GRIT (The Silver Nitrate Series Book 2) (13 page)

“H
er name was
Talise, and she was born in Canada,” the old man began, scooting his empty plate across the table with the back of his hand. Silver didn’t expect such a thing. She’d come to the house to meet up with Zenith, but soon discovered he’d gotten held up at work. Problem was, she was already there. Denise insisted she have a bite to eat while she waited, and led her into the kitchen where Paw sat, looking a bit sullen and depressed in a pair of old, blue denim overalls and threadbare, white socks.

The full moon showed brightly through the window as the soft-spoken woman on the radio sitting on the kitchen counter announced the next song, the old man looked up.

“Can I talk to you about my grandson?” His eyes pleaded, sparkled with untold tales.

“Yes, of course… of course,” she answered, eager to hear what Mr. Taylor had to say… it was much more different than she’d imagined. Much more different indeed…

“Zen’s mother’s family moved here to Syracuse when she was two or three. My wife and I met them, and helped them get situated. They were Seneca, too.”

Silver nodded in understanding as Denise disappeared to the living room with a dust cloth and Pledge spray.

“Talise and Degan, my son, were inseparable once they hit their teenage years. Before that, they’d just say pleasantries. I knew that my son, Degan, liked Talise… liked her as more than a friend. Degan was very good in school; he was brave and proud to be Iroquois. He was always helping those that were less fortunate. His mother and I raised him that way. We were blessed. I had good jobs. I had the support of the council. Osha, my wife, Zen’s grandmother, was respected as well and she did a lot for the community.

“Degan and Talise fell in love and got married. No one was surprised. They just seemed to fit together.” He moved his fingertips together, as if they were drawn to one another like magnets. “They weren’t married more than three or four months before Talise became pregnant.” He smiled sadly. “It was Zen…” He grabbed his water glass and took a shaky sip before setting it back down.

“Paw, sorry, Mr. Taylor, Zenith really is conflicted about his parents, particularly his father. He’s come a long way, though.”

The man kept staring down at the table, not looking her in the eye.

“Yes, I know, and you can call me Paw, that’s fine. You see, Zenith worshiped his father, Silver. Degan knew how to get things done. He understood how to work the system. He also was one of the proudest fathers I’d ever seen. When Zen’s first tooth fell out, he called everyone.” The man chuckled.

“He always talked about how talented Zen was, too. See,” He coughed roughly into a tissue then began once more. “Zen had loved music since he was a tiny baby. He was fussy as an infant. I believe it’s called colic. The only thing that would settle him down was music. One evening, his parents had to go out without him, so Osha and I watched our grandson. He’d become fussy again. Osha would hold him close, hold him tight.” He smiled, pretending to rock a baby in his arms. “But it did no good. Zen had some lungs on him. He only grew louder, more impatient. I had an idea. I took the baby from my wife, and I walked into our spare bedroom. In that bedroom was a drum set covered with boxes and this and that.” He waved nonchalantly. “I hadn’t played them in years.

“I sat him down, cleared it all off, and then brought him close to me. In one arm, I held the stick and softly hit the drum; in the other, I cradled him. Silver,” he said, looking at her with sorrow in his eyes. “It was like… a light switch! He watched me so intensely. I stopped drumming, and he began crying again. I started drumming, he stopped instantaneously!” He snapped his finger. “That worked. I found it interesting but thought no more of it. That was until his father told me, several years later, that he’d taken Zen into a music store and the boy touched the guitars, the pianos, but then saw the drums and made himself at home.

“He climbed his tiny little body onto that seat, Silver, grabbed those sticks, and began to bang and bang and bang. Degan was shocked! He said, ‘Father, this wasn’t normal.’ He said, ‘Zenith was making real songs, real music… It sounded good, like he knew what he was doing!’ A crowd had gathered around, store employees and other customers, and they all clapped when he was finished. My son said to me, ‘Father, you should’ve seen his face when they clapped. He lit up. I’ve never seen him smile so big. Can you teach him?’ I agreed to do so, but I had no idea what was truly going on. You see, Silver, you have to see something like that in person to believe it…

“I brought him into that spare room once again. This time, he no longer fit in my arms, but he climbed up on the chair. I handed him the sticks and said, ‘Play.’ He hesitated for a second. Sometimes Zen was a bit shy as a boy, but that shyness disappeared once he started playing. I stood there in complete shock. I called Osha in… she screamed. You see, she thought it was me playing, not him. That’s how good he sounded. I don’t know how he got that way. Degan and Osha said it was from me. I’d like to think so. But, he was so good… so good, Silver. So, from that point, I taught him everything I knew and he took it from there.

“He’s won many awards. He played for the council several times. He knows how to play our ceremonial drums, and traditional ones, too. This got him a lot of attention. Zen became popular, but didn’t seem to care. All he wanted to do was practice his drums. He was a pretty good student, too… Education was important, though. I told him early on, if his grades slipped, no drums. He kept them up, all As and an occasional B here and there. Nothing kept his interest as much as music, but girls became a close second.”

