by Sybil Bartel
I didn’t know whether to hate this woman or thank her. “Jesus Christ, Gunnar. I don’t even know what to say to that. I should tell you that it was wrong of her to tell you but part of me understands why she did. Adults shouldn’t dump on kids but I think you’ve probably seen and heard more shit than most adults.” I shouldn’t have even been talking to him like he was an adult but hell, he had a right to know the score.
“It’s okay.”
Was it? All I knew, we couldn’t change it. I just wanted to make sure he was okay. “As long as you’re good, I’m cool. That’s all I care about right now.”
Gunnar looked at me with the honesty of a kid. “I’m good.”
And just like that, all the shit that’d happened in the past few days melted away and it was just me and this kid. A smile touched my face. “You’re better than good.” He was great. And he was my brother. I ruffled his hair. “Let’s clean up and we’ll watch TV before we crash.”
Two hours later we got off the couch to go to bed but Gunnar stopped me in the hall. “Graham?”
I turned. “Yeah?”
“Thanks for...dinner.”
Except he wasn’t thanking me for dinner, not really. It didn’t matter. I got it. “Anytime, bro, see you in the morning.”
“Six?”
I chuckled. “I’ll give you till seven.”
I was exhausted but when my head hit the pillow, all I saw was Carly’s face. I was drifting in the tide, losing control of something I never could’ve controlled in the first place. I wanted to pick up my phone and call her but I didn’t. This was the right thing to do but it felt so fucking wrong, I was sick inside. I didn’t want to give up my Hummingbird.
But she was never mine in the first place.
Chapter Thirty-Five
Direction
I woke up feeling hungover. Lack of sleep, shit emotions, no sex, who fucking knew what else. I dragged my ass into the shower and should’ve been clued in when I smelled coffee halfway to the kitchen.
Gunnar and Jep sat at the kitchen table eating breakfast. I glanced at the clock, six-thirty.
“Morning,” I grumbled. “Thanks to whoever made coffee.” I poured a cup and leaned against the counter.
“Morning, son.” Jep’s voice held no animosity from last night.
“I made the coffee,” Gunnar said quietly.
“Thanks.” I took a sip and almost spit it out. It was mud.
“Is it okay?” Watching my face, Gunnar looked young and innocent.
I schooled my features. “It’s perfect.” And part of it was. The only other person who’d ever made me coffee was Carly. The thought brought a stab to my heart.
“Eggs are on the stove.” Jep pointed with his fork.
I couldn’t eat right now if you’d paid me. “Thanks.”
“What’s on the agenda for today?” Jep asked casually, like he took off from work all the time.
I didn’t call him on it. “Going into the shop, then we need to get Gunnar a computer for his schoolwork.”
Jep’s fork froze halfway to his mouth. “You’re enrolled in school here?”
I knew what he was asking.
Gunnar beat me to the punch line. “Not really here, it’s Florida Virtual School.”
“Virtual school?” Jep had the same reaction I did.
“Yeah, like, online classes?”
“So you don’t go to a schoolhouse?”
Who the fuck said schoolhouse? Jep was pushing fifty, not a hundred.
“No, it’s all done through the internet. I use a computer,” Gunnar patiently explained.
“Well, shit, that’s something new.”
Gunnar didn’t comment.
“Okay, we’ll go see what Graham has going on at the shop, see if his old man can show him a thing or two, then I’ll take you computer shopping. How’s that sound?”
“What do you know about computers?” Jep’s idea of technology was fuel injection.
Jep reached into his pocket and pulled out a brand new iPhone. “I know ones with an apple on ’em are good ones.”
Christ. I dumped my coffee and pushed off from the counter. “Let’s roll.”
Jep and I worked all morning pulling apart the destroyed Mustang. We didn’t talk about its significance and Gunnar quietly helped with getting tools. I’d be lying if I said it didn’t feel good to work with Jep. He’d taught me everything I needed to know about classic cars but we didn’t work the same way. I was always in a hurry to figure out the problem, fix it and move on. Jep was more patient. He wanted to know why something had broken and how he could make it better. There wasn’t a lot to mess with on old cars because there were no electronics, but that, to me, was the beauty of them. They were pure in their machinery.
