Page 14 of Missile Tow
“I assume you’re correct about that,” he agreed. “But something made him leave.”
“Someone,” I corrected.
“Hmmm,” he mused, locking sympathetic eyes with mine. “I’d wondered ’bout that, son.”
“I guess I wasn’t good enough,” I complained, noticing Mr. J. frowning.
“Doesn’t please me to hear you speak about yourself like that, son,” he offered. “You’re certainly good enough. What you’re too good for is how you’re conducting yourself now.”
“Hey. What the…”
“Calm down, son,” he soothed. “Meant no harm, but you’re throwing your life away with how you’re actin’ these days. And let me say this. The John I remember… well, he wouldn’t like this version of you.”
“Yeah? Well, he can fuck off,” I hissed.
He shook his head in disbelief. “You don’t mean that. You’re angry is all you is. And I get it, but you’re not getting back at John by being miserable. You might think you are, but you ain’t.”
My eyes were full at this point. Mr. J. was right. I wanted to be miserable because I wanted John to know how I felt. He needed to know he’d destroyed me. I figured if the whole town knew how sad I was, they’d somehow get the message out to John. Maybe he’d come back.
I swiped at my eyes. “I thought he’d come back by now,” I confessed. “He doesn’t even visit his folks.”
“And who’s telling you that gossip?” he asked. “You don’t strike me as the type of fella who wishes John harm.”
“Not anymore anyway.”
“See? That’s progress, ain’t it?” he asked, chuckling. “You know, John might never come back to Missile. He might have his reasons too, but you’re still here, son.”
“Yeah. And alone as fuck.”
“With that attitude, I expect you always will be,” he taunted. “But what a waste of a pretty face,” he added.
“No one good ever comes to this godforsaken place,” I ranted. “I’m stuck with that business,” I added, pointing at themercantile. “Folks depending on me and shit. ‘Be happy,’ they say. ‘Lighten up,’ they say. Fuck that! Iammiserable because I loved John. I loved him very much, and I didn’t deserve this shit.”
“You’re right. You didn’t deserve what you perceive John did to you. How dare he make a choice about his own life!”
He was just plain pissing me off now. “That’s not fair,” I protested. “I didn’t mean he didn’t have the right to make his own choices.”
“So you’ve decided to punish yourself instead? And those around you who care about you?” he asked. “That make sense to you? Because the young man I’ve admired from a short distance has disappeared, Chip. Where is that boy?”
I slapped at the ladder and turned away, being met with silence from behind me. Mr. Jenkins said nothing as I stared through the snow with blurry, tear-filled eyes. After a minute of uncomfortable quiet. I slowly turned around.
“It hurts,” I acknowledged, doing what I didn’t want to do, admitting weakness. I clutched my jacket where my heart was and bunched up the fabric within my fist. “Right in here,” I gasped. “It fucking kills me in here.”
The expression on Mr. Jenkin’s face proved he’d been there, done that. His eyes revealed a pain that obviously still haunted him. But he smiled as a distant memory took him back.
“I’m still hurting too,” he said, a hesitant quiver of his lips fighting emotional defeat. “Thirty-plus years and I still think about Paul every single day. And guess what?” He didn’t give me time to respond. “I’m still alone.”
His head tilted in question, as if to ask if I wanted the same fate.
“Where’s Paul now?” I inquired.
“Dead,” he replied. “He never came back. I never asked him to, and he never did.”
“Did he ask you to join him wherever he was?”
“Many times. Many times,” he repeated. “I wouldn’t budge from this town even though I wanted to be with him. Unfairly, I wanted him to bend and do as I wished, even though I never voiced it after he left.”
“One big difference,” I pointed out. “John left for someone else.”
