Page 113 of Free Heart
“Son?”
“Do you have to sell it?”
“I’m an old man. People don’t want to hire me. I need the money to make it through.”
“I know.” I’d known before I’d asked, but my heart is wild with so many lost things that I hadn’t known to grieve. I’d always assumed I could go back. I always believed the house and Dad—and Mom—would be there waiting.
“Peggy Jo is a wonderful woman,” Dad says again, sounding uncomfortable. “I might not have a lot of experience with the world, but I know women like her don’t come around often. Somehow, she seems to think the same of me…”
I try to let go of grief to focus on what he’s saying.
“She said she was in-between at the moment. She had wanted to stay longer at Bella’s, but the baby’s father isn’t a fan of hers. She wasn’t kind to him for walking out on Bella while she was pregnant—”
“Why would she be kind? Asshole.”
“That relationship won’t end well, but until it falls apart, she isn’t welcome back.”
My heart hurts for Peggy Jo. I’ve never met Bella, but that seems too unkind.
“She’s also worried about Dan living in the van during the lead-up to his next attempt. She thinks he’d do better being in her house again—that you both would. I can’t disagree.”
“We’re okay in the van.”
“Okay isn’t good enough before such a feat. He needs ideal.”
NowIcan’t disagree.
“I asked her to come along home to West Virginia with me, as a friend, for moral support.”
“As a girlfriend,” I whisper.
Dad clears his throat. “I’m not asking your permission for it.”
“No,” I murmur. “No, you don’t need it. I’d give it anyway, but you don’t need it.”
I wipe a hand over the back of my neck and feel the buzz of the lengthening undercut on my fingers. “It’s all good, Dad. I want you to be happy. I understand. It makes sense.”
I feel like my voice is coming from inside a tin can, but Dad doesn’t seem to notice. He smiles. “I knew you’d understand. You’ve always been a loving boy. Your mama and I are proud of you.”
“Thank you. I’m proud of you too. I’m glad you’re the ones who got me from the baby store.”
He swallows hard, shine coming to his eyes.
I check my phone and stand up. “My break’s over. Do you want the rest of the boba?”
Dad picks it up and takes a big sip, chewing on the tapioca. “I like it. Your Dan has good taste. No surprise. He chose you.”
I don’t know if Dad’s trying to butter me up to make it okay that he’s selling our history and my last connection to my mom, or that he’s taken up with a new—wonderful—woman, or if he really means it and new love has opened his heart and mind in ways I never saw coming.
Butmymind is too thick with grief over the last of my childhood disappearing to make room for his brighter future. I don’t have it in me to take it in as more than words.
“I’ll see you back at Peggy Jo’s,” I say, not even wondering how he’ll get there. I go back to working the counter, and later I see Martin at the door of the shop. Dad rises to leave with him, but before he does, he comes over and says a few words to me. I listen and watch him go.
I’m a seahorse, and I thought Dad was too. Maybe he is. Maybe he’s just come through the other side of grief and been reborn.
As for me, I’m reeling, and I need Dan to reel me in.
*
