Son of a Beard

by Lani Lynn Vale

  The music that’d been playing changed, and my body jerked at the realization that the service was about to start.

  The funeral home had gone over everything that they were going to do, down to the last detail, and I knew the sound of my grandparents’ wedding song signaled the beginning of the service.

  My eyes went to the screen above the microphone, and my heart ached when I saw the first picture was of my grandfather and me fishing.

  The next was of my sister, him, and my grandmother riding on a motorcycle, almost exactly like the one that had been plastered all over the Internet with a rude, derogatory comment right above Verity’s ass.

  As the pictures flowed through the slideshow, Verity leaned her head against my chest and rested her hand on my thigh, completely ignoring the angered eyes of Kenneth.

  I turned my head slightly once to see him staring at Verity, and I turned back. Without flipping him off, might I add…though it was close.

  As the slideshow came to a close, another song started to play, and I immediately stood, as did the men two pews back.

  The National Anthem.

  My grandfather had served twelve years in the Army while my grandmother had served eight. It’d been where they met.

  My grandfather had come to my grandmother, a nurse, after a suspicious case of gout had nearly brought him to his knees.

  And the rest was history.

  They spent nearly every waking moment together from that point on and had even died on the same day.

  Which, I guess, was a blessing.

  I didn’t see one lasting long without the other—especially knowing the other had died so brutally.

  Verity’s hand on my knee, circling it with one blunt fingertip, brought me back to the present, and I buried my fingers in her hair, wishing this thing would be over with already.

  But it didn’t happen fast.

  It was the slowest funeral I’d ever been to, and I didn’t know if that was due to the fact that there were actually two funerals happening at once, or if the people that spoke were just talking for irrationally long times.

  Whatever the reason, by the time it all ended over an hour and ten minutes later, I was practically jumping out of my skin.

  My body itched in this brand new, long sleeved dress shirt. I had a suit jacket on that restricted my movement, and the pair of pants I was wearing were one size too small.

  Verity’s presence, though, kept me comfortable, and she stayed with me the entire time.

  By the time the funeral coordinator gestured for the family to leave, I was already on my feet and urging Verity to walk quickly—which she thankfully did after she got out of the pew.

  My brother and sister followed suit, keeping up with my retreating back, and piled into the same car as me.

  “Mom’s going to kill us,” Trent muttered, looking at the crowd that started to seep out of the auditorium’s doors.

  “Mom can suck it,” I mumbled, leaning back into the seat and staring tiredly at the roof. Remembering my manners, though, I leaned forward and took Verity’s hand. “Verity, this is my brother, Trent, and my sister, Marnie.”

  Marnie waved her fingers, and Trent gave her a nod.

  “This is the girl that you were talking about?” Trent asked after a while.

  I nodded and brought Verity’s hand up to rest on my thigh as I stretched my own arm out behind her on the seat.

  Bikes started up around the car we were in, and I relaxed even further.

  “Are you going to be all right?” Verity asked softly. “You don’t look too good.”

  “Big brother here doesn’t like crowds,” Marnie offered. “It took everything he had to be in that building with all of those people. That was thanks to our Aunt Eloise and our mom, though. If we’d have had our way, we would’ve had a wake like Pop and Grams wanted, instead of going through all this.”

  Verity blinked, then opened her mouth to say something.

  However, nothing came out.

  Instead she just shook her head and gestured to the bikes.

  “What’s up with the biker brigade?” she continued to ask questions.

  “They’re my club,” I answered. “They’re here for moral support.”

  Her mouth lifted up into a smile.

  “Well, they’re doing a damn fine job keeping everyone away from you.”

  I looked out the same window that Verity was, my mouth twitching when I saw the crowd heading our way.

  However, Big Papa and Aaron were holding them off with a scowl covering their faces.

  “You’re lucky they’re here, big brother.” Marnie whispered.

  I was.

  I was also lucky Verity was here.

  I wouldn’t have been able to get through the last hour and a half without her soothing touch calming me down.

  Making me see reason.

  That was until Kenneth shoved his way between Big Papa and Aaron, making his way to the car.

  Aaron gave the stupid man an annoyed look, but let him by when I waved him away.

  “Here we go,” Trent mumbled.

  Verity turned her face into my arm, and I became irrationally annoyed at the fact that that man had the nerve to say a goddamned word to me, or even approach the same vehicle that I was in.

  “What do you want?” I asked, rolling the window down just far enough to hear him and he could hear me.

  “I wanted to make sure that Verity was…”

  Verity’s head popped up, and she glared. “I’m fine. Or I would have been had you left me alone. I’m here to offer Truth support on one of the hardest days of his life. So, if you don’t mind, I’d like you to please leave.”

  I laughed and rolled the window up. Apparently, she didn’t need me to fight her battles for her.

  “I sense a story…” Marnie murmured. “And since we’re stuck here until the cars move, why don’t y’all tell us the story of how you met.”

  Verity’s smile wasn’t forced any longer.

  “As long as Truth has no problem with me telling it…”

  I shifted my fingers back into her hair, leaned my head back, and urged her on with a wave of my hand.

  “After you.”

  ***

  Two hours later, my mother, father, sister and her good friend who’d driven down with her, as well as my brother, Verity, and I sat around the table, eating in silence.

