Because of Ellison (26 page)

After I arrived here, I kept to myself. I made acquaintances
obviously, but I
I
was quick to side step any
romantic advances and I kept my friendships to the people who were more serious
about school work than their social lives. Ellison had yelled at me for
becoming a recluse, but I couldn’t help it. I wanted to impress her — to
make her proud. I’d never wanted that before and the desire was too much to
ignore. I finally joined a non-profit group to appease her and keep her from
worrying that I’d become some creepy guy holed up in an apartment who only saw
the light of day when he had class.

Luckily, there were only two more weeks of school before we
got a break and I intended on returning home and using my parents plane to fly
down to see Ellison. I would only be able to stay for a day or two, but I had
this overwhelming urge to hold her, to talk to her in person, to take care of
her in any way that I could.

~
    
~
    
~

The morning after that night, Ellison had laid into me over
email. If I’d printed the email, I was sure it would have been several pages
long. She let me have it for my threat to fly down and she let me have it for
my constant messages. I had no idea where her anger had come from because, even
for Ellison, the length of the email was a bit much. I didn’t text her for the
rest of that day trying to give her time to calm down. However, when I texted
her the following day, she would only respond with one word phrases or curt
explanations. It’s been like that for the past two weeks, which only made me
more determined to fly down and find out what was going on with her.

I’d left school as soon as break started and I was pulling
up to my parents’ house in New York. As usual, my mother had the place decked
out for the holidays and everything looked perfect and cold. I sat in the car
looking up at the perfectly placed lights and the festive ornaments and bows
she had placed throughout the large yard. But, despite the obvious attention
that had been paid to the detail of the display, there was no warmth to it
— no love.

Climbing from the car, I grabbed the bags I’d packed for the
trip and walked inside the house, tossing my bags down in the foyer. My mother
must have heard something messing up the perfection of her décor and came
flying down the hallway.

“Hunter! Honey, why are you home so early and why aren’t you
putting your stuff in the guesthouse? You’d be more comfortable there. I
refurnished it.” A fake smile appeared on her face and I groaned.

“I need to use the plane. I’m going to Florida for a few
days.”

Mom never lost her fake smile when she said, “Well that’s
not going to be possible. There is a little less than a week left before
Thanksgiving and you need to be here. It wouldn’t look right if my son didn’t
come home for the holidays.”

I scoffed. “Mom, I’m going to Florida, one way or the other.
If I have to drive, I’ll drive, but I’m going. If you let me take the plane, I
can make sure I’m back in time to play the perfect child for your friends.”

Her jaw dropped. “How dare you? I want you around for the
holidays because that’s what families do and not because I’m just trying to
make a good impression.”

Brushing past her, I walked to the kitchen and yelled back
over my shoulder. “I’m going, mom. You can decide how I get there, but nothing
is going to stop me.”

I sat down at one of the barstools and grabbed a pile of my
mail that my mom had been saving while I’d been gone. Flipping through the
assortment of envelopes, I tossed most to the side and chuckled at the amount
of junk mail I’d received over the few weeks I’d been gone. I also tossed out
the phone bills and credit card statements because my parents’ accountant took
care of those electronically. However, on the bottom of the stack, I found a
plain white envelope, addressed to me, but without a return address. The
writing was nothing more than chicken
scratch
and I
immediately ripped open the top and extracted a two page, handwritten letter.

Hunter:

I’m not good at
writing out long-winded shit, but I’m going to attempt to clarify some things
with you that I’ve been considering.

Before reading the rest of the letter, I flipped to the
second page and scrolled my eyes down to the signature. It read ‘Henry James.’
I almost dropped the paper from my hands. Why the fuck was Henry writing to me?
Flipping back to the first page, I continued.

You know I’m not your
biggest fan, and I’m not writing to retract my earlier threats. I meant every
single last one of them and even if you fuck up after I’ve passed away, I’ll
still find a way to pay you a visit. I can promise you that. I just wanted to
get that promise out of the way before moving on to why I’m writing this.