Silver burst out laughing, and the old man followed suit.

“You know, Zen accused me of changing, and I’ve thought about that. Some days, Silver, I look at him and think he’s Degan. He corrects me, and I see that it hurts him, but he tries to play it off. Zen doesn’t like to really show anything but humor and anger… His father was that way.” He hesitated, as if needing a moment. “But Zen hurts very badly, and he became confused after his parents’ passing. He’d had a good life, and then, there he was living with Osha and me. Osha was ill, but we told no one. She had heart disease.” He took another sip of his water. “I decided to not tell Zen about what happened to his parents. Osha and I believed he was too young to hear those sort of things…but, as fate would have it, he got wind of it, and that’s when a part of my grandson changed, died, was never the same. He became… cynical, cold hearted.

“He was disrespectful to women, to everyone, really. I became quite sore with him—told him he should not behave that way. He stopped, at least in front of me, but inside, it was still growing within him. It’s like he hated all of humanity sometimes. His teachers were concerned—said he was bright, but standoffish. He also dressed differently. You see, my son—sorry, my grandson—had his own sense of style. He’s never looked like everyone else, not even his peers. I believe he got that from Degan… he was the same way. Zen got his ears pierced when he was quite young. I told him no, so he did it himself in our bathroom with a safety pin and rubbing alcohol.

Silver emitted a soft laugh.

“He would sometimes shave his head, but just on one side… He got tattoos, his nose pierced, all sorts of stuff. At one point he had bars going through his eyebrows. He was an odd sight to me, but popular at school once he joined that band. No one picked on him because he looked different; it seemed actually that people respected him because he
did
. He did what he wanted, didn’t care what other people said. He joined that band with his friends eventually, and that helped, but he was still a very angry person, Silver. Then… Osha died.” He reached for his tissue and dabbed at his eyes. “That, I believe, was the final straw for him. He and Osha were quite close. We have two other grandsons, Len’s sons, but they’ve lived out of state with their mother since they were babies. We rarely saw them. Still, I believe Zen was her favorite.” He smiled sadly. “He decided to get a trade, so he went to welding school. I was very proud of him. He did well, got good paying jobs and worked quite hard. He was dependable, reliable.

“I think he used those drums to play his pain away… and he worked so hard to buy a house because he wanted a place of his own, to be isolated. You know, Zen always had a lot of friends, but he didn’t trust anyone. No one could get close to him. I knew though that, if he was like his father, he’d want to eventually open himself up to more, because Zen… Zen just wanted to be loved, Silver. He wanted someone to love him, and not leave. Everyone he cared about has left. He wanted to be accepted and for someone to understand him without him having to explain himself. I believe he found that in
you
.”

Silver reached across the table and stroked the man’s hands.

Paw is not going to make me cry!

She was so moved and what the man shared, she knew she’d keep it close to her heart forever.

“Zenith pulled up!” Denise called out right before the sound of a truck door slamming shut ensued.

“Thank you for sharing this with me,” Silver whispered, giving the man’s hands a gentle squeeze.

“Thank you for loving and taking care of my Zen… I’m okay now. Yes, I’m just fine. So happy he has you in his life…”

“Well, can you
tell him that I called?” Zenith asked, exasperated.

“Yes,” the woman stated on the other end before hanging up abruptly.

Javier refused to accept his calls on his cell phone, or at his second job as a third shift warehouse manager. It had been weeks since they spoke. When he’d returned from Michigan for practice, he discovered the basement door had a new lock. He could hear them playing inside, but he was all but ignored. He banged on the door, cursed, but no one let him in. No one helped. The extra sting came when one of the songs he’d chosen was being practiced, right then and there, rubbing the situation further in his face: Miguel’s ‘Pussy Is Mine’.

He and Flip had talked a few times, and though his friend had tried to talk some sense into Javier, it was no use. Javier felt betrayed and lied to, and didn’t want Zenith crawling back after the fact.

Like he was second best, the consolation prize.

He hadn’t told them he’d gotten the deal, but turned his back on it. It was obvious that they assumed he’d been rejected. He didn’t even care about that; his heart was cracked and out poured red and white smoke.

The shit hurt. He’d hoped it wouldn’t, that he could just move past it, but it was tearing him apart inside. He was as much a part of ‘Pure Grit’ as Javier, and one without the other simply didn’t make sense. He was losing focus at work now, falling into daydreams. Not only was that not like him, it was downright dangerous.

Shaken out of his thoughts, he smiled as Silver approached him, clad in a robe and her hair plaited against her scalp in thin, long black braids. Beads of water glistened against her shoulders like crystals.

“I thought you’d be asleep by now,” she said in a slightly husky voice. She slid into bed with him, plumping up her pillow before beckoning him to move closer.