by Hayden Hunt
“You read this?” he snapped. “You read my story?”
“No, only this page. And I’m sorry, I know you didn’t want me to, but I missed you so much and I had to do anything to feel close to you. Reading your writing really helped me.”
At hearing this, his face softened.
“Well, okay, I guess… But I don’t really understand. What does this page have to do with your proposal?”
“For a while I was going back and forth on whether to come here and propose. Not because I don’t want to with my whole heart, I do, no doubts about it. But I wasn’t sure what you’d think and that’s what made me question myself. Until I read this.” I took the paper from his hand. “Baby, I want this. I want to be with you like this. I want it to be ten years down the line with us on the couch, watching our kids play in the yard, spending every bit of time we have together. I want that to be us.”
“So seeing these characters have their happy ending, that’s what did it for you? That’s what made you decide to propose?”
I shook my head. “Nope. I want what they have, but that’s not what made me want to propose.”
“What about this page made you come here, then?”
“I read this and it was your writing. Your beautiful, creative, exquisite writing. It reminded me how deeply I love you for everything you are. You’re an amazing writer, Charlie. You’re just an amazingly creative person in general. How the hell could I let the person who wrote this escape my life?” I laughed. “I can’t! I have to lock him down.”
I got down on my knee one more time. “So I’m going to ask just one more time. Charlie, will you marry me?”
Tears filled his eyes. “Yes!” he cried. “Yes, I’ll marry you. I’ll spend every day of the rest of my life with you, absolutely!”
I picked him up and spun him around the room, both of us laugh-crying in complete and utter joy.
When I set him down, I held his face in my hands and wiped away his tears with my thumbs. But as soon as I did, his happy tears seemed to devolve into sadness and he gripped me around my torso as tightly as he could.
“I’m so glad you came. I needed you right now.”
“Baby…” I whispered, completely taken aback. “What’s wrong?”
“I just got a horrible phone call…”
My heart sank because I knew exactly what news was coming next.
“It’s Bailey, isn’t it? She isn’t going to be okay, is she?”
I waited for him to tell me that she had passed, but he only started bawling more and placed his head on my chest.
“Babe, please, talk to me.”
“No…” he muttered, making my heart sink more. Until he added: “No, it’s not Bailey. Bailey is going to be fine.”
“Then what is it?” I whispered.
He looked up at me, eyes red.
“My father’s dead.”
I gripped him as tightly as I could and let him sob into me for as long as he wanted. A full ten minutes passed before I even said anything.
“Babe,” I finally whispered, “what do you want me to do? What can I do to make it just a little bit easier?” I asked.
“Take me out of this house,” he muttered. “Bring me to your place. I don’t want to be here anymore. I’m selling this house and I don’t ever want to come back.”
“Absolutely,” I said softly. “We’ll leave. We’ll leave right now.”
And with my arm around his shoulder, we both cried all the way to the car.
16
Charlie
Slowly but surely, I could feel myself beginning to heal after the death of my father. It wasn’t easy, but I forced myself to stay busy and focus on my future.
That was the easiest option for me, to focus on everything I still had waiting for me rather than everything I’d lost. Which, right after my father’s death, felt like a lot.
After our last encounter, I had thought that maybe his death wouldn’t be that difficult for me. It might affect me, sure, but not devastate me the way that it had. After everything he said to me, I thought I could just remind myself he was a hateful person and move forward.
But it hadn’t been like that at all. His death only reminded me of the relationship I’d never get to have with him.
It would have been easier if the circumstances were different. Maybe if he had cancer instead of Alzheimer’s and still had enough of his mind to communicate with me. If he could have told me that he changed his mind, that I was still his son and he loved me… Then I could have moved forward.
But life wasn’t always nice and tidy like that. It was messy and it was complicated, and we couldn’t always get what we wanted. As Noah constantly reminded me, though, that didn’t mean we couldn’t make the best of things.
Noah had helped me immensely. As soon as I told him I didn’t want to be in that house anymore, he brought me to his home and I hadn’t gone back. He got my clothes and bags and brought everything here, and then I went to a real estate agent to sell the place.
I gave the agent the key to the house and told him I had my reasons to not want to be there, so he would need to handle all open houses. He seemed to understand.
So I’d been able to avoid the house completely. Which had been great, for both me and Bailey. But today I had to go back.
Finally, after many months of waiting, the house finally sold and in thirty days a new family would be moving into it.
Which meant I needed to finally go through all the crap that was still there.
Noah offered to do it for me, of course. Because he was sweet and it seemed he was willing to do anything for me, including cut back on the job he loved. But I knew I had to do this myself. Today was the day to finally take that step forward.
I already had a company that took away old belongings scheduled to come out at the same time I arrived. They were going to take all the big things. The couches, rugs, any other furniture that needed to be cleaned out. I didn’t much care what they did with it. I was only going to collect the valuables. Old quilts of my mom’s, photographs, and that pile of knick-knacks in the closet.