At noon, Jep and Gunnar took off for lunch and computer shopping. I was hesitant to let Gunnar go alone but he said he was cool with it. A half hour later, Myles showed up.
“Feeling better?” His teasing smile told me he knew I’d been lying.
“I wasn’t sick.”
“I know.”
“What the fuck do you want?” I tightened some bolts and set down my wrench.
“Checking in. You haven’t been at practice and we have gigs Friday and Saturday. Last time I saw you, you were busy denying you had a mother.”
“I still don’t.” Fuck. I forgot about the gigs.
“What happened?”
She showed up, dumped a brother on me and died. Now I was a stand-in dad. “Nothing.”
Expression patient, Myles waited.
I sighed. “She’s dead.”
He blinked in surprise, then showed me again why he was my friend. “I’m relieved for you.”
I was glad she was dead, just maybe not for the same reasons I would’ve had before I found out what I did last night. The hate was mixing in with something close to empathy for a person who had cancer but I was still glad she was dead. And until this very second, I hadn’t realized how freeing that reality was. “Thanks.”
“So what took three days?”
This was why everything Myles touched turned to gold. He had intuition and he was smart as hell. “I have an eleven-year-old brother I didn’t know about until four days ago.”
Myles blinked twice. “Shit.”
“Yeah.”
“I didn’t see that one coming.” He ran a hand through his hair.
“No fucking kidding.”
“I’m almost afraid to ask, what kind of shape is he in?”
I knew what Myles was asking. “Worse shape than I was at eleven. The bruises will heal but the rest?” I’d fucking break down if I thought about it. “He’s smart, so he’s got that going for him.”
“And now he has you,” Myles said quietly.
I snorted. “Then he’s fucked for sure.”
“No, he’s not. Where is he?”
“He’s been staying at the house.” I moved some tools around, buying a few seconds before I told Myles my plan. I knew it would change the whole dynamic of our relationship and the band’s too. With Gunnar in sight, it hadn’t seemed like such a stretch, but now? Fuck, it seemed like a huge undertaking. “He’s going to live with me,” I admitted.
“You ready to be a dad?” Myles wasn’t being insulting, he was genuinely asking.
“I’m not a dad, I’m a big brother.”
“Dude, you take in a minor, feed and clothe him and make sure he goes to bed on time? That’s being a dad.”
I grunted but he had a point. I’d asked myself a dozen times in the past few days if I could do this and the answer was always the same. It didn’t matter what I could or could not do, I wanted Gunnar to have a chance at a decent life and I, at least more than Georgia had, could give that to him.
“Where’s his biological father?” Myles asked pointedly.
I glanced at my watch. “Jep’s with him at the diner, eating cheeseburgers. They met last night for the first time.”
Myles just stared at me.<
br />
“I called him once I figured it out.” I didn’t know why I was explaining my actions to Myles.
Myles inhaled and let out a low whistle. “You do know Jep’s going to fight you for him.”
“No, he’s not. I told him it was Gunnar’s choice. If he doesn’t respect that, I have no problem cutting him off.”
“This isn’t about a kid having a choice. This is about a man getting a second chance with a son he never knew he had.”
And just like that, Myles put it all out there. He was right. I knew he was right. But I also knew I was right. Jep had been careless with the possibility of Gunnar existing and he’d been downright negligent with me. I still harbored anger at him and that anger didn’t want to give him a second chance.
“What’s Carly think about all this?”
My hands fisted. “She doesn’t.”
“This affects her too.”
Motherfucker. I was not having this conversation with him. “No, this doesn’t affect her because I told her to take a fucking hike.”
“What the hell, Graham?” Myles lost his calm disposition. “Why would you do that?”
“Because I don’t do relationships. And I certainly don’t do relationships with an eleven-year-old kid hanging around!” Was he fucking stupid?
