Sweet Ache

The door beside me pushes open, her shouts having caught the attention of Beth and some orderlies. I remain with my back against the wall as they enter and hope they can help save Hawkin from his own personal Hell.

Within seconds they are pulling her away from him, restraining her from going back for more despite the anger visibly vibrating over her small frame. But Hawkin hasn’t moved his feet; he’s a broken man staggered by hidden lies. Lies most likely told in good faith to protect the mourning little boy but that are now breaking the grown man.

Beth puts a hand on his shoulder and says something to him but it’s almost as if he can’t bring himself to look away. The nurse urges again and he takes two steps before stopping and looking back at his slowly calming mother.

“I’m so sorry, Mom.” The broken and pained grate of his voice makes my chest constrict. He moves again, head kept down, but I see him wipe an errant tear from his cheek as he walks past me and out the door without a word. I scurry after him in silence as he strides through the facility with purpose.

He shoves the exit doors open with force, and I can hear him gasp for air as his chest heaves in a futile attempt to rein in the tears he doesn’t want to fall and the shout I know he wants to yell at the top of his lungs. He does neither though. He bends over, placing his hands on his knees for a few silent moments before standing straight up and walking to his car.

He holds the keys to the car out to me and says, “Just drive.”

I oblige without hesitation. I start the car, merge onto the highway, and drive to no set destination as he sits in absolute silence beside me, hands gripping his thighs and eyes fixated on the world beyond the windows.

I squeeze the wheel beneath my hands to prevent myself from reaching out and grabbing one of his to give him some kind of comfort. My mind spins, thinking of all of the things every son would want his parents to be proud of and knowing that he’s had none of this. He’s been the rock, the support, the everything for himself, and I know that what I told him in the car on the way to the facility holds true. Every man has his breaking point, and his absolute silence makes me fear that he just reached his.

Chapter 27

HAWKIN

My arms scream and sweat runs down my chest. I have no fucking clue how long I’ve been banging on the drums, but I know that a part of me feels a little more whole while the rest of me feels a lot more empty.

The beat bangs in my ears like my dad’s words to me over and over and over. And as fucked up as my head is right now, all I can think about is how wrong he was. And how absolutely right he was. It makes no fucking sense though. So I pound a little bit harder, try to lose myself in the rhythm I can’t find to try to cover up the pain some when all I want to do is drown in it.

He told me love would make me weak, would kill me just like it did him. Well, I loved him, I loved my mom and both of them have brought me to my knees today with their lies and made me weaker than I’ve ever felt in my life.

How’s that for fucking irony?

Just when I’m ready to take a chance and step out of the goddamn box he put me in, I feel like I’m blindsided by the truth that I’m just as weak as he was. My mom just proved that by knocking me to my knees with the hidden secrets she’s kept locked in her erratic mind. The one woman I’ve loved … just made me weak. So these fucking drums are taking the punishment I’d love to throw his way right now.

When my mom screamed those words to me—the hatred, the accusations, the hurt—I swear that the image of the aftermath of my dad pulling the trigger flashed in my mind. But along with the old ones etched there came new memories. Ones so bright and powerful, they knocked the air from my lungs and no matter how hard I pushed them away, they just kept coming.

In that split second of time, I tried to rationalize that it was the Alzheimer’s fabricating lies but deep down, I knew they were true. It was almost like hearing those words opened my subconscious, allowed me to remember details that the fog of his suicide repressed: the crammed suitcase on my parents’ bed, my mom’s red-rimmed eyes that morning she’d blamed on allergies, the continual guilt my mom carried like a badge before she transferred it unknowingly to me.

The images spin out of control. They are so vague and yet are so fucking vivid at the same time. I can’t breathe. I want to throw up. I want to scream. To cry. To slide under the haze of alcohol and numb myself. To fade away for a bit.

Must run in the family.

The thought is distracting enough that my arms give out and the drumsticks slip from my hands to the floor below with a clatter. I grit my teeth and clench my fists and yet don’t even have the fight in me to want to throw a goddamn punch in the air.

I know she’s there, sitting on the couch she hasn’t moved from since she brought me home to bang on Giz’s drums. Something about the gesture, the fact that she remembered I said that’s what I do when I can’t process life, breaks momentarily through the haze of my confusion.

“I’m sorry I brought you there today, that you had to see that … but I wanted you to know.” The words are out of my mouth so softly that she shouldn’t hear them and yet I know she does because I hear her shifting on the couch. She must be wondering what the fuck to do, but truth be told, I don’t even know. I mean, who the hell am I? A man who has lived another man’s principles his whole life only to find out they were a lie?

“I wasn’t sure if you wanted me to stay or be alone….” Quin’s quiet voice pulls me from the goddamn tornado of incoherency in my head and heart. I can hear the hesitancy in her voice but I don’t have it in me to look at her just yet because I’m afraid if I do she’s going to see more of me than I can through this fog of confusion. Silence suffocates the room, both of us unsure of what step to take next.