Taking Lead

by Dallas Redford

  “Fuck off, Tyson.”

  “Who the fuck do you think I am? I’ve been nothing but good to you. Trying to take care of you. We’re new to this city. You’re my closest friend. I’m still learning fundamental shit about you? Don’t you think your friends and family deserve your honesty?”

  He drives his palms into his eyes, shaking his head as he walks away from me.

  I feel glued in place as he dresses. The world is as still as a glacier between us. I’m livid. Brokenhearted. Embarrassed.

  My hands are twitching at my side. I’m still ready to fight but I don’t know what the battle is right now.

  One thing crystalizes by the time he’s fully clothed and pushing past me toward the door. “Can you lock up?” he asks me.

  But, I know that I can’t do this. This is the end of all of this. “No, you do it,” I say, handing my key to the clubhouse over to him for good. “I’m sorry.”

  30

  Chapter 30

  That night, Bryson comes to sit in my bar. And even though I feel like the loneliest boy in the world right now, the last thing I want to do is talk to him. I pour his scotch and tell my boss that I need to take a break. There’s rent and the fact that I probably need to move back to Fairview. Rebecca’s gone. Davis doesn’t want me. Well, he wants me but he’s not going to do anything about it. It’s all such a mess.

  In the employee room, I can’t relax. Oddly, the only thing I want is to hear Davis’ voice. Even with things being as they are, I just need to hear him.

  As the phone rings, I send up prayers to Baby Jesus that he’ll pick up. Hopefully, he’ll pick up.

  He doesn’t pick up.

  I look at the time. It’s around six but, then again, I’m not altogether sure what time it was when he left this morning, so I don’t know when he got back to Fairview. What he had planned or how his day went. Nothing.

  When the phone rings in my hand, I think it’s him calling me back until I realize it’s my dad.

  “Hey, Dad.”

  “Hey,” he says. “What’s going on?”

  “Not much. On my break at work. Shitty day.”

  “Yeah? What’s going on up there? Do I need to come bust some heads?”

  I smile, feeling a smidge better. “Nah. It’s just work crap. Plus, I’m looking for a roommate. But, it’s cool.” I pause and press my ear closer to the phone. “What’s that weird beeping?”

  “Uh…just the monitor,” he pauses. “You know your room is still available if you need to head home for a—”

  “What monitor?”

  “Oh, your mom. She had a touch of pneumonia. It’s fine now. They got her on antibiotics and lots of fluids. Everything’s okay, though.”

  “Pneumonia? You’re in the hospital?” Anxiety blooms in my chest.

  “Calm down, son. Everything’s fine.”

  “Dad, Mom’s in the hospital. Why didn’t you tell me? I would have come up there.”

  “There’s nothing you could have done. And you got so much going on there. It’s fine, Chris. She’s fine. I’ll tell her you called when she wakes up. She’ll be pleased.”

  I take a deep breath and sit down, shaking. I feel so powerless. “Dad, if’s Mom’s in the hospital, you have to tell me. I could at least drive you back and forth or help out with work or something…”

  “Davis drove back to help out. He just brought us some dinner. This hospital food is shit. He’s going to walk Misty and everything. Everything is fine here. I gotta go, though. Doc’s here. I’ll tell Mom you called.”

  He hangs up and I’m angry. On top of everything else that’s going on, I’m angry at my mom and my dad for pretending like I no longer exist. Like I don’t have time for them. Who wouldn’t think to tell their kid something like this was happening?

  In reality, I can’t be angry with no one but myself. I’m angry at myself for running to Chicago, this stupid big city where no one knows me or cares about me. I have no fucking friends, no girlfriend. The rent’s too expensive and I just lost one of my jobs, the one that I really wanted, the only one where I could make something of myself. Because of something I couldn’t control. And, on top of it all, Davis—

  Davis drove back to help out.

  Davis knew my mother was sick before he left, and he didn’t say a word.

  That makes me angry all over again.

  I scroll to his number and hit redial.

  When his voice breaks across the line it’s so delightfully husky and deep that I almost lose the courage of my conviction. Because I now know what that voice can mean when he talks like that. I’ve inhaled the words that fell from his mouth when he spoke in this tone. “I was just about to call you back, mister.” There’s a hint of something naughty in his tone.

  “Oh, you were, were you?”

  “Yeah. I was trying to get some shuteye and a certain sexy guy made an appearance and now I’ve got a bit of a situation,” he murmurs.

  My blood heats. Not exactly in a good way. I’m mad at him. Mad at the world. Still, the idea of him lying there with a big fat erection starts some sort of reciprocal reaction in me. He doesn’t get to get off that easy, though.

