Now, looking at Kyle, he says it again. “Your mother has enough on her plate.”
“Well, I don’t know a damn thing about that ring or how it got here. You of all people ought to know I don’t have any use for the kind of lowlife that’ll do that shit.” Kyle’s referring to the fight he had with Gee over the stolen bat.
“All right, then.” Harris turns away, turns back. “What about Gee?”
Kyle’s brows shoot up. “What about him?”
“I’m just wondering—are you guys friends again? You hanging out?” Do you know, for instance, that in addition to throwing for more than two thousand yards as the king of high school quarterbacks in the state of Texas his senior season, Gee is also dealing drugs and doing home invasions with his cousin? Are you by any chance part of his crew? Harris wishes he could ask, that he could go that far, but that ground is pocked with land mines, and Harris isn’t prepared to handle the fallout.
“Hell no—”
“So Gee hasn’t been here, inside the house, I mean.” Harris keeps his tone casual.
“No. I see him at school, on the field. We don’t hang out.” Kyle’s at his desk now, flipping through papers like he’s bored, or possibly he can’t look Harris in the eye.
Watching him, Harris can’t be sure he’s not being fed some kind of bullshit, and his heart aches with his uncertainty and his love for his son. He would do anything, sacrifice anything, to keep Kyle safe. But without knowing the truth, he’s helpless. “You’re not covering for someone else, another one of your buddies, are you?”
Kyle’s head jerks up; he looks at Harris. “No, Dad. What is your deal? Why are you on my ass?”
“Why aren’t you more interested in how Zeke’s damn ring got into your drawer? Have any of your friends been up here? Has Gee? What about at school? You hearing any rumors about the robberies around town?” Harris is thinking out loud, talking fast. He wasn’t lying the other day when he told the cops, Mackie and Carter, he hasn’t heard a peep about the break-ins. He feels like he would have, should have, heard some whisper about them—maybe not firsthand, but the news would have gotten back to him. A lot of shit gets said in a locker room. The guys talk a lot of smack, horsing around.
“I told you, Gee and I don’t hang out—” Kyle breaks off, angry again. He seems totally at sea, and Harris wants to drop it; he wants to let it go in the worst way, but that other alternative—that scenario where it’s Gee who took the ring and planted it in Kyle’s drawer—is roaring in his head. And what if Gee didn’t plant the ring? What if, instead, he gave it to Kyle for safekeeping?
Harris’s heart is grinding like a piston. His mind is a hash of conjecture and suspicion. Maybe he’s paranoid, out in left field, except he knows—knows there’s something going down here. And either Kyle’s part of it, or he’s not. Harris hopes like hell it’s the latter, but if Kyle is in it, then Harris has got to get him out. He’s got to do whatever it takes to protect his son. He tucks Zeke’s ring into his pocket, thinking how sometimes the medicine you have to spoon-feed your kid doesn’t taste good, doesn’t sit well, and they fight it. They get mad as hell at you for forcing it. He thinks how sometimes you have to let your kid hate you. Finding Kyle’s gaze, he says, “I don’t want your mother knowing about any of this. Not until I get to the bottom of it, and I will. You know I will.”
“I’m not lying.”
“Then you’ve got nothing to worry about, right?”
Kyle glares but says nothing.
Turning, Harris picks his way toward Kyle’s bedroom door.
“It really sucks that you don’t believe me.”
Kyle’s voice stabs Harris between his shoulder blades, circles around to his heart. He pauses.
“You know what, Dad? I don’t give a shit what you think. Even if I did steal that ring, I’m not as bad, not as big a liar, as you.”
Harris wheels, facing his son, who is almost a man, who could probably take him down if they were to go head-to-head. “What the hell does that mean?”
“You’re back doping yourself. I heard Mom talking to Gramma about it. You’re taking Oxy again or some other damn drug. They want to believe it’s for your back, but that’s bullshit, isn’t it?” Kyle takes a step; his eyes are hot with accusation. But there’s a kind of pleading in them, too, for Harris to step up, be the man, the dad, Kyle wants and needs. Harris can’t stand seeing it and jerks his gaze away.
Kyle takes another step. “I bet you can’t go a day, can’t go a fucking hour, without it, can you? Huh, Dad? C’mon, why don’t you man up and admit it? You’re an addict. I love you, Dad, but I hate you, too, for what you’re doing to yourself, and me, and Mom and Connor.” He takes a third step, and now his voice is harsh, broken. “What’re you going to do? Keep taking the shit till you’re dead like Tom Petty?”
