Page 124 of Pick Me Up On Tuesdays

He shifted just enough for me to feel the slight movement in the room, the gentle hum of something shifting, something stirring. It was nothing, really, but I felt it. My hands tightened around the laptop, the cold metal offering no solace, no relief.

Moments ticked by—more than normal. The type of moments that were like stretched elastic, elongating the air between us farther and farther until it was almost painful tobreathe. At last, his voice cut through the silence, low and heavy, the type of voice that bore a load, a weight. I had not expected it.

“You see,” he began, his tone calm—too calm—each word carefully measured, like a confession wrapped in silk. “When I was young, I knew exactly what I wanted. Power. Money. Control. I understood the price. The sacrifices. The blood. The silence. I knew what I’d have to give up to get it.”

He paused, eyes distant, not with regret, but with clarity. “And I did it anyway.”

I knew about the cult. I had clawed through obscure books, whispered forums, and forgotten corners of the internet—searching, desperate, starved for anything that could bring my father back. Grief wasn’t just a shadow I walked with; it was the air I breathed. It sank into my bones, howled in my chest, and made even the silence scream.

He was gone. Stolen. And the hole he left behind was not poetic—it was brutal. It was the kind that made mornings unbearable and nights feel like drowning with your eyes wide open.

But there was no way, was there?

The cult... they promised impossible things.

They traded souls for solid wealth. Monsters draped in velvet. They surfaced only beneath red moons, those nights when the sky looked like it, too, had lost someone and wept crimson. When the moon wasn’t bleeding, they disappeared—unless they had a mission.

And I was sure my father’s mission was me.

Because seventeen-year-old demons? That’s what the cult salivated over. And I was ripe for the taking—lonely, angry, broken. Just the kind of soul they liked to chew on.

I didn't respond, not right away. His words hung in the air, heavy and foreboding. He moved again, just enough to remind me that he wasn't as far away as he once was. That, if anything, this was different. His words had always been laced with a bitterness I couldn't help but notice, but there was something in them now—a resignation, perhaps—that compelled me to look at him. Finally. I didn't want to, but I did.

A smile, faint and unapologetic, tugged at his lips. “Because some things are worth the cost. Even if they burn you alive.”

I looked at him then, really looked at him, beyond the mask he'd been wearing all those years.

There was something in his eyes, something hollow that he'd never allowed me to see before. And in that moment, something shifted inside of me, but I didn't know what.

"Is that supposed to be making me sorry for you?" The words tumbled out before I could catch them. The anger that had been seething beneath, rolling and twisting in my chest, slid up my throat. "You bartered your soul for power. For what? So you could turn me into something like you?"

The words rested on my lips like rough glass, gritty. My hands trembled on the rim of the laptop, their pressure tightening with anticipation as I waited for his response. The heat of his eyes rested on me, and for a fleeting fraction of a second, I considered whether he'd respond, would fight back and protest, but then his shoulders eased a fraction. A breathescaped his lips, one that was so soft it hardly counted as real. It was almost. Resigned.

“No. I thought about what you said, and…” His voice softened, almost pleading. "I want you to have a choice. To be something other than I was. That's why I'm not forcing you to do it anymore. I won't ask you to go with them. I want you to be you. And who knows, you could be greater than I ever was.”

The words weighed heavily, a burden I couldn't move. I looked at him, attempting to comprehend, but all of me denied it. The silence hung once more, heavy and heavy with foreboding. My brain spun, unsure of what to utter. I wanted to yell. I wanted to cry out that it was too late, that I didn't need his sympathy, that I didn't care about his regrets.

But I didn't.

“You’re leaving,” I said, my voice barely more than a whisper, as though saying it aloud would make it too real.

He nodded. There was no defiance in his movement. No anger. Just. Resignation. “The cult is taking me. I’ve served them for so long. I’ve been a puppet, just like they wanted. But it’s over now. They want all of me. And they’ll take me, whether I’m ready or not.”

For a moment, the words didn't compute. They didn't belong. But then they did. They took hold, the gravity of them settling in me like a cold rock.

"I never wanted you to be like this," I growled, my throat closing as I tried to get the lump that had formed there to go down. "I never wanted to be anything like you."

He laughed, but the laugh was melancholy. It wasn't funny at all, but full of a silence that spoke more of sadness. "I know. But perhaps you'll be different. Perhaps you'll be great.”

I gazed at him, and something within me stirred, something I could not put my finger on. Maybe it was regret. Maybe it was sadness. Maybe it was something between the two. But I couldn't find words to say it, so I didn't. I just stood there, fighting the urge to scream or run or do anything that would break the fragile silence.

And then, out of the blue, he stepped forward and embraced me.

It was awkward. Unnatural. His arms were stiff around me, like he didn't know how to hold me, or if he should. We weren't close, not in the way that counted. Not at all.

For a moment, I was frozen. Did not know what to do. Did not know what I was supposed to be feeling. But something shifted between us, something raw and broken. And I could not stop myself from hugging him, though I did not want to. Though I was not sure I should.

"I'm sorry," he whispered, his voice breaking. "I never wanted to hurt you, son. Never."

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