Grayson
Rosie’s avoiding me.
Ever since she left my house two days ago, I haven’t heard from her. I text, call, and she doesn’t answer. I don’t know if she freaked out by what I told her, but she asked me.
I don’t want her to know how fucked up I really am. This whole arrangement was about her, so why does she care if I go to class or not?
I panicked when she told me she’d leave and told her the reason why I needed the money. At least it started off that way. During freshman year, I came to Redfield full of anger, wanting to get rid of every memory I had of New York.
But now, I don’t know if leaving is what I want anymore. Which is probably why I’m here in New York at my parents’ house, having dinner with them. Dinner. That’s a foreign concept to me. My dinner consisted of takeout in my car, avoiding being at home as much as possible.
I couldn’t take the arguing every fucking day. My father always had something new he resented me for. I don’t know why the old man has such a problem with me, but for some reason, he despises me.
I like to think he grew wary of me after what happened. He was his brother, after all, but he’s been like this for as long as I remember. Which is why I would sneak out and hang out with my uncle. He ended up being the one person I looked up to growing up.
He taught me everything I know. How to drive, how to change tires, how to change engine oil. His whole life was cars, and whenever I snuck out to his garage, he’d teach me something new.
He took me driving a lot. The longest road trip we had was to Pennsylvania, where he drove us to a mountain, and we sat there, looking out at the view. He gave me my first taste of beer that day.
I didn’t think I’d ever go back there again, but when I had Rosie in my car with me, the only place I wanted to go was that mountain. I hadn’t been there in over five years, and I was glad Rosie was with me, even if she’s avoiding me now.
“Put your phone away,” my father snaps, bringing his glass to his mouth and taking a sip of the dark liquid.
I sigh and tuck my phone into my pocket.
“We spend thousands on that school, and for what? You’re still the same disrespectful screw-up.”
I scoff. “College doesn’t all of a sudden make me holier than thou. It’s called bad parenting.”
His eyes narrow as he points a finger at me. “Don’t you talk back to me.”
“Okay, why don’t we all calm down,” my mother says, trying to appease him.
My father grunts. “Don’t tell me to calm down,” he spits out. “I won’t be disrespected in my own house by a murderer.”
My jaw clenches, and my fists tighten underneath the table. “I’m not a murderer. How many more times do I have to say it wasn’t my fault?”
“Excuses don’t cut it, boy. I saw what you did to him,” he retorts, lifting his glass and spilling some of the drink on the table. I still remember being frozen in place, watching him die right in front of me. I couldn’t move, I couldn’t stop it.
“Frank.” My mother mutters. He grunts, waving her off. I wish she’d stick up for me. Tell him that it wasn’t my fault. Tell me that it wasn’t my fault.
It wasn’t my fault, was it? I try so hard to convince myself that I couldn’t help him. But what if I was wrong? What if it was my fault?
“Would you like some dessert?” my mom asks me. “The cook made some delicious cheesecake. Amelia,” she calls out, and in comes a maid. A new one since the last time I was here. “Bring out dessert,” my mom tells her. “I think we’re stuffed from the main course.”
Amelia starts clearing the plates from the table. As much as I appreciate my mother for trying to make the situation better, dessert isn’t going to suddenly change the fucked-up relationship my dad and I have. I don’t understand why he hates me. He always has for as long as I’ve been alive. There’s nothing I can do to change that.
I stand from the table, heading out of the dining room.
“Where are you going? We haven’t finished.” My dad says.
“To the bathroom,” I tell him. “Would you like to check my shoes for needles before I go?”
He grunts, and I take that as my cue to leave. I head out of the dining room and into the downstairs bathroom.
I don’t know what I’m doing here. I came here trying to figure out the relationship I had with my parents. My mother asked me to come, but so far, there has been no evidence of them putting what happened behind them.
I stare into the mirror, gripping the edge of the sink as I try to figure out who the hell I am. I’m a product of those two out there. What does that even mean? Will I grow up to be a hot-tempered asshole like my father?
Will I even have kids? I’ve never thought about it before. A relationship, marriage. Just the thought of having kids terrifies me. What if I end up just like him? What if I become unattached and hate the kid? What if I fuck up his life just like my dad did mine?
The only man I ever looked up to is dead.
Because of me.
Maybe Frank is right. I am a fuck up and a murderer. Maybe Rosie knows that too, and that’s why she’s been avoiding me.
She doesn’t want to be with someone like me, and she told me that herself. I don’t want a relationship anyway. So why the hell am I checking my phone again?
I curse at the screen and shove my phone into my back pocket, turning on the faucet and cooling my face off. I head out of the bathroom, debating whether I should leave or go back in there.
“You can’t keep bringing this up, Frank.” I hear my mother say.
I stand in the corner of the dining room, trying to listen in to what my father will say. She told me to come here to make amends with him, and he’s been holding the front door open since I got here.
“I don’t have to do anything with the likes of him. He’s no son of mine.” I roll my eyes. Hearing him say that puts the nail in the coffin. He doesn’t think of me as a son. He doesn’t want anything to do with me. I just wish I knew why.