I’ve noticed something
over the past couple of days and I can’t sit around and ignore it. I don’t have
time for that. I know that before you left you were hiking daily with El and I
know the reason she allowed that was because you followed her around until she
had no choice but the talk to you. I’ll admit, that was pretty slick and I’d
used that maneuver on Ms. James plenty of times during our marriage, so I won’t
hold it against you. I’m not proud to admit this but I found some notes in
Ellison’s room one day after she’d returned from one of those hikes. My
curiousity
got the best of me and I read them. I’m sure you
know what was in those letters because you wrote them.

When I first met you,
I thought you were looking out for yourself over the needs of my daughter. I
know what it’s like to be a man your age and the last thing I wanted was for my
daughter to fall for the crap I assumed you’d been feeding her. But then I read
the letters, and you surprised me. I’m not saying I trust you any further than
I did before I read them, but it made me consider the fact that you might care
for El more than I realized.

So, before I leave
this life, I wanted to correct some things that could become mistakes later on.
Since you left, my daughter has been in a funk. It wouldn’t be obvious to the
outside observer, because, let’s face it, my daughter is good at concealing her
thoughts. But I’m her father and I can tell. Even after her break up with Finn,
she never acted sad or lost. It pains me to see her act that way now.

What I’m attempting to
say is this: I know Ellison cares about you and I suspect that you care for her
more than I originally believed. I see no reason for you two to go your
separate ways if there’s a chance that you can make her happy, and THAT is all
I want for my daughter. I still think you’re a punk kid and I still think you
have tons of growing up to do, but you have potential and I think that if you
straighten up your shit, you can be the person that makes her happy. So,
consider this a challenge. Before I die, I want to give you my blessing for
pursuing my daughter, but I only do so with the condition that you become a man
and not a boy. A man will look out for her over
hisself
and a man will take care of her no matter what it takes — I think you can
be that man.

Don’t go showing this
letter to my daughter in an attempt to win her either. That’s a punk maneuver
and once Ellison reads this she’ll be pissed you went against my wishes. But I
will tell you this: if you want to be with Ellison, if you really love her as I
suspect you do (considering her damn phone goes off about every five seconds),
then grow the fuck up. Do something with your life and do it for yourself and
for her. Be something she can be proud of, be something she will accept into
her life. I’ve raised her not to put up with bullshit and I’m sure by now,
you’ve learned that. Don’t expect anything less with her. Most importantly, be
her equal. She’s an amazing person and it’ll be difficult for any man to be
worthy of her time. So make yourself worthy.

That’s the only advice
I can offer you, son. What you do with it is up to you.

Henry James

I read the letter three times to make sure that I understood
it correctly. Henry James — the man who’d explained to me numerous times
how my life would end badly if I messed with his daughter — was asking me
to go after her, to not give up in my pursuit, and to become the person worthy
of her. My jaw must have hit the countertop because my mother’s curiosity was
peaked to see the expression on my face.

“What is that, Hunter? Who is that letter from?” She
attempted to take it from my hand, but I pulled it to my chest. Henry had
intended this message for me, man to man, and I was going to honor that.

Standing up suddenly, I looked at my mom while folding the
letter back into its envelope and shoving it in my pocket. “I have to go. Am I
allowed to take the plane, or … ”

“You’re not going anywhere, Hunter.”

My entire body tensed and rage began to bloom within my head
and chest. “Excuse me?”

My mom’s expression was stern. Her brows furrowed between
her eyes and her lips were pulled into a thin line. “Your dad is on his way
home now. You’re not going to screw up the holiday season for us by, once
again, making a stupid decision. We sent you to Florida to learn about what
it’s like to live in poverty, not for you to join those people.”

The way she said ‘those people’ made my stomach turn. It was
obvious she viewed Bill and Lily as nothing of value, as something less than
her and disposable. That little bit of rage within me grew in intensity until
it was an inferno of loathsome contempt towards the woman who’d raised me.