  “You should have told me my mom was in the hospital,” I say.

  He’s silent so long that I pull the phone away and glance at it. Yep. Still connected. “Davis?”

  Now, his voice is clear, and it has an edge. “Wasn’t for me to tell.”

  It’s enough to set me off. “Davis! You were with me all day yesterday in bed, right next to me and—Wait. When did you find out?”

  “I don’t know. Sometime during midday. But, look: you need to talk to your parents. They told me they didn’t want to worry you. If someone tells me not to share something, then I’m not going to. Besides, your mom is already feeling better. I was there not too long ago dropping off lunch.”

  “I know.”

  “So, what’s the big deal? You should be happy your mom is recovering from being sick. You’re not being very mature about this.”

  I yell, “I’m just so fucking tired of everyone treating me like a child!”

  I hear Davis chuckle on the other end.

  I say, “Guess I’m only mature when you want someone to fuck you, huh?”

  Davis lets out a snort. Then, the line falls quiet.

  “…and this is why it could have never worked, Chris.”

  “This is why it never would have worked?”

  “Someone who was grown up, an actual man, he would have more than beer and fucking salami in his fridge. A man would never make a woman feel like such shit that she has to leave in the middle of the night and take everything including the fucking curtains. A man owns up to his errors. He’s responsible to those around him. Takes care of his family. A man is grateful for his parents, calls and checks up on his mother and father. He respects his friends and treats them well.

  “A man doesn’t run away from his life when shit gets hard and set up a new life in a new town—a life that isn’t real. A man accepts limitations. A man doesn’t push and push trying to force his way into situations, into people’s lives. He understands we can’t always get what we want in life. Real men are real. Real men take the cards that were dealt to them. Real men give it their all and when that’s not enough, they take the loss.”

  I can’t speak. I just sit there, his words piercing me.

  He’s throwing Rebecca at me.

  Jordan, too.

  Even what went down with him is wrong and it’s my fault.

  What’s happening with my parents is my fault.

  “Fuck you, Davis,” I manage to control the wobble in my voice. I’m shaking with rage. “Fuck you. My life here is real. I am a real man. And exactly what does a real man have to say about getting fucked by his friend’s son and acting like it never happened? Leading him on and then breaking his heart? Where’s your real man speech on that? I bet you don’t have shit to say, huh?”

  He lets out a long shaky sigh.

 
“Chris, a real man would say that was a mistake he’s wishing he never, ever made.”

  31

  Chapter 31

  The road is completely empty heading out of Chicago. One of the good things about having older friends is that they can do favors for you, like rent cars. Tyson didn’t hesitate when I asked him to rent a car for me. I could tell that he was still mad at me, but he lent me a car out of the few his family has if I promised not to crash it. I tried to apologize to him about yelling at him and quitting but he wouldn’t have it. “Fuck it, dude. It’s cool.”

  It wasn’t cool, I could tell from his voice. But we’d said what we needed to say, and he was already moving on. I wanted to cry as I pulled away from his place. He really did know me better than I gave him credit for. I didn’t deserve a friend like him. Especially if I didn’t even have to grovel to get a second chance. He genuinely loved me enough to just offer it.

  I knew more than ever that I didn’t want to quit Basketball Boy’s Club. I had no idea what I would do once I got back to Chicago. And yes, I kept telling myself, I was going to go back.

  For a while, I ride along Lake Shore Drive and the sun pushes through my window, golden and soft. I recall the drive with Davis along LSD and how it felt like the world was opening up to me in a way that it never had before. I push him out of my mind along with his tirade about my needing to grow up. It was finally finished with him. That thing that we’d started three years ago had an end.

  The only thing that remained was the fact that my mother is ill, and my parents thought I was too busy to tell me. Or worse, they think I’m unconcerned.

  Davis is right about at least one thing, I haven’t been the kind of son I should be. My parents deserve more.

  Once I pull into Fairview, strange things are happening with my emotions. I don’t freak out over it but being a guy, our emotions normally come in two modes horny or hungry. And now, there is all this other stuff welling up inside of me that I must deal with now.

  Even though it was my choice to leave years ago, I still feel relief to be back on the dirt roads and winding through the trees. My parents live on the outskirts of town and I’ve always loved how tranquil it is out here. The hustle and bustle of the big city is fun but now that I’m out of it, I feel a little bit of the scrapes and scars where it’s been crushing me.