Harris recoils, as if rather than bitter accusation and terrible pain, Kyle has hurled boiling water at him. Denial is thick on his tongue, but he can’t open his mouth. His chin drops. He’s aware of Kyle’s breath heaving hotly around the room, and he wants to go to him, to gather his boy into his arms. I’m sorry, he wants to say. You deserve better than me. The words, and something that he imagines are tears, are clogged in his throat. It feels as if an eternity has passed when he leaves Kyle’s room, leaves his son standing alone, without support, stripped of hope, of any reason to believe. It’s the easy way, Harris thinks, the coward’s way, and he can’t remember a time when the world has felt so dark or cold.
Harris never thought he would marry, never figured he’d have kids. Even in his teens he somehow knew he was no kind of role model. His mom blames herself, the lack of a long-term father figure. Maybe if he’d had siblings, she said, a more ordinary family life. But it wasn’t any of that, not really. The truth is Harris was scared growing up. He’s still scared. More scared now than he’s ever been.
He can’t wait for Holly to come home from the grocery store, can’t keep his goddamn promise to quit the dope either. He can’t stop seeing the anguish and fury in Kyle’s eyes, and he’s got to stop seeing it. He’s got to think how Zeke’s ring came to be in Kyle’s drawer. If it was Gee who planted it—but Harris can’t go down that road. It can’t be Gee.
In the kitchen, he tears a sheet off her memo pad and scrawls a note. Something’s come up. Don’t hold dinner. Don’t wait up. He hesitates a moment, then adds, I love you. Has he written that to her before, since the early days of their relationship? He doesn’t think so. He can’t imagine what she’ll think of it.
In his truck, leaving the neighborhood, he doesn’t know where to go. He wants to hook up with Gee, get something to smooth himself out. He needs to talk to Gee anyway. He needs to look Gee in the face and ask him about Zeke’s goddamn ring. But he can’t just drive up to the kid’s house and bang on the door. He’s the Wyatt High School athletic director, the fucking head baseball coach. Guys in his position don’t do dope, much less have a student athlete for a supplier. They don’t turn their backs on a kid’s criminal activity. Harris pounds the steering wheel with the heel of his hand. Tears blur his vision. He jerks the truck to the curb. Jesus, Jesus, how did he get himself into this mess? Kyle knows. Kyle thinks he’s an addict.
Kyle is scared.
Harris saw the fear in him, and his confusion, swimming behind the anger in his eyes. Harris never wanted his sons to be scared; he never meant to be the source of their fear.
Straightening, Harris wipes his face, pulls his phone out of his jacket pocket and calls Zeke, leaving a message after the answering machine picks up. “It’s Harris,” he says. “I’m heading your way. Be there in twenty.” He figures Zeke is home, probably nodding off in front of the TV. If he isn’t, Harris will wait. He pockets his phone, feels Zeke’s championship ring underneath it. He wants to be rid of the damn thing.
It’s six thirty, nearly dark, when he pulls away from the curb. Around him rectangles of light shine from the houses that line either side of the street. A vision buil
ds behind his eyes of families gathering around dinner tables. He hears their idle chatter, the ease of their laughter, but he’s on the outside. He’s always felt on the outside of such visions.
He can hear the blare of Zeke’s TV as he comes up the front walk. The curtains over the living room window are open, and he can see Zeke is stretched out in his recliner. A glass, holding what’s left of Zeke’s ritual predinner cocktail—precisely two fingers of Jack Daniel’s—is on a side table near his elbow. Zeke only allows himself one such drink unless he has company. You drink alone, you’re in trouble, he says.
Zeke has all kinds of little sayings and mantras that he claims keep his attitude positive and upbeat. If it were anyone else spouting all those clichés, Harris would be annoyed. But there’s something about Zeke, a rightness, a kind of constancy—Harris doesn’t know how to describe it, really. As much as he once felt mentored by the guy, he now feels protective of him. From the day they met at the A&M field house, when Harris was a scared freshman, Zeke has kept Harris steady. Zeke is the only other person aside from Holly and Harris’s mom who knows about Hoff, how up until Hoff dropped out of his life, Harris’s ambition, his dream, was to play football. When Harris confided in Zeke, when he showed Zeke some of his old game film, Zeke was dumbfounded at Harris’s skill; he pressed Harris to try out for the A&M football team as a walk-on. He pushed Harris hard enough on the issue that Harris blew up, telling him to back the hell off. The pain on Zeke’s face almost undid him. But talking about it was the only thing that would make it right, and it was the one thing Harris couldn’t do.
