Chapter Fourteen: Prodigal father

My father sets up each of our houses with timed lights that switch on every night at 7 p.m. They stay on until turned off by hand or by the timer at 1 a.m. It was just after midnight as I reached the house and all the windows were dark. I checked the houses next door and across the street. They had lights on so it wasn’t one of the rolling blackouts performed by the local DWP or an area power outage. Someone had been or was in the house. Someone hostile. I just didn’t know if it was my father, or someone worse.

I parked the car on the next street over, by an alley that bisected the block. It was covered by overgrown hedges on both sides and you had to know the passage was there in order to find it.

The backyard was just as dark as the front of the house. There was no movement in any of the windows. Then I saw the signal. The screen door to the kitchen was propped open with a pot of withered herbs – chamomile for safety. Oregano would have meant get out. The Pater was back.

I waited in the dark of the kitchen for him to say something. My father can turn silence into torture; talking first was a tactical error.

He was seated at the kitchen counter. The glow from the microwave’s clock only illuminated the outline of his head and torso.

I reached out and flipped the kitchen light switch. Yes. That tall dark-haired man with the bruised face and thick scab under his left eye was my father.

“Nice of you to call in.” I said.

“I was tied up.”

I looked at his wrists and arms. No ligature marks.

“Why were you at school this late?” He asked.

On the counter was his mobile phone. The GPS tracking application was in play. My car was the red dot pulsing in the middle of his screen.

“I went for a run.”

“And then rolled around in the grass to cool off?”

I didn’t look down at myself. I must have picked up debris in the skirmish with Logan. I should have changed in the car. Sloppy.

“You missed your call in. Twice.” I countered.

“You should have been out of here over a week ago.” He said.

“Your fingers obviously weren’t broken.”

“You let the battery run out on your cell phone.” He said.

“You could have called.”

“You broke protocol.”

“I’m sick of protocol.” There. I said it. It was the same as saying I was sick of him.

“It’s what’s kept you alive.”

“I exist. I don’t enjoy it.”

He didn’t have a come-back for that.

“You’ve made it your mission to keep me alive. I don’t see what the point is.”

“He changed the subject. The house is cleaned. Get in the car. We’re leaving.”

“No.”

“You’ve met someone.”

“Several someones.”

“A boy.”

“Have you been spying on me? Am I now on your hit list?”

“When I met your mother, I wanted to quit who I was and move into her life. It got her killed.”

“No. That’s wrong. You got her killed. You couldn’t stop being whatever you were – are. I don’t remember much, but I know you were gone a lot. I know I was afraid of you whenever you came back.”

“This is not the time. We’re going.”

“No.”

He looked at me. He was analyzing his options. Whether he would have to hurt me to make me obey. Whether I would fight him with every dirty trick he had ever taught me. Which I would.

“Mom got the better end of the deal. She died. We continue on as ghosts trapped in a hostile world. She didn’t want this life for me.”

Nothing moved in my father’s face, but all light seemed to drain from his eyes.