The Silhouette (Alan Quinn and the Second Lifes)

by Thomas William Shaw

CHAPTER TEN

  Dad pulled a stick of butter and a few slices of cheese from the fridge and sat them down on the counter next to the stove. He opened up small talk, “So, where is your mother?”

  I said, “She likes to run errands while I am at school, I suppose.”

  He collected a sharp knife and the loaf of bread, then switched on one of the eyes. He said, “Well, put your bag up and bring Peaches in the kitchen. I will make you a grilled cheese and we will talk.”

  I looked down at my toes, still struggling to allow any of it to sink in, “Can I just have the grilled cheese for now? I don’t really feel like talking.”

  Dad pulled out the frying pan from under the stove and sat it on the stovetop. His face crinkled with disappointment. Faintly, I could see a slight hint of understanding. He responded, “Yes, I suppose I could work with that.”

  I wrapped the satchel around the dining room chair at the head of the table and had a seat. I scratched Peaches on the head who had come over to nuzzle me with her big golden nose. Just to think that only a few nights before, Darius had come over to prove the existence of Draio. It really did a number on my mother and now she had gone out somewhere by herself. The red stone he left behind on the table stood as the painful reminder.

  I worried how she might react upon seeing my father for the first time in three weeks. I hoped the unopened wine bottle lying on the piano was a good sign that she would be on her best behavior when she got home.

  As the stove heated up, a greasy, buttery smell began to rise into the house. My stomach rumbled with the desire for a warm meal. Peaches was in agreement. She went into the kitchen and nosed Dad’s legs, hoping to grab a few scraps that may accidentally fall to the ground.

  Dad chuckled, “This is not for you, my new furry friend. The prince would not be very pleased with your tomfoolery.”

  About seven minutes passed before Dad grabbed the spatula to place the sandwich on a plate and delivered it to the table. “Anything to drink?” he said.

  I spoke quietly in hopes of hiding any instance where I might come off as forgiving, “I’ll take some water, I suppose.”

  He rushed back to the cabinets, grabbed the first glass he could get his hands on, and filled it to the brim with water from the faucet. He placed it in my hand and sat across from me, eagerly waiting for me to enjoy his creation.

  He said, “I have never gotten a chance to cook for you. It is not necessarily a steak dinner, but I am plenty proud.”

  I picked up the sandwich with both hands and studied the crispy brown marks from the frying pan that broke up the pattern of butter and cheese. I bit in and tore off a corner. It slid right down my throat, warming my body from stomach to my brain. The sensation was so overwhelming, that my eyes sealed shut, leaving me in my own personal world that only inhabited my sandwich and me. I felt completely ridiculous but I didn’t care.

  Dad reached across the table and grabbed my arm. He said, “Is there anything you would like to ask me? I am an open book.”

  I barely heard a word he said. The blackness I witnessed by closing my eyes was beginning to brighten up. Trees with crooked branches populated the entire landscape. A huge water source appeared with big, crashing waves far away in the distance. Grass rose up around my feet, but no higher than my ankles, which were not very big to begin with. It was a world where a beach, a forest, and a park could come together as one. It was perfect.

  Peaches ran into view, chasing a butterfly with a shiny pink glimmer radiating from its wings. Peaches leapt at least twenty feet in the air on every jump, but she was still no match for the butterfly that, I swear, began to laugh. I had never heard a butterfly make a noise before. It sounded like one of Peaches’ squeaky balls, which made my ears rattle when she would bring them to me.

  A man with hair down to his shoulders walked out of the ocean in the distance. I could not make out his face, but he was dressed up in a brown long coat to match his brown shirt, pants, and boots. There were sheaths and straps holding swords, knifes, and a few guns. The man resembled a pirate, but his face might as well have been completely blank for how well I recognized him.

  His mouth opened. He said, “Alan, are you ready?” Loud enough to assume that he was standing right beside me. The voice was familiar but not enough that I could immediately identify it.

  I said, “Ready for what?”

  The man stopped in his tracks about 50 yards from the park. A warm breeze passed through under the shimmering sunlight. He spread his arms out to his sides. A solemn voice filled with all of the tragedy in the world responded to me. He said, “War.”

  Gigantic streams of fire and electricity shot out of his hands, wrapping around every tree on the island and bringing them down in ashes, leaving little more than stumps in their places. It went quickly like an eraser on a notepad. The man aimed the streams toward the sun, which disappeared from the sky, leaving behind an atmosphere made completely of lightning and flames. The ocean dried up into a vapor. The remaining water swirled up into the sky into a roaring tornado.