  I pull into the drive that wraps around the house. I don’t see my dad’s car which makes me think he must be at the hospital still. I check the time. I left this morning from Chicago and I made good time so it’s just about lunchtime now. Surely, my parents must be hungry. I’ll need to piece together a meal.

  As I head into the house, I grab the mail off the floor. There’s a lot of it. That pisses me off because I now know that my mother has probably been in the hospital for a while. My father is devoted to her and he probably hasn’t left her side. Hence, the piled-up mail.

  That burns me. If she’s been too sick for my father to even bother with the mail, then that’s something I should know about. I throw the letters on the kitchen table feeling dejected.

  Fuck. Just thinking about how much my father loves my mother is crazy to me. Especially since I will never have that. I wasted all that time pining over Davis.

  I take down a pot with the aim of starting a meal for them. I plan to take a quick shower and then run across to the hospital and surprise them. I’ve brought some flowers for my mother with me from Chicago and I want to give those to her to cheer up her room. I’m anxious to see how she’s doing and what state she’s in but this is such a mess that I can’t turn up empty handed. I need to do this right.

  I stop in my childhood room and give it a once over. My mother has recently been in to clean, I can tell. Everything is neat and just like it was before. I look for traces of my new self in my room because I certainly don’t feel like the same guy I was, back when I lived here three years ago.

  No matter what Davis says, I’m not a boy any more.

  I look for evidence that points the way toward the man I’ve become. Is it in the posters of glistening basketball players on the wall? In the small collection of CSs, DVDs and books that I own? What about the porn stash on the memory stick hidden in that box underneath my bed?

  I reach under my bed, searching for that box. I’m still the only one with knowledge of the unlock code. I open it. I haven’t looked inside in years. There are some baseball cards I thought might be valuable one day. As I flip through them, I realize I haven’t heard any of these names recently. I never was much good at baseball. Around the time I stopped collecting, I started playing basketball and it took over my life.

  At the bottom of the box, a glistening catches my eye. I reach in and remove the dog tags that Jordan and I had made when we went to Washington DC on our school class trip. They say our names and declare us best friends forever. It’s hard to see them and not for the reason I would have expected.

  The moment we had them made come rushing back to me. The strength of our friendship. Jordan was like the brother I never had.

  Friends don’t give up on each other. Not when they’ve pledged to be best friend forever. Though he was an asshole to me, I made him feel as if our friendship was something I could easily cast away. It’s hard realizing how quickly I was willing to trade my history and devotion to him for a chance with his dad. Instead of taking the time to work it out.

  Friendships are gifts, not negotiations. We owe our friends honesty and devotion. No one wants to feel like, just because they’re having growing pains, they aren’t worth your time of day.

  I take out my phone to call him, the emotional rollercoaster I’m pulling me down deep toward tears. But, before I can, I hear noises downstairs. I rub my eyes dry. My mom’s home! That’s good. I head down to help and get her flowers, so I can present them to her. For some reason, right now, it’s so crucial to me that she knows I’ve been thinking about her.

  I can’t even get down the stairs before Misty comes thumping through the front door and up to put her paws upon me in greeting.

  She’s doing that wiggle thing with her butt that she does when she near the limit of her excitement. “Hey girl!” I say, getting down to greet her.

  When Davis makes his way through the door, I freeze. I watch him wipe his feet on the rug and I can’t decide what to do. I fight down the impulse to disappear back up the stairs. I can’t run in my own house.

  He looks up and the shock of seeing me jumps across his face, only to die out seconds later. It looks like he’s going to say something but then, I hear my mother cry out. She is back! I bolt the rest of the way down the stairs, Misty on my heels and pass him. Outside the front door, I find my dad helping my mother up the stairs.

  I rush to help my father assist her. Once I take her arm, she wrestles away from me and my father, chuckling. “Stop fussing over me! Gosh!” She stops to look at both of us. “I feel fine.”

  She looks fine. Not nearly as sick as I feared she’d be. A little piqued, yes, but not as bad as I feared. I guess I hadn’t let myself think of how bad it could be. But, the level of relief I feel now is immense.

  “I can’t believe you didn’t tell me you were sick,” I say to her. Somehow being next to her and knowing that something bad has gone down of this magnitude makes me feel like a little boy. I wrap her in my arms, my eyes watering.

  “Don’t start in on your mom,” my dad says. “Let’s get her in the house first.”

  “Sorry,” I mutter feeling ridiculous and selfish.

  “Leave my baby alone,” my mother counters, leaning into me. It doesn’t escape me that she does lean on me a little as we cross the threshold. Inside, though, she lets me loose and heads into the kitchen where she looks around like she’s seeing it anew.