Now he rings Zeke’s doorbell, and he watches Zeke come to himself, slowly get to his feet, make his way to the door. His service to his country as a marine is still evident in his bearing, and when he opens the door, the sight of Harris brings a sparkle of delight to his eyes. A perennial bachelor, Zeke has often claimed Harris is the son he never had. Harris follows Zeke into the kitchen. He’s polished off the last of the Jack Daniel’s, he says, but maybe he could interest Harris in a beer? Harris’s grin of consent is more grimace. There’s no sign the old guy is disturbed, which is a relief. He’d be ranting if he’d missed the ring. No doubt he’d have called the cops. It’s what Harris should have done long ago.
Sitting at the table, they talk for a few minutes about the upcoming Super Bowl. Harris turns his bottle of beer—Stella Artois this time; Zeke is a self-proclaimed connoisseur of fine beer—in his hands. He’s shaky, nervous as hell, pissed—he can’t sort out the hot sea of his emotions, except his head feels like it might explode. Picking up the bottle, he takes a healthy swallow, coughs, wipes his mouth.
Zeke eyes him, squinting. “Shouldn’t you be home eating dinner? Something tells me this isn’t a social call.”
Harris digs the ring out of his jeans pocket and sets it on the table between them.
“What the hell?” Zeke glances at Harris. “Is that mine?”
“Yeah.”
“What are you doing with it?”
“I found it,” Harris says. “In Kyle’s dresser drawer.”
Zeke sits back.
“He swears he didn’t take it.”
“Well, when would he have? Kyle hasn’t been out here since”—he thinks a moment—“junior high, maybe? You don’t bring the kids anymore.”
It’s the hint of disappointment in Zeke’s tone that lets Harris know Zeke has noticed Harris’s lapse. But the last time he brought the boys, they complained of boredom. Harris hasn’t argued for bringing them again. In fact he’s been glad for their disinterest. It’s risky having them with him when he comes to pick up meds or a script from Zeke. Until earlier today Harris felt pretty confident no one knew what he was taking, how much, or when. But as usual he was fooling himself. Kyle—Kyle of all people knows, and he’s scared the way any good, decent kid would be.
Harris was so damn wrong to think even for an instant that Kyle was involved with robbing anybody of anything. He wouldn’t provide a hiding place, either, wouldn’t be anybody’s fall guy—Gee’s least of all.
But Harris can’t think about Kyle now—of his goodness and decency, or that Kyle called him an addict. It will crack him open, take him down, and he can’t afford that. Kyle is all that matters, that he stays safe. Harris doesn’t care what it takes. As bad a father as he is, as poor a role model as he’s turned out to be, he’s determined to protect his son. He knows, knows in his bones, if he finds out Gee planted the ring—and there’s no doubt now in Harris’s mind that someone did—he’ll take Gee apart. Kid or not, Harris will crush Gee with his bare hands.
Zeke catches Harris’s gaze. “How does he explain it, the ring being in his drawer?”
“He says someone must have put it there.”
“What? Like they’re framing him? Who would do that? Why?”
“I’m pretty sure Gee Drake is behind it.” Anger crawls through Harris’s brain, darts a hot tongue behind his eyes, but he’s got to be careful, be cool. He wants Zeke’s take on the situation, wants his help to think it through, maybe figure a way out. He doesn’t want Zeke riled.
“You’re serious.” Zeke leans back, shock riding his gaze.
“You’ve heard about the break-ins all over town.”
“You’re saying Gee’s robbing houses?”
“Him and his cousin. I think they took your ring deliberately to set Kyle up.”
“Why? What the hell is this story you’re telling me? It makes no damn sense.”
“Yeah, probably I’m being paranoid. I shouldn’t have come. I don’t know what the hell I was thinking.” Harris starts to rise.
“No. Jesus. Just sit down and tell me. Gee’s got a beef with Kyle, is that it?”
