Saying goodbye to his grandparents and sister was more emotional than Nate expected, though, after the morning’s sentimental journey, he shouldn’t have been all that shocked. Robin had picked up an assortment of hefty sandwiches from a shop by the catchy name of Mr. Pickles and they all sat around the dining room table chatting about everything and nothing. Amy brought up her and Nate’s ride around town but avoided any can-of-worms specifics. Nate tossed in what a pleasant, easy city Fresno seemed to be; Robin guessed that it had to feel “small time” compared to L.A.—not that she’d ever been, except for a class trip in sixth grade en route to Disneyland. The comment begged an open invitation to visit, which Amy immediately offered her daughter (but not her parents, who didn’t exactly seem to be chomping at the bit).
After, everyone assembled in the driveway as Nate loaded Cody and their bags into the truck. Amy was unusually quiet; Nate couldn’t tell whether she just wanted to get out while the going was good or if she was feeling bad about leaving. He guessed it was a bit of both. Robin and Diane were, not surprisingly, teary, while Gene stoically examined the ground. For Nate’s part, there was so much more he wanted to say, ask, and understand but knew he had more than enough to process for now.
Gene was the first to move in to hug Amy. “Take care of my grandson, now,” he said, with a warm, proprietary tone that tugged at Nate’s heart.
“I will. As long as he’ll let me,” Amy promised, directing a gentle smile at her son. Robin watched them both with such unbridled love and hope that Nate could feel himself further unraveling. But he stood straight and held it together as Robin hugged him goodbye, unsure why he felt such a pressing need to be a “good soldier.”
Diane opened her arms to Nate, seeming warmer and more authentic than the day before. “This was wonderful,” she said through misty eyes. “Please come and see us again soon. Okay, honey?” Nate said he would and, at that, Diane pulled him closer and whispered, “And just know, when Gene and I pass, we’re leaving all of your father’s money to you. It’s rightfully yours.”
Nate nodded at that strange, out-of-the-blue comment, but had no idea what she meant and wasn’t thinking clearly enough to follow up. The covert way Diane delivered that bit of news should have set off a few bells, yet before Nate knew it, she had already turned away so he wouldn’t see her cry. By then, Nate was focused on Robin clutching Amy for dear life, a mix of desperation and resignation on her face. Amy’s eyes sort of shrugged at Nate, which he found endearing because he knew how much she cared about Robin—and now him.
“It feels so strange to leave,” Amy said as they pulled away from the curb. She watched her childhood home vanish behind them.
“You can stay,” Nate replied, no harm meant.
She turned away from the window. “Do you want me to stay?”
“Only if you want to.”
Amy looked disappointed, as if she was hoping for something more definitive, more positive from her son by now. Eyes half on the road, half on Amy, Nate realized he’d fucked up. “I don’t want you to stay here. At all,” he finally told her, and she immediately brightened.
They didn’t talk for a while. Nate was finding his way out of Fresno and onto the 41 South, while Amy seemed lost in thought. He tried recalling the name of that book on one of Jim’s office shelves (would he ever start to call them his?) by—oh, who was it? Thomas … somebody? Not that he’d ever read it, but he’d always liked the title. It hit him: You Can’t Go Home Again. Maybe Amy couldn’t. Not that she’d been gone that long but, well, things had changed for her—a lot. Maybe he’d read that book after all; he’d only been staring at its cracked spine for most of his life.
Nate switched on his Pandora, needing some music to fill in the blanks (Cody was already fast asleep so even he was silent), and kept it on his usual go-to: the classic rock channel. He knew the day he removed it from the presets—if he ever did—would be a sad one. Or maybe it wouldn’t. Maybe it would simply be a celebration of his dad’s memory and Nate’s moving on. In the meantime, “Carry On Wayward Son” by Kansas came bursting through the speakers, jolting Amy to attention. Nate turned down the volume.
“Sorry about that,” he said.
“Oh, no, that’s fine. I like this song. Haven’t heard it in forever, though.” Amy pulled down the visor to check her look in the mirror, and swept some stray hair off her forehead. “A little before your time, no?”
“Chronologically, yeah, but this is all my dad ever played—and all I heard growing up, so it kinda stuck.” Nate didn’t know why but he felt the need to add, “I like newer stuff, too.”
Amy nodded, then stared out the window as they passed a place called Selma. “God, my parents looked old,” she remarked, as much to Nate as to the little town zipping past.
“They looked okay to me, but what do I know?” he said with an imperceptible edge as he replayed Diane’s parting words. Meanwhile, Kansas sang about noise and confusion and illusion, which seemed about right just then.
Amy spun back to Nate, about to say something, but seemed to shift gears. “When their time comes, I don’t know how I’ll handle it. I hope I’ll be as strong as you’ve been.”
Nate wasn’t sure how “strong” he’d been—this weekend being the most recent case in point—but he was glad if anyone saw it that way. “Do you think I’m in their will?” he blurted out.
“Nate, what kind of question is that?” she asked with a short, annoyed tone—very un-Amy, Nate thought.
“You tell me,” he answered tightly, turning down the radio as the song ended: Don’t you cry no more …
“Tell you what? What are you talking about?”
Cody rustled behind them, sticking his head between them as if trying to “cute” them into not raising their voices.
A produce transport truck the size of a small train barreled up on their right and soared past. Its weight and speed sent a hurricane of sand and dust across Nate’s windshield. “Hey, slow the fuck down!” Amy yelled at the disappearing semi as if the driver could actually hear her.