I came earlier than the junk company so I could collect all the blankets that belonged to my mother off of the beds and couches. I brought a few boxes and folded them all neatly in there, trying to avoid the pain that came along with that.
I placed a few picture frames that were in the house in that box too, and some of my mom’s old jewelry still sitting in the bathroom drawer. But that was about all of what I had to collect, at least outside of the closet.
I dreaded going into it. Something about seeing so many belongings all in one place was just too overwhelming for me. But I figured it would be best if I did it now, before anybody else came. If I got emotional, I really didn’t want anyone else to see it.
As I expected, I was overwhelmed the second I opened up the closet door. No, I couldn’t do this. Not today, at least.
I decided immediately that I was going to just put all these boxes into my car and sort through them at a later time. Maybe it would be easier once I wasn’t in this shit hole of a house anymore… Though probably not.
As I started moving boxes out of the closet to pack in my car, one in particular caught my attention. It was full of a bunch of old mail, haphazardly thrown in there. But one envelope in particular caught my eye because it had my name on it.
“Charlie Shaw” was written on the envelope in red ink, followed by an address. I recognized the address immediately. It was actually one of the places I lived in after I moved to San Francisco. And yet I never got it… It had been sent, with postage and everything, but underneath the stamps was “return to sender.”
My heart dropped as I processed what this meant.
This letter was supposed to make it to me. Somehow, my father had found one of my old addresses. Though, clearly, he found it after I had already moved out and it got returned.
My father tried to write to me?
I didn’t know what to do here.
Did I open it? Did I leave it alone? This day was emotional enough despite the fact that my father wrote me a letter he was never able to send.
For a while, I just stared at it, unable to decide. I wanted to open it because my first thought was that it was something positive… But based on my last encounter with my father, I would guess it wasn’t. It could very well be hate mail.
That was actually the most likely scenario. He was in this house a long time, alone, a bitter old drunk man. He probably just couldn’t stand the thought of me being happy living away from him while he lived his miserable life.
Yeah, I shouldn’t look at it, I thought. I shouldn’t pour salt in my wounds… But that little part of me that wanted it to be positive couldn’t resist.
I tore the letter open and sat down on the floor to begin reading it.
Son,
I don’t know if this is where you still live, but I’m praying that it is. I’ve been trying to get a hold of you for so long, but apparently you don’t keep in touch much with your old friends. It’s been impossible to find you but I’ve been trying for a long time. I have to say that, so you know… That I have not given up on speaking to you.
I owe you an apology bigger than words can offer. I don’t know why I did what I did to you all those years ago. I don’t want to make excuses for my actions, but I was a very sad drunk. I missed, and continue to miss, your mother all the time. And in my sadness, I ceased to be a father for you, even before I kicked you out.
But that, in particular, was the most atrocious thing I’ve ever done to you. Hell, it’s the most atrocious thing I’ve ever done to any other human being. How does a father disown his own son simply because he had the courage to come out to him as gay? A shitty one, one that doesn’t deserve to have a relationship with his son… But is hoping his son will allow it, anyway.
I’m sober, six months now. I guess this is my way of making amends, but really, it’s so much more than that. I have regretted what I did to you for so long, but like a coward, I hid from it. I let it keep me angry. I held onto my hatred because if I let go of it, I’d have to face the fact that I was wrong and I destroyed my relationship with the only family I have left for no reason.
I was wrong, Charlie. And I destroyed what I had with you for nothing. I’m strong enough to admit that now. Strong enough to even accept that this likely isn’t enough and we may never repair our relationship. If you never want anything to do with me, I respect that, I will not bother you.
But even if we cannot work things out between us, I want you to know that I still will always cherish the memories we do have. I always go back to thinking about when you were younger and I was a real father to you. Those memories of you and your mother are all I have left.
I won’t drone on anymore because I don’t want to make this about me. I just want to apologize and open the door to a relationship if you want to have one. And more than anything, I want you to know how proud I am of you. Despite what I said, you’re who I raised you to be. You are a good, courageous man. It took courage to come out and it takes courage every day to be yourself in a world that wants to hold you back. I will always, always be proud of that.
With all the love in my heart,
Your Father
I was wiping tears from my eyes halfway through the letter. All this time I spent thinking my Dad hated me, and he didn’t. He really had changed his mind. He wanted a relationship with me!
While I was hit with sadness that we never got that relationship, depressed at the thought of him alone for so many years, I also felt something else… relief.
Relief that all the closure I could ever need was in this letter. It would have been better to have a relationship with him while I still could, but this was second best. Never again would I have to doubt the love my parents had for me. I would actually be able to remember my father in a positive light, the way I remembered him as a child.
For the first time in a long time, I got the sense that I might actually be okay. With the knowledge that my father loved me and always missed me, I’d be okay. I would heal.
