Page 84 of The Blessing

“I didn’t want you to feel any different,” he rambles on, unfazed by my sudden change in demeanor.

“Stop being so fucking vague and tell me, Dad,” I quietly spit out, not wanting to draw too much attention to our unfortunate conversation.

“She came back because she knew you were here.” What the fuck? “That day you said you ran into her, well, I asked her about it and she had no idea who you were. She wouldn’t have approached you like that if she had known.”

“Known what?” I spit out, not recognizing my own voice. “Who is she, Dad?”

He says the words and I feel my entire body shutdown. I feel fucking paralyzed in my chair as I stare at him in utter disbelief. I should have known. God, I should’ve fucking known! She felt so fucking familiar to me and now I know why. My mom… Evelyn… has been so cold to me my entire fucking life, and now I know why. She never had an inkling of anything resembling love. I had brushed it off... I told myself it didn’t matter. I told myself she was defective in some way and just couldn’t love me right—but all this fucking time—God, I just can’t believe it. I can’t believe my dad would do this to me. I can’t believe my dad would allow me to grow up thinking I was unlovable just so he could hide this dirty little secret from me. I can hear my chair rattling beneath me. Every muscle in my body tenses as if I were receiving a harsh physical blow. I want to punch something—someone. I just want a release from all of my fucking pain.

“Trevor? Son?”

An angry tear rolls down my cheek before I can stop it. My entire life has been a fucking lie. “That woman is my mother?” I ask, my voice raspy as I’m barely able to get the words out.

With a clenched jaw and watery, bloodshot eyes he nods. Before I can stop myself, my fist slams down on the table, knocking my dad’s cup of coffee off. It shatters on the tiled floor. All I can see is fucking red. I can’t listen to another word my dad says. I don’t listen to what anyone says as I storm out of the coffeehouse with hot, angry tears rolling down my face. Fucking pussy! I need to feel better. I need to feel something. I need a release. I turn facing the brick wall of the coffeehouse and slam my fist into it repeatedly until I see my blood staining the bricks. The pain in my knuckles feels incredible. It distracts me from the pain burning within me and makes me feel alive.

How could she leave me? If that woman is my mom, how the fuck could she leave me behind? Why wasn’t I good enough for her? I fall to my knees, trying to catch my breath. I’m sure I look fucking crazy, but I’m too far gone and pissed to give a shit about that now. I hear the chimes of the coffeehouse door opening from my spot on the sidewalk.

I feel my dad’s arm wrap around my shoulder and hear him say, “Son, let me talk to you. Please, let me explain. I did it to protect you. It was the only way.”

A dark laugh passes through my lips. “You protected me by lying to me? Here, I thought I was pissed at you for having an affair. I could’ve forgiven that though because I fucking loved you. But now? Now you tell me that the woman I thought was my mom for my entire fucking life, isn’t my actual mother? That instead, my mom is a woman I met one fucking time in my entire fucking life at a Goddamn grocery store!”

I want to ask why he’d do this to me, but why waste my fucking breath? Part of me wants to beat the shit out of him, while another part wants him to console me like he used to when I was a small boy. That second thought pisses me off. I don’t need his comfort. I don’t need anyone. I stand up and walk off, leaving both my truck and him behind. I walk in a haze, too angry to see where I’m going. I don’t care where I end up, as long as it’s far away from him. I let my feet lead the way. My body takes me to a dive bar and I throw open the door, allowing some light to shine in on the darkness of the bar. There’s no customers inside, only a bartender coming from the back as soon as he sees me take a seat. He tries to make small talk, probably wondering why I look like fucking shit. I cut him off, ordering a whiskey, straight up before slouching over the bar top.

As soon as I get my drink, I down it. The burn is a welcomed one, feeling like a greeting from an old friend. That exhilarating feeling doesn’t last long, though and it’s quickly replaced by the burn of regret. Angry tears fill my eyes and my entire body tenses in frustration and disappointment. The bartender asks me something, but I don’t hear him. I quickly tell him to “fuck off,” causing him to return to the back while muttering curses under his breath. I slap my face once, and then a second time even harder. What the fuck have I just done?

In a matter of seconds, I’ve let everyone down. I let Grey down. I fucking promised him I’d never do this again. I told him I would be a good dad to him and look at me now. I can’t stop the tears as they trail down my face. I can’t believe I’ve fucked everything up so quickly. Before I know what I’m doing, I ball my hand into a fist and slam it down on the glass, causing it to shatter across the bar top. I stare at my bloodied hand for an unmeasurable amount of time before wiping my tears with the other. I pick out a few shards of glass protruding from my wounds. With my bloodied hand, I reach for my phone, wanting to hear the sound of Ronnie’s voice before I do something much worse. She answers on the second ring.

“Trevor?”

Her voice immediately soothes my entire being. She’s the cure to any ailment I could possibly have. I close my eyes and allow myself to calm down to the sound of her breathing.

“Trevor? What’s wrong?” When I don’t answer right away, she quickly continues, “Baby, you’re scaring me!”

My heart drops. She would be so disappointed if she knew where I was. I’ve never felt so fucking ashamed of myself in my entire life. I was doing so well and now I fucked it all up. Just like I fuck-up everything I touch.

“Trevor, where are you? I’ll come to you, wherever you are.”

“Ronnie,” I finally gasp, sounding just as cowardly as I feel. “I messed up.”

“Trevor?” Her voice raises an octave. “Baby, just tell me where you are and I’ll come get you. We can talk about this when you’re home.”

“I messed up really bad,” I tell her with a shaky voice.

“I understand, baby, but you need to tell me where you are, so I can help you.”

I hear Grey’s cries in the background and I wish I were there to soothe him. I just want to hold him. I just want to go home. “I’m at a bar,” I tell her, feeling fucking repulsed.

“Okay, Trevor. We’re coming,” she says without a trace of judgment in her voice. “Just tell me which one.”

I drift outside and look up at the poorly painted sign. As soon as I read off the name, Ronnie assures me she’ll look it up on her phone and be on her way.

“I love you, Trevor,” she says, sounding very worried all of the sudden. “We’ll be there soon.”

I know why she told me she loved me. She’s worried I’ll do something worse if my self-deprecation continues. She’s right, if she hadn’t told me that—I don’t know what I’d do. As sad as that fucking is to admit, I need to hear it right now. Maybe I’m struggling with my life more than I care to admit.

I return to the bar and throw some money down to pay for my whiskey, including enough to cover the broken glass and cursing at the bartender. I grab a towel from behind the bar and wrap it around my bloodied hand before saying goodbye to this hellhole. It’s amazing a place like this can harness all the demons I’ve been suppressing since the day my brother died. Feeling beaten down and ashamed, I slowly make my way outside and take a seat on the sidewalk. I put my head in my hands and contemplate how easy it was for me to pick up that drink. The thought is fucking debilitating. It means I can fuck-up at any time. What will happen if I lose control again? One wrong decision could ruin my life. I can’t allow myself to do anything that would jeopardize my relationship with Ronnie and Grey. I’d be so incredibly lost without them.

As I sit under the afternoon sun, I think about Felicity… my mother. I wonder if deep down I knew there was something distinctive about her when I saw her for the very first time. I thought she seemed familiar, but perhaps that was because she looked so much like me. Our features are similar—so similar that I can’t believe it didn’t occur to me before. Then again, I hadn’t thought about the possibility of my dad lying to me my entire life. He said he did it to protect me, but protect me from what? What was so bad that he needed to lie to me for all of these years?