“You can’t stop me.” I stalked in her direction and noticed
how she backed up a few steps when I approached. “
Those people
have more strength, honor, determination and
intelligence than you can ever hope to have. What’s more important is that they
have a heart, something
which
appears to have turned
cold within you. Bill raised Lily as best he could as a single father. He gave
her everything and he raised a beautiful person in the process, however you and
dad turned your backs on him when he needed you. You could have done something,
but you chose to turn your noses up at him because he didn’t fit the mold of
your perfect fucking family! Bill McCormick and Henry James raised two amazing
children and they did it in the best way they could, meanwhile you and dad
raised a fuck up — but you were too fucking busy to even notice. Luckily
for you,
those people
stepped in and
did something about it. They accomplished something in three months that you
and dad couldn’t bother to complete over a 19-year period. So, no mom, I’m not
going to sit around and prance for your friends to make you look better —
because it’s not your achievement.”

I pushed past her and walked quickly to the foyer.

“How do you expect to get there, Hunter? You don’t own your
car and we’re not giving you permission to drive it to Florida.”

I turned around to find her with her arms crossed over her
chest. Her gloating expression showed me that she thought she had me cornered.
I intended to show her that two could play that game.

“Then have me arrested, mom. Be sure to raise enough of a
stink about it that it’s all over the news. I’m sure it’ll be much easier for
you to explain that I couldn’t join dinner because I was sitting in jail than
it would to simply explain that I was visiting relatives.”

Her eyes narrowed and her skin took on a red tone. I’d
cornered her right back and she was too focused on her precious image to
continue with her threat. I turned back around, grabbed my bags and stepped out
of the house determined to fix a mistake and find the only person that
mattered.

Ellison

It was like he’d given up as soon as he was put in that
hospital bed in the living room.

When they’d first transported dad to the house, he looked
the same, spoke the same - acted the same. But over the past two weeks, I’ve
watched him age 30 years. It’s like nothing I could have imagined. It was
almost as if I’d taken photos of him every day for those 30 years and created a
fast moving flip book. The only difference was I couldn’t flip it back to the
way he was before he got sick.

Before they brought him home, I’d been up all night, barely
able to fall asleep while I wallowed in self-pity. The only thing that broke up
the ‘pity party for one’ was the aggravating text I received from Hunter when
he’d threatened to leave school. The one fucking thing I didn’t want for him
and he threatened me with it immediately when the shit hit the fan. I’d pushed
myself out of bed that morning and typed out a lengthy email about it. He was
the one good thing in my life that my father’s cancer wasn’t destroying, and I
couldn’t allow him to mess that up. I’d tucked him away in Massachusetts, far
enough that he wouldn’t be dragged into the desperate helplessness of my life.
I wanted him to stay there, to become something. It was the only victory I felt
like I had over this nightmare situation — letting him go was the hardest
thing to do, but he was a star that I launched into the sky so that his light
would be protected from the shadow that was slowly creeping into my life. If
nothing else, I could look at that light and think that at least one thing
hadn’t been tainted by my father’s disease.

And Hunter threatened to fuck it up by coming back.

I haven’t been responding to his texts very
much,
in fact, I’ve kept my phone tucked away in a drawer
most of the time. I have nothing to say to him, nothing to tell him that
wouldn’t make him want to rush down even more. I’ve dropped 10 pounds already
over the last two weeks. I’ve been a constant caregiver to my father and I’ve
only had breaks when Jake or the nurses were here to let me sleep. I could
sleep forever and it wouldn’t be enough. I’m exhausted, I’m beat down and my
heart is torn from my chest every day and every hour — it feels like it
never ends. But I keep getting up, keep brushing off the pain of watching my
father die to cook for him, clean for him, and administer his medications. I
can’t tell Hunter those things. I couldn’t lie to him either. So I just said
nothing.