  The grass around my feet caught fire. I wanted to run, but I was frozen in place with nowhere to turn. I was going to die right then and there without a friend. Peaches had vanished from the island, or worse, she was taken in the inferno.

  I looked at the man. He was laughing and pleased to see the world burn. The streams of power died down and returned to his palms. The tornado faded with the wind. The fiery sky remained, heating my cheeks to what felt like 1000 degrees. I felt it was only moments before I would dissolve into ash. I was beyond shaken.

  The man began walking towards me again. He moved 10 yards at a time, nothing like a human man. His face slowly came into focus as he neared.

  The sadness and hate in his eyes I had not witnessed since the night he left us. This was his plan, eh? He was sent back to take me from this world and hold me witness to this travesty. Dad grabbed a hold of my shoulders and lifted me up to his eye level.

  He shook me, saying, “Alan? Wake up.”

  The worlds around me blinked on and off like a light switch. I was back at the dining room table in Ashton. Dad was standing next to me with his hands on my shoulders. I weaseled out of his grip and went straight to the nearest window to open the curtains. I was thankful when the sunlight came pouring in. The vision had felt so real. Where did it come from? I watched as the stone’s glow died down.

  Dad sat back down at the table. He said, “Is something wrong? Perhaps we are moving too fast with our family reunion?”

  I said, “No, I was just day dreaming. I haven’t been able to do that in awhile,” but was still unsure what I had just envisioned.

  “Day dreams are my favorite,” he laughed to himself. “They are the mind telling you the world around you is not enough. There is something more incredible or terrifying waiting for you in a far off land. Our minds crave adventure. It is up to us to satiate their hunger.”

  I eyed him. He was in his professor mode, but something didn’t feel right. For the first time, I did not think him human. What if he was just a Silhouette who found human culture fascinating? Was I just an ongoing science experiment? I sat down at the piano chair, effectively keeping my distance from his place at the table. That lasted about five seconds. He approached me.

  “You hardly ate any of your sandwich,” he said.

  “I am not hungry.”

  “You seemed quite hungry a moment ago.”

  “Well, I am full,” I said, fishing for the words to say to him. “Where were you?”

  The question hit him in the chest. He was all up for answering questions until I took control of the inquisition. He sat down at the couch with his back firmly against the cushions. He twiddled his thumbs before he said, “Not too far from town.”

  “Were you with the dream chasers?”

  “Davison and his group have been very good to this family. I am not sure I understand the animosity you feel towards th
em.”

  “You did not answer my question.”

  A slight glimmer of admiration bloomed on his face, “You sure have grown up in the last couple of weeks. I left a thirteen year old and came home to a seasoned adult.”

  I crossed my arms and tilted my head. He got the point.

  “Yes. We were in the Dahlgreen area, exploring. I told your mom what I was going to be doing, but I guess she forgot to tell you or something.”

  The fact that he would say that triggered a dreadful pain in my forehead. I said, “She did a mighty fantastic job of forgetting, didn’t she? She has been completely wrecked since you left.”

  Dad froze a few moments to collect his thoughts. He said, “You would not—”

  I rose from my seat, “Understand? Is it because I am your stupid thirteen-year-old son? I can’t even begin to explain what the two of us have gone through in just the last couple of days.”

  He perked up, “What sort of things?”

  I hadn’t realized where I was going with my tirade. Was it the best time to bring up Darius and everything else that had been going on?

  Dad leaned back, “Well? I would not have asked if I did not care for the answer.”

  I raced through my mind, trying to find something smaller to cover. I said, “Ok, Mother has developed a nasty addiction to wine. Mostly, I have had to care for her.”

  Confused, he said, “Wine?”

  “A lot of wine.”

  “That all?”

  I fought to hold his gaze. I wasn’t ready to talk Draio with dear old Dad. I said, “That’s the most of it.”

  “Well, I am terribly sorry for what I have put you and your mother through,” he said. He stood up and turned to the portrait of Mom hanging above the couch. If I looked hard enough, I could almost make out that his eyes were watering. He said, “I love her, you know?”

  I crossed my arms, “I guess.”

  “I know you will never understand the motivations for my actions but they are what they are. I am a man built around his dreams and those dreams told me to distance myself from my wife and my son. Those dreams told me danger was coming. What was I supposed to do, Alan? Yes, I could have stayed, but that would have either put you in danger or it would have said I had lost faith in my passion. You cannot expect me to do something like that. Could you?”