Myles threw his hands up. “I’m not saying you should have sex with her in your living room while your brother watches TV! Shit! What’s wrong with you? She was good for you and you know it. You’re twenty-four years old, you’re not a monk, what are you trying to prove?”
“Screw you.” And how had this conversation derailed?
His hands went to his hips. “If this is you four days in without a piece of ass then I’d hate to see you in a month. Do your brother a favor and hand him over to Jep.”
That stung. “Fuck you.”
“Fuck you back. Be at the gig Friday night.” Myles walked out.
I threw a wrench halfway across the shop.
Chapter Thirty-Six
Trust
Gunnar showed back up with a MacBook, an iPad and an iPhone. He looked bewildered and Jep looked like a pig in shit.
“Good trip?” I was pissed he’d bought all that for Gunnar and I hadn’t.
“Great.” Jep smiled and patted Gunnar on the shoulder.
Gunnar nodded, flinching only slightly.
“How ’bout we all go grab some dinner.” Jep beamed at us.
“It’s four in the afternoon.” I was tired of him trying to play the hero.
“We’ll have an early dinner together before I get on the road.” Jep wasn’t going to be talked out of it.
Whatever. Gunnar could always eat and Lord knew he needed the calories. “Fine. Gunnar, where do you want to eat?”
“Smokey’s?”
If anything could make my mood worse, that was it. I hadn’t been to Smokey’s since my first date with Carly. “Perfect,” I muttered. Just fucking perfect.
I managed to be decent during dinner and not once comment on any of the bullshit stories Jep was telling Gunnar. Jep brought up repeatedly the subject of Gunnar coming to visit him in Miami. The third time he did it, I told him we’d come when we had a chance but Jep didn’t give it up.
“Well, how ’bout I come pick Gunnar up Friday and you can come get him Sunday, Graham? Would you like that, Gunnar? It’s warmer than here and you can swim in the pool.”
Gunnar looked at me nervously. I didn’t know if that meant he didn’t want to go or he did want to go but he didn’t want to hurt my feelings. Fuck, this was like a bad episode of Divorce Court and we were trying to figure out custody.
“We’ll see how the week goes and let you know.” I threw some cash on the table and glanced at my watch. “You’d better hit the road. I’m taking Gunnar to band practice anyway.” I hadn’t planned on it but it was as good an excuse as any.
“All right, all right.” Jep sighed. “I’ll be off then. You boys let me know about Friday?” He put his hand on Gunnar’s shoulder and looked down at him with one of those expectant looks I hated. “Call me?”
Gunnar nodded but I stepped in. “If he’s not busy with school, he’ll call you. Otherwise I’ll call you Friday morning.”
Jep glared at me. “He has a phone.” He said the words but his tone was saying: Don’t fuck with me.
I wanted to tell Jep that didn’t mean Gunnar had to use it but I didn’t. I knew I was walking a fine line with him. He could easily take Gunnar if he wanted to, but so far he was being cool and I didn’t want to jeopardize that—for me or for Gunnar. “We’re late for practice. Talk to you later.” I ushered Gunnar to the Barracuda.
Gunnar asked the hard question once we were safely inside the car. “You don’t like him?”
Inhaling, I thought a moment how best to answer his question. “I like him but I think he needs to give you space and let you come to him on your own. He isn’t ill-intentioned. After I ran away, he kicked Georgia out and came looking for me. He brought me home and straightened me out and raised me till I was eighteen without ever laying a hand on me. He was fair and he provided for me. Am I still pissed about the first twelve years of my life? Yeah, he shouldn’t have let her get away with it.”
I left out the part where if he’d kept it in his pants or if he’d bothered to track her down after fucking her, then maybe Gunnar wouldn’t have suffered like he had.
“She wasn’t always bad,” Gunnar said quietly.
Christ. What did I say to that? Victim or not, she was a fucking drunk abuser. I didn’t want to admit it, but maybe I understood now why she was the way she was but it still didn’t excuse it in my eyes.