“Sorry,” she apologized to Nate as the windshield cleared and the produce truck’s ear-splitting rumble faded.
Nate waved her off. His body tensed. “Your mother told me that when she and Gene die they’re leaving me my father’s money. What money?” It occurred to Nate that he didn’t call them Grandma and Grandpa, the newfound familiarity gone.
Amy took a sharp breath. The question seemed to flatten her. Cody instinctively ducked back into his seat and out of the fray. “Twenty thousand dollars,” she eventually replied in a small, discomfited voice.
Nate squinted at Amy. “What are they doing with it?”
Amy met his confused stare and struggled for the words. “Your father gave it to them,” she said quietly. “In exchange for you.”
He set his eyes back on the road, trying to process her response. His head felt like it was slowly detaching from his body. “What are you saying?” he finally asked. “That my dad … bought me?” It sounded so ridiculous he would have laughed out loud—if not for Amy’s undeniably grave look.
“He bought them. Bought their cooperation. Bought their silence.” Amy bit her lip, studied her hands, clenched them into fists.
The whoosh of the asphalt escaping beneath them provided a dull, thudding soundtrack to their fraught exchange. Nate didn’t have to wonder, he could tell Amy’s words were true—and slowly, astoundingly, knew what they meant. “Un-fucking-believable” was all he could muster.
“My parents didn’t ask for the money, Nate. But they did take it.” Her voice turned darker as she dug back in time: “My father had been in a really bad car accident and was out on disability, which wasn’t much. He didn’t know when he’d be able to work again—if ever. Mom was taking extra shifts waitressing to make ends meet. The bills were piling up. They had nothing.”
“Christ, how much could my father have had?” Nate wanted to shout, pound the wheel, wake the dead.
“He had you. That was all he wanted.”
Nate went stone silent, knocked out by this unthinkable curveball. He clutched the wheel and stared out at the unfolding freeway. For all the good that came of the weekend—and he couldn’t deny its worth—it felt as if he’d taken one step back for every step forward. It was like some ping-ponging poker game where he stayed alive, still had a few chips left to play, but couldn’t quite pull ahead. That was okay, he’d thought, he’d eventually land in the black. He had a whole new family and that was a big fucking deal. And big deals take time.
But this—this was a dagger to the heart. If only Jim were still around to answer why: why he’d made these dubious choices, who had he hurt along the way, and maybe who had hurt him? How often had he looked back at what he’d done? Did he really think the truth would never be revealed? And at what cost to his son? Nate might as well be asking Cody.
“I never thought my parents would say anything, especially this weekend, or I would’ve told you myself,” said Amy, breaking his trance. “It was so long ago, Nate.”
She looked at her son with beseeching eyes: Let it go, please let it go. But the news was too fresh, too lurid to stash away, to pretend he hadn’t heard. To try to un-hear it. It opened a door to a blaze of thoughts best left unsaid—that were said nonetheless.
“What else do you have to tell me, Mom?” Nate asked with a snarl. “What other little fun facts are up your sleeve? Oh, I know—maybe your father is really my father? And maybe my father is really Robin’s father? C’mon, might as well get it all out now!”
“Nate, stop it! This isn’t you!”
“Yeah? Well, maybe I’m not who I am either!” He didn’t see the minivan speeding up to pass him on his right and had to slam on the brakes to avoid a collision. Nate reflexively threw his arm across Amy as Cody was launched out of his seat and onto the floor beneath him. Fortunately, there was no vehicle directly behind Nate and the minivan took off like a shot (a minivan!). Nate turned to find Cody scrabbling back onto his seat, then looked over at a shaken Amy.
“Are you alright?” he asked with urgency as she resettled herself. “I’m so sorry! I didn’t mean any of that. At least not the way it sounded. Which was terrible, I know.”
“I’m fine. It’s … fine. And, no—I’m sorry.” She took a deep, head-clearing breath. “And really, I wasn’t trying to keep anything from you. It was just another … shitty piece of the whole story.” She took Nate’s arm. “There’s nothing else, I swear.”
He saw the hurt in her eyes, the regret. And at that moment, Nate decided to believe her, to continue to honor the memory of his imperfect father, and to try to do what his mother had tacitly asked: to let go of what was and focus on what is. Could he do it? He could only hope. But he also knew it would mean sealing away all the pesky details of the traumatic tale. Out of sight, out of mind. Or maybe in his case, it was the other way around.
Still, hadn’t opening up recently to Jennifer, to Danny, even to Amy, paid some obvious emotional dividends? Brought him closer to them, eased his mind a bit? Yet why didn’t candor come more naturally? He flashed back on something his father had said when Nate first started dating: “Women like a little mystery, kiddo, don’t show all your cards at once.” What a strange and oddly sophisticated thing to tell an impressionable teenager. Nate didn’t remember taking the advice to heart—girls were already a mystery to him back then, did he need to add more of it to the equation? Nonetheless, the seed had been planted and it apparently took root somewhere in his subconscious. And here he was.
“Why don’t you try and sleep a little?” Nate suggested. “You look exhausted.”
Amy nodded, appreciative. “Okay, maybe I will. Truth be told, I didn’t sleep too well last night.” A smile surfaced. “Also known as the forty-year-old mattress challenge.”
“Not to mention some thirty-year-old memories.”
“Those, too.” Amy leaned back, crossed her arms, and closed her eyes. She was snoozing in seconds.
Nate took his right hand off the wheel, reached behind to scratch Cody’s head, then settled in for the rest of the ride back to L.A. To paraphrase one of his dad’s classic rock favorites: what a short, strange trip it had been.