I would heal with the love of my life by my side. And I would bring all the love I wanted to give to my parents into our new family. I’d thrust it onto our own children.
And I would do my very best to make sure that we always had the relationship I craved with my father, who loved me from a distance.
Epilogue
Charlie
I adjusted my tie in the mirror, my hands beginning to feel a little clammy as I thought about what was coming next.
I’d been waiting for this day a long time, the day I was going to marry the love of my life. So why was I so nervous all of a sudden?
I heard a familiar bark down by my feet. It was Bailey, of course, begging for a treat. I had a box on the bathroom counter.
“Okay, fine, you can have one treat,” I told her. She barked her approval. “But only after I get your ribbon situated.”
I tied a light blue ribbon around her neck. On the ribbon were both Noah’s and my rings. Bailey was going to be our little ring bearer. I gave her a treat after she let me tie it on.
“But don’t lose that!” I instructed her.
It was a little silly to have a ring bearer considering we didn’t even have an audience to watch us get married. We had no best men, no friends or family in attendance.
All my friends were in San Francisco and I didn’t want to bother them into flying here for just a small ceremony. And because Noah worked constantly before me, he hadn’t made many friends anyway.
He wasn’t close to his family, either. He never even bothered to tell them about me. They wouldn’t approve and their opinion didn’t matter to him. Obviously I’d lost all my family, so they couldn’t be here either.
Oddly enough, I was okay with this. For the first time, I felt truly at peace about the death of both my parents. It was crazy to think with all the turmoil I’d experienced a year ago I could actually find peace with the situation.
But I knew my parents were with me wherever I was. Their spirit was here at this ceremony. I knew they’d be proud of me. My father, especially.
Wow, that was so crazy to think about. My father would actually be proud of me for getting married to a man and being true to myself. Just the thought made me smile.
This wasn’t the first time I’d been happy in my life, but it felt like the first time my happiness was complete. Even as a child when I was happy with my family, I wasn’t true to myself because I was in conflict with my homosexuality.
Then when I finally did accept my homosexuality and move out to San Francisco, I had conflict with my family. No matter how much I tried to ignore that, it was always with me. It always kept me just an inch away from real happiness.
Not to mention the fact that I dated men just to date them. Never did I feel very passionate about any of the men I’d been with. I just didn’t want to be alone, and they filled the space.
Now not only was I comfortable with who I was, but I felt like I’d mended my relationship with my father even if it was after his death. And I’d found a man who did more than just keep me company… He was everything I ever wanted. He made my soul feel alive. He wanted to build a life with me.
Which started today.
I actually was excited about the fact that it was only going to be us two at the ceremony. We were having our officiant meet us at the local lake, where we were going to be united in marriage forever among the nature that surrounded us.
I never was one for weddings. I mean, I enjoyed going to other people’s weddings, sure. I just never could imagine it for myself. All that attention focused on me and my future spouse? Nope, that didn’t appeal to me at all.
I wanted to be able to say my vows to just Noah. I didn’t need a crowd, and I didn’t need a best man or flowers lining the aisle that led to the altar. I didn’t want a cake or a bunch of gifts. All I wanted was him, and he felt the same way. And, of course, we both wanted to incorporate B
ailey.
This ceremony was going to be absolutely perfect for us.
“Hey there.” I heard Noah’s familiar voice coming from the doorway of the bathroom
“Hey!” I pushed him, shielding my eyes. “You’re not supposed to see me and I shouldn’t see you! It’s bad luck.”
He laughed. “Uh, yeah, I’m pretty sure that’s only for brides, Charlie. And you’re not a bride, you’re a groom. And I’m a groom. So I think by that standard alone, we can throw all the traditions out the window.”
“Fair enough.” I unshielded my eyes and he walked up behind me, giving me an embrace from the back and a kiss on the neck.
“You look absolutely stunning,” he told me.
“So do you.” I grinned at him.
“Are you ready to do this?” he asked. “Got cold feet yet?”
I chuckled. “Uh, do you?”
“Never. I could have done this ceremony a week after I met you and I wouldn’t have gotten cold feet.”
I turned around and wrapped my arms around his neck.
“What do you think comes next?” I whispered in his ear.
“What do you mean?” he asked.
“I mean, for us. We’re here, we’re at the wedding, we’re making the big commitment. What do you think comes next?”
He pulled away from the hug and looked me right in the eyes with a smile.
“Happiness. Children, a big yard, the dog that we love running around with them outside as we sit on the couch and watch.”
I laughed. “I see, so we’re going to be like the couple at the end of my old book?”
“Of course not. Because I didn’t waste any time with you. We’re not going to be like them, we’re going to be better.”
I kissed him and Bailey barked between us jealously as she always did when we showed affection for each other around her.
“Oh, hush,” I told her. “It’s our day, we can kiss if we want to.”