“It’s bad enough you opened your legs to my brother and birthed that son of a bitch, I don’t have to stand by and hear him disrespect me too.”
I freeze at the doorway. What?
“Keep your voice down.”
“Why?” my father says, slurring his words a bit. “You don’t want him to hear how much of a slut you are?”
“Frank,” my mother says more harshly.
He laughs bitterly. “I have no need for a wife,” he says. “I haven’t for a long time. I have other women willing to do your job.”
Bile rises in my throat, remembering the times I walked in on him with his assistants. I was crushed knowing he cheated on my mom, and now I know my mom cheated on him too.
This is why I can’t imagine a world where love exists. How the hell did two people get married and devote their lives to each other and go behind their backs and betray each other? It’s fucking stupid to think that would equate to something as fabricated as love.
“That son of a bitch has his face. He’s living evidence of your betrayal to me, to this family, to my legacy,” he says. “How am I supposed to forget that?”
I almost snort. His legacy. The one he built with my mother’s money. My father’s company is nothing but a way to appease himself that he’s the breadwinner when we all know she is. My mother has been a famous designer for as long as I’ve been alive, and I’ve been nothing but proud of her.
But the same can’t be said for my father. I always felt like he was jealous of her success, that he felt emasculated by her wealth. But maybe it was more than that. Maybe it was the affair she had.
“You promised me you would let it go. I can’t keep doing this with you,” my mother replies.
“I can’t forget it. He’s a reminder of your betrayal. That asshole is nothing but a disappointment. I was willing to raise him as my own, but then he went and murdered my brother.”
My jaw clenches, and my palms itch to go in there and throw a fucking punch in his face.
I don’t need to be here. I stumble backwards into the statue behind me, causing the dining room to fall silent.
“Grayson?” My mother calls out.
I step into the dining room, seeing my mother with a red face and my… father? Uncle? Frank, with a disgusted expression I’ve been on the receiving end of my whole life, at least now I know why.
“What the hell were you doing?” Frank asks. “Were you eavesdropping?”
“About how Uncle Gary was actually my dad? Yeah, I heard that.”
“Bout time you knew,” he spits back, taking a sip from his whiskey.
I snort out a laugh. “Now I know why you never liked me.”
He gives me a glance, repulsion painted on his face. “You have his face,” he says. “I’m surprised you didn’t figure it out. Never took you for a dumb fuck.”
Frank and my uncle didn’t share a lot of similarities. Frank was rich, my uncle was not. Frank has a receding hairline, and my uncle had a full head of hair. They might not have been similar, but they were still brothers. They shared DNA. I ignore his statement. I’m not dumb. I know that. He knows that. I don’t even bother replying to him as I turn to face my mother. “Did he know?” I ask her.
“Grayson,” my mother starts.
I shake my head. I don’t want to hear any excuses. “Did he know?” I ask her again.
She lets out a breath, a sympathetic look on her face. She shakes her head. “No, he didn’t know.”
I nod. “So, it was just a coincidence that I spent so much time with him. That he wanted to teach me about cars and hang out with me?”
She nods. “He loved you so much,” she says with a hint of a smile. “Maybe he suspected. But your father and I agreed to keep it between us.”
“You knew?” I ask Frank. I guess it’s redundant to call him my father. He never felt like a father, and now I know he isn’t even my father biologically.
“I walked in on them,” he says, avoiding my eyes and taking a sip of his drink.
“He’s my dad?” I ask my mother. It feels surreal. My father.
She nods.
“He was, and then you killed him.” Frank retorts.
I feel my fists clench at my sides. “I didn’t kill him.”
He narrows his eyes at me. “What else do you call standing there watching him while he dies?”
I didn’t kill him. It wasn’t my fault. I didn’t know what to do. I panicked. “I was thirteen,” I say through clenched teeth. I was only a kid. I was a fucking kid.
“That doesn’t excuse your actions.”
“I came to you,” I yell across the room. “I asked for your help.” I run a hand through my hair, feeling my whole body burn with anger. “If you weren’t too busy fucking your assistant, you could have helped me!”
He stands from the table, slapping the table with force. My mother jumps in her seat. “You killed him. That’s on you. Don’t you forget it,” he yells back.
“Frank. Don’t talk to him like that,” my mother says from her seat.
“That screw-up was a cokehead anyway. No one misses him.”
My face heats, and I go blind with rage. I stalk towards him and grab his collar. “He was your brother,” I seethe.
“He was a fuck-up,” he spits out. “Just like you.”
I shake my head, hating those words that come out of his mouth. Sure, he had problems with drugs. But he was the best man that I ever knew. He was my father, and I didn’t even know it. And I lost him.
I feel someone tug my arm and turn my head, seeing my mother. Her eyes are filled with tears as I see her mouth ‘Grayson’ over and over at me. I can’t hear her, though. My ears are ringing with hate for the man in front of me.
My fist makes contact with his cheek, blood sputtering out of his mouth.
I push him against the wall. “Fuck you,” I breathe out.
I let him go and turn, heading out of this fucking house and leaving this life behind me.
My mother can keep living her fucked up married life with that psychopath and leave me alone.
My father is dead.
And I don’t have a reason to come back here anymore.
