface in that one moment when he looked genuinely happy. It made me happy also, but sad. This man had been missing from my life for twenty-three years. I looked over to the framed photos that were arranged on his shelf. I felt for the first time utter hatred for his deceased wife and his son. They had taken my father from me.

  “Are you all right?” he asked, breaking me out of my angry contemplation. His smile softened but it remained.

  “Yes,” I said, forcing myself to return his wonderful smile. “I was a little distracted.”

  He followed my look to the pictures and glanced back at me. He stuck out his ring finger where a silver band remained and regarded it.

  “She died three years ago and I still can’t find it in myself to take the ring off or put away her picture,” he said. “Hard for an old dog like me to move on.”

  “She sounds like the love of your life. Very hard to give up someone you love so much, even after they’re gone.”

  He nodded and sipped his coffee; perhaps to buy himself time to form his next thought.

  “Makes it difficult to date when I won’t take down reminisces of my past life,” he said, laughing. “Women are kind of picky like that.”

  I agreed with him and held my coffee cup up to my mouth. I tipped the cup back only enough for the hot liquid to wash against my upper lip.

  “It was hard,” he continued, glancing over his shoulder to look at the pictures. “But I am glad I had Phillip. I was so devastated that I couldn’t even will myself to get out of bed for weeks. Wasting my life then, just wishing I’d die in my sleep. The kid had so much strength in him... pulled my sorry ass out of the rut until I learned how to survive on my own without her.”

  “He is in the Marines?”

  He sighed. “Yes. Dropped out of college and enlisted. He’s somewhere in Germany now.”

  He drank more of the coffee and placed the mug back onto the coaster, half empty. “I’m sorry,” he said sheepishly. “I’ve just been talking uninteresting nonsense.”

  “Not at all,” I said and looked at my watch. Only ten minutes had elapsed. I would need to buy more time. “Will you tell me everything you can recall about the letters? And can you recall any conflict...even very minor, that you may have had with neighbors? Or from work?”

  He picked up his mug again. “There’s not very much.”

  “Well, I would know what may be important,” I said. “Trust me.”

  It took forty minutes and two cups of coffee for him to drift off into a drug-induced sleep. He had fought the “headache” that came over him half an hour in and had wanted to excuse himself. I persisted, staying with him until the drug finally made him unconscious.

  For nearly twenty minutes I sat staring at him – studying his slumped form, his arms splayed. His head was rolled to the side, resting against the cushion. With his eyes closed and his dark lashes fanned out, he looked young, unguarded. As I watched him, I wondered which of his features I’d inherited. I didn’t think I looked like him.

  I got up and walked through his apartment, exploring the rest of his place as carefully as I could. I wanted to learn who he was. I went into his bedroom first.

  His bedroom had a particularly masculine scent – perhaps collected from the cologne and aftershave he used. It smelled nice. His bed wasn’t made, but aside from that, the room was immaculate. All of his clothing was hung up neatly and the furniture free of dust. Even his belts were hung up – the buck
les threaded through the neck of a hanger in his closet.

  The small bathroom that was connected to the bedroom was clean with very few toiletries on the countertop. He was a minimalist; didn’t like clutter. I smiled to myself, happy to know we had fastidiousness in common.

  He had a spare guest room where he maintained a small desk and a twin bed, its sheets and blankets made up, waiting to be slept in. His briefcase lay next to a closed laptop on the desk. The only decoration in the room was a framed oil painting of an antique kettle with the word “TEA” written below it.

  I came back out to the living room. He was as I had left him. I picked him up this time and took him to his bedroom. I lay him beneath the sheets, nestling him into the unmade bed. I ran my fingers through his hair; it was soft. There was a kind of excitement that went through me then that felt sexual. This man was my father. He used to belong to someone else and now he belonged to me.