Gunnar shifted in his seat. “She wasn’t, like, mean, until she got sick. Before that?” He shrugged. “I don’t know, she was only like that if I did something, you know, like, wrong.”
Breathe, breathe. I gripped the steering wheel, fighting for control as a distant memory surfaced. Six, maybe seven, I vaguely remembered her pushing me on a swing. Rationally I knew she couldn’t have been the monster I remembered one hundred percent of the time, but when you’d been beaten as often as I had, that’s what you remember. “Gunnar, I can’t imagine you ever doing something wrong enough to deserve being hit. And that’s my point. Most parents don’t hit their kids. Jep didn’t. He doesn’t. He’ll never hurt you. If you’re thinking of going on Friday, I want you to know that. He may be irritating but you will be safe with him. I have no problem with you spending time with him if that’s what you want to do.”
“Do you want me to go?”
No. Yes. Fuck, I didn’t know. “I want you to do what you’re comfortable with. I’m behind you either way.”
“Okay.” Then a few second later. “He has a swimming pool?”
I laughed out loud. Leave it to a kid to see life from that perspective. “Yeah, he has a pool and it has solar heating so it’s warm year round. He also has a big screen TV and you’d have your own room. He cooks decent and his shop is five times bigger than mine, so there are a lot of tools to mess around with. He also lives in a decent neighborhood, lots of other kids around.”
“Maybe I’ll go.”
He was gonna go. “Sounds good.” I pulled up to the studio and cut the engine. “You’ll meet my friend Myles and the two other members of our band, Ben and Aaron. Myles is cool, Ben is quiet and Aaron is irritating. Just walk away from him if he annoys you, it’s what I do.”
A ghost of a smile touched Gunnar’s face. “Okay.”
“Other than that, be forewarned, we’re loud as hell.” I smiled. I was actually excited to have Gunnar hear us play. Music had been my outlet when I was his age. Maybe Gunnar would pick it up too.
Gunnar looked at the signage Myles had put up last week. “You practice at a recording studio?”
“Yeah. Cool, huh? Myles owns the studio. See, being a musician can pay off.” I chuckled and got out of the car.
We saw Myles first when we walked into the studio. Myles looked surprised for a
bout half a second then a full-blown smile hit his face. “Hey, man.” He clapped me on the shoulder and turned to Gunnar. “You must be Gunnar.” He held his hand out.
Despite me only saying his name once to Myles, he’d remembered.
Gunnar shook his hand. “Yeah,” he said quietly.
Myles smiled wider. “Killer name, dude, perfect for the music industry. You play anything?”
Gunnar shook his head.
“Wanna learn?” Myles loved any opportunity to turn someone on to music.
Gunnar glanced at me then back at Myles. “I don’t know.”
“This is what Myles does,” I warned Gunnar. “He eats, breathes and shits music. He’ll hound you till he has an instrument in your hands.” Wasn’t a bad thing.
Myles sized him up. “You look like a drummer. You got the build for it. Ever thought of playing drums?”
“Not really.” Gunnar said it like he thought Myles was crazy.
Myles laughed. “Dude, he is so your brother.”
“Right,” I said proudly. The little man was cool. He was growing on me every day.
* * *
Gunnar and I fell into a routine. I roused him in the morning, he made breakfast while I showered and we went to the shop. I worked while he did his schoolwork and answered the phones. When he wasn’t doing his assignments, he ordered parts for me or helped on the cars. Gunnar whipped through his schooling by noon each day. I figured out quick that he was super book smart. I asked to check his work twice before I gave up the pretense. Not only did he not screw up, he was smarter than me. We’d order lunch during the day and I’d teach him how to cook at night. He came to practice every night and by the end of the week, Myles had him working in the control room while we played. Gunnar said we were great and the compliment from him made me soar. Myles never did get an instrument in his hands, but he seemed happy he’d gotten Gunnar to take an interest in the sound equipment.