Page 60 of Next in Line
I swallow slowly as an old ache builds in my chest. It feels like a heavy boot pushing down on me that I want to shove off my body. “Yeah…it was about the only cool thing he ever did with me.”
Maggie absorbs that statement for a few seconds before asking, “Where does he live?”
“Fuck, who knows,” I reply with a self-deprecating huff. I stretch my legs out around the ice hole and shake my head from side to side. “He skipped out on us when I was fourteen. He’s got mental issues, and…well, my childhood with him wasn’t easy.”
Maggie moves closer, her eyes trained on me with a seriousness that makes me anxious. “What kind of mental issues?”
Memories begin flooding back into my mind’s eye, causing me to flinch because I haven’t thought about my dad in months. Even when my mom asked me if I went ice fishing with him a couple of weeks ago, I let it go in one ear and out the other. But something about seeing someone else’s reaction to your truth brings back all the old feelings that live dormant inside you.
“He has bipolar disorder, which isn’t a problem when he’s taking care of himself, but he would go off his meds a lot and get manic. It was always really fucking scary. Fishing was the one thing that would sort of re-center him. Ice fishing more than anything, though. I think it’s because it’s contained, you know? When we were in the hut, it was like he could finally quiet his mind.
“When I was a teenager, he started going off his meds a lot more. And then one day, he just completely disappeared on us. My mom had the cops searching for him everywhere. And when they finally found him, he was living with this other family that he’d been lying to us about for years.”
“Oh my god,” Maggie groans, and I look over to see the pain on her face. It’s a familiar look. One that I remember seeing as a teenager when word spread around Boulder that our dad had abandoned us.
“Apparently, he had another wife and child in a town about two hours away who knew nothing about us or the fact that he was already married. It was a mess.”
“What an ass,” Maggie says, her upper lip curled with disdain.
I nod in agreement because it’s true. I’m well past ever defending anything my father did. “He tried to blame his disorder on a lot of his choices, but that was bullshit too. He was just a bad guy. He even stole money from Tire Depot, which he built from the ground up with my uncle Terry.”
Maggie goes silent for a moment as the heaviness of everything sinks in. “Where is he now?”
“With that other woman still,” I reply with a shrug. “Last I heard, they moved to Nevada.”
“So you guys don’t ever see him?” She looks so young and sad as she asks that question. As if she can’t fathom a life with a deadbeat dad. And I’m glad she can’t. I hope she never loses that innocence about her. It reminds me that there are still good people left in this world.
“Sometimes when he’s off his meds, he shows up, says he misses us and wants to meet his grandkids. My sisters refuse him, and I always end up having to throw him out of my mom’s house. It’s a fucking mess. Everyone hates him for choosing the other family. I just don’t give a shit about him anymore.”
“I don’t blame you,” Maggie says, mindlessly reeling in her line.
“My uncle is the kind of guy I want to be. If he hadn’t taken me under his wing, I don’t know where I’d be right now. I am who I am because of him.”
The backs of my eyes burn with unshed tears as the weight of that statement sinks in. To think about how my uncle had to be so angry with his own brother yet still embrace his brother’s son the way he did is a remarkable thing. And the fact he trusts me with a business he started with my father, who not only abandoned his wife and kids but also his brother and business partner…a lot of trust is between us. Trust that I don’t take for granted.
“I can’t imagine how that would feel as a kid,” Maggie says gravely. “To be ice fishing with your dad one day, and the next day, he’s gone for good. My brain can’t even comprehend how someone could leave their family like that.”
I nod in agreement. “Honestly though, I don’t even try to understand it all anymore. Now that I’m older, I’m just over it. I refuse to give headspace to someone who can hurt me that deeply ever again.”
I feel Maggie’s eyes on me when she asks, “Do you think that’s why you don’t do long-term relationships?”
I jerk my head back in surprise at her change in direction. “No,” I reply instantly, and she raises her eyebrows. “No,” I confirm and then exhale heavily because I feel like she’s trying to look right through me. “When I was younger, I was really freaked out that I was like my dad, so I avoided relationships like the plague. But now that I’m older, and I know I don’t have the disorder, I just like my life the way it is. Everything I do is on my terms.”
She shakes her head from side to side. “I don’t know, Sam. If these past few weeks have taught me anything, it’s that I want someone special to bait my hook for me, you know?”
“Thankfully, I can bait my own hook,” I grumble, looking down at our poles in the water. “We’re two very different people, sparky.”
She presses her lips together and shrugs. “I don’t think we are. Your passion is people, and that can extend far beyond family and your employees.” Maggie’s eyes are sparkling as she turns to look at me. “You have a big heart, Sam, and I think you’d be surprised at how wonderful it feels to give it away to someone extraordinary.”
I can’t help but smile at her optimism. She’s perched on that stool, looking adorable with a fishing pole in her hand and speaking passionately about her grandiose ideas of love—it’s certainly never a conversation I’ve had while ice fishing.
Yet somehow, she’s inserted herself into a part of my soul that not many people have. The fact that I’m hanging out with her after we’ve had sex is already very telling. But it’s not just the sex that draws me back to Maggie. It’s her open optimism. I think it’s starting to rub off on me. Maybe her romantic ideals aren’t as naïve as I once thought. Maybe my future could look different if I wanted it to.
The next few hours are full of less deep talking and more deep fishing. A school of fish shows up, and it’s a flurry of catch and release for the entire afternoon. It’s a good thing this excursion is a secret because this is the kind of fishing day that your friends wouldn’t believe anyway.
When we’re tired out for the day, we tear down and hop back into my truck to make our way back to Marv’s. I pause before backing out of my parking spot because something has been on the tip of my tongue all afternoon, and this might be the only time I have the guts to actually say it.
“Thanks for coming with me today,” I say stupidly because that is so not what I was going to say.