  The creeping memory of Darius’ horrible fate tickled my brain, sending a shiver up my spine. Mom was worse than she had ever been and my life had been on the line more than once and the week wasn’t over. I wondered why Dad thought he was protecting us by disappearing. There was so much room for it to continue to get worse without him.

  “Why now?” I questioned.

  He turned back to me, “Why what?”

  I said, “If it was so important to distance yourself from us, why are you home now?”

  He said, “Sometimes love is too strong to be kept at a bay,” and proceeded out of the living room and up the stairs to his bedroom.

  I was dumbstruck. The two of us had never had a father-son moment together, but here I was trying my hardest to throw it all away like yesterday’s garbage. Other than never being around when I needed him, what had he truly done to hurt me? He introduced me to a new world that was coming to life all around me. Wasn’t that a good thing?

  “I trust you will make sound decisions in this pivotal moment?” Lathon appeared as a thick, black human shape in the far corner of the room. “Right?”

  “Keep your voice down. I don’t know what to think,” I said. “I need him.”

  “You need him in his present state like human civilizations need cholera. He is a tampered good. He has a dangerous air about him.”

  Anger rising in my voice, “Is that what you think? He has a dangerous air about him? You’re one to talk about dangerous people! I bet you could kill me on your first try. I imagine I am better off with him.”

  “You do not mean that and you know it.”

  I remained silent.

  He moved to the kitchen table in record speeds, “This man went missing, admitted he went on an adventure with some of the most dangerous human beings I have met since the first time I sprouted into existence, and now he wants to be lovey dovey with his family that he has hardly ever spent any time with up until now.”

  He mused, “On a second thought, yes. This must all be perfectly normal because that is how you perceive it.”

  Tired of being handed lectures from Lathon, I said, “This is my Dad we are talking about.”

  “And?”

  “Well, he is my creator. He is responsible for my well being. He may have done a lot of awful things in the last few weeks—”

  “Ha. That is an understatement.”

  Before I could stop myself, I said, “But, when it boils down to it, he is what separates me from you. For you see, you have no idea where you come from. He’s my dad. It’s something you would never understand. You are a glorified orphan. Lathon, I mean—”

  It was too late. Lathon had faded from the room. The house became silent with the exception of the creaks from my father wondering upstairs. I punched the tabletop. I was becoming a disaster to everyone around me.

  Lathon appeared on the couch. His frame shaking like a rattlesnake tail. He said, “I have come to a decision. I will allow you to try your dad for a few days.”

  “He is not a puppy.”

  In a struggle to keep calm, he said, “I want you to experience firsthand what you are up against. Maybe then you will grow to respect me. When I think you’ve become desperate enough, I will make my grand return.”

  Confusion set in. “Where will you go?”

  “That I will keep to myself. You are fraternizing with an enemy spy. I would not have that information getting into the wrong hands.”

  “I guess this is goodbye for now?”

  Lathon disappeared in a millisecond, leaving me alone with my sorrows. The first noise to break the silence was the clicks and clacks that hit the wooden planks as Peaches walked downstairs. A squeaky, turtle toy rested in her mouth. She walked it over to me and sat it next to my feet.

  A slight twinkle in her eyes made me smile. I thought I had already figured out where Lathon was going to be hiding for a short while. Before I could sneak in that I knew Peaches’ true identity, she let out an obnoxious bark, eliminating my suspicions. Everything was going to be normal after all.

  I supposed I could use a break from Draio’s finest. There was homework to be done, dinners to be eaten, time to be spent with my family—normal stuff.

  Dad walked back downstairs. He stopped himself at the front door. As his back turned to me, I let all of my emotions take over. I ran to him and grabbed a hold with my entire wingspan. “I am sorry,” I said.

  His voice was gruff, pained. He said, “Apologies are useless, wretch. Let go of me.”

  “What?”

  He turned around and hugged me back. “I said, ‘I love you, son.’ Things are about to get a lot better.”

  “That is not what you—said.”

  For all I knew, my mind was playing tricks on me. Dad had never said something so cold and calculated in his life. I had a hard time believing he picked up new speech patterns while he was away. He held on tight to me, only letting go when we heard a loud noise coming from outside.

  Mom was home. She was shouting to herself as she came up the driveway. I hoped her mood would improve once I showed her who had come home at last.