Harris doesn’t answer. He takes a swallow of beer, buying time. Why did he think laying it out for Zeke was a good idea? Once the old man knows, he’ll be implicated, unless they call the cops, right now, tonight. But Harris can’t keep it inside; he’s too damn scared for Kyle. He looks at Zeke. Who else has he got?
“Maybe the cousin is the mastermind,” Harris says, though he doesn’t really believe this. He’s witnessed Gee’s behavior long term—in the locker room, on the playing field. His responses to horseplay, to team play, are too intense, too over the top. Harris has seen Gee slam his locker door after a bruising loss. No big deal when it’s once, maybe twice or five times, but Gee—back when Gee was a freshman, Harris counted the number of slams and reached twenty-five. There’s something brittle in Gee, a watchfulness, a kind of hostility. The kid hides it well. Gee plays it as if he’s just one of the guys. He can dish out the insults and horse around like the rest of his teammates, but he doesn’t like getting crowded. Doesn’t like to be handled. He’ll start to lose it. A curtain of rage lowers over his expression. Often, he’ll push back, too hard, too much like he means it to hurt. Harris has seen it happen.
Gee’s good, though, about catching himself. Someone gets onto him, Gee turns on the charm. He’ll grin, waggle his hands. Just joking. Just playing with you. Just having a little fun. Lighten up, why don’t you?
Harris is fairly certain he’s in the minority with his observations. His mother dismissed his concern over Gee when Harris brought it up a couple of years ago. Harris glances at Zeke now. “What I hear, the cousin’s older, thirtysomething, got a five-year-old daughter—a lot of responsibility, but not much else. He’s Gee’s mama’s poor relation.”
“What you hear from who?” Zeke asks.
“Gee.” Harris is regretting it more now, that he came here, that he’s spilling his guts.
“So Gee, who by the way is from one of the wealthiest families in this county, is robbing houses with his dirt-poor cousin, and then what? He comes to you and confesses? Is that how you know this? What are you, his priest? I didn’t think his folks were Catholic.”
“I saw him and his cousin on Thanksgiving Day when they went into and then came out of the Guthries’ house, carrying a bunch of crap.”
“You call
ed the police.”
“Obviously not, or Gee’d be in jail.” Harris shifts his feet. He can’t meet the old man’s eyes, but he feels the heat in his gaze.
Zeke leans forward. “I’m confused,” he says. “You witnessed a robbery, saw the thieves leaving the house, and you didn’t call the cops?”
“Think about it, Zeke. Gee’s a local hero, a football legend. He’s got recruiters chasing him from every powerhouse college team you can name. If he’s arrested, he’ll lose all that. The town’ll lose all that.” Harris peddles the lie he’s fed himself, shoving it past the brutal knowing in his gut that it isn’t the town’s collective ass he’s interested in saving but his own.
“So he’s better off getting away with it? Stealing other people’s shit? Like my ring? They came into my house—what else did the bastards take—?” Zeke breaks off, gets up fast enough that his chair shoots across the floor.
“Take it easy, man.” Harris gets to his feet too. He steadies the chair, lays a placating hand on the old man’s arm. He thinks how the situation just keeps getting worse. “I shouldn’t have come,” he says again. “Shouldn’t involve you—”
“I’ve got to check out my house.” Zeke brushes past Harris. “See what else is missing.”
Harris follows in his wake, blood hammering in his ears. “We can’t involve the police. Not until we know more.” But the cops are exactly who should be—who would be involved if Harris were any kind of man, any kind of dad at all. The sense of this, the enormity of his failure, is suspended in his mind, an anvil, waiting for the right moment to drop.
Zeke is opening and closing bureau drawers. He checks closets, the shelves in a medicine cabinet. Coming back across his bedroom floor, he meets Harris’s glance. “I want to search the rest of the house alone. Wait in the kitchen.”
Harris agrees, but it rankles, getting dismissed like he’s some guy off the street who can’t be trusted. He wonders what Zeke doesn’t want him to see. His drug stash, probably. If there is a stash. Harris has never known. Zeke has given Harris samples of different drugs, mainly pain meds, from time to time. He has said he gets them from a couple of pharmaceutical reps he knows. It makes sense that if Gee and the cousin found drugs when they were here, they’d have taken them. Harris sits down. His gut is fisted in ice.
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