  Though, the rest of the men and women at the table, including the members of my club and their women, filled the silence around us—making the awkwardness of the past four days all but disappear.

  Verity and I were at the end, and she was leaning into me as she listened to something Sean was telling the rest of the table.

  My mother and father, finally deciding to join society, were listening to him talk about some patient he had, and I was thankful to finally have their attention off of me.

  “What’s going on with your parents?” she asked.

  That was something I did not want to answer.

  I hadn’t spoken to my parents in over four years, and it wasn’t because of lack of trying on my part.

  It was due to the fact that they didn’t like my life choices and had no problem letting me know it.

  My brother and sister had been fairly neutral about the way I lived my life, but ultimately, they stayed out of it—which meant that they didn’t choose sides, and saw all of us, just separately.

  “My parents are upset that I chose to throw my life away to do a job that they didn’t approve of,” I finally settled on.

  When I didn’t expound, she chose not to pursue the topic, likely fearing I’d freak out and leave just like I’d done the last time we were together.

  “I quit my job yesterday,” she said into the silence. “I had a bad day, and my boss made a derogatory comment about a photo that’s floating around the Internet of us…and I just snapped.”

  My stomach clenched. “I saw
the photo,” I murmured. “And I wasn’t very happy about it.”

  She sighed.

  “It’s life,” she finally settled on. “That’s not to say that I wasn’t extremely upset about it when I saw it.”

  I should really tell her that I found the guy who’d started the cruel photo circulating, but I didn’t want to admit that I was the guy who caused the little shit-for-brains to be put into the hospital.

  Instead, I blurted out what was on my mind, like usual.

  “You wouldn’t be willing to run a business, would you?” I teased her jokingly.

  Her eyes widened.

  “I would…if you needed me to. I’ve done it for years with my mom, and I’ve been in customer service for eight years now,” she surprised me. “What would you need me to do?”

  I thought about it for a second, and finally nodded, thinking it could work out great to have someone there I trusted.

  “The pub already has a manager, kind of a service manager,” I answered. “Really, I would just need you to be the person to make business decisions during the day when I can’t be there, and be the boss man that everyone goes to with their petty problems. Like calling in sick, and complaining about customers…you know, stuff like that.”

  “What about payroll?” she asked, turning to face me.

  “That’s mine,” I said. “I’ll do that on Fridays before class starts, and if anyone has any problems with that, I’ll take care of it Friday afternoon when I get out of class.”

  She nodded, her eyes distant as she thought about what I’d just offered her.

  “I won’t take anything over what I deserve,” she finally said. “You can’t pay me anything exorbitant.”

  My mouth twitched. “I’ll pay you what I think you deserve.”

  Which was a lot, but she didn’t need to know that.

  “Well, okay,” she settled into my side once again.

  “So when are you opening the pub back up?”

  That was my father, always asking the hard questions.

  “I don’t know,” I admitted. “I was just discussing that with Verity.”

  My father’s eyes narrowed on the woman at my side.

  “What does she have to do with when you’re opening it?”

  I clenched my teeth.

  “Since I just asked her to be the fucking boss man,” I snapped.

  Chapter 10

  Have you ever been too nice, and ended up in a situation which could’ve been avoided if you had just been the asshole you were originally? Yeah, me neither.

  -Truth’s secret thoughts

  Verity

  I had a feeling I had just landed in the middle of a huge shitstorm, and I could do nothing but sit still and wait it out.

  I watched as father and son started throwing verbal slurs at each other, and I realized something was really wrong with their relationship. Fathers didn’t say things like this to their kids. Not now, and not ever, no matter what their age.

  The entire table, all bikers, and siblings combined, all stared at what was happening, too.

  Truth’s body, which had been pliant and almost relaxed only moments before, was now stiff and vibrating with anger as he pushed away from me.

  “We’re not doing this here and definitely not today of all days,” Truth rumbled low in his throat.

  His voice sounded nice and even, but his eyes told a completely different story.

  “How’s it feel to be dating a fucking killer?”

  Those words were shot out of Truth’s father’s mouth, and I could do nothing but flinch at the anger that seethed inside of him.

  “Ummm,” I mumbled. “Maybe it’s time for me to go?”

  Truth’s hand tightened on my hip, telling me without words that he wanted me to stay right the fuck there.

  So I did, and I witnessed every single derogatory comment his father dished out.

  And by the time he got to the fourth ‘fucking waste of space and air,’ I was done.

  “Excuse me, Sir,” I stood up and leaned forward. “I don’t know who you think you are. I don’t know why you think this is a good time to air out these old grievances, but it’s not. It’s inappropriate. First of all because we’re in the middle of a restaurant, you’re behaving badly and people are staring at you. Secondly, it’s obvious that Truth is hurting. I can see it. You can see it. Hell, even the people in the kitchen washing the dishes can see it. So I suggest you either sit down and be quiet or leave.”

  Truth’s father stood up like I’d poured ice cold water into his lap.

  “Truth,” he sneered, his breath wafting toward me. I could smell the alcohol all the way over here. “Don’t you mean Ernest? Let me tell you something, Truth couldn’t be a more hypocritical name for him. You don’t know what he’s done. You don’t know who he’s killed or why. I do, though. I watched him do it once.”

  My jaw clenched, and I picked up the first thing I could find, which happened to be a roll, and threw it at him.

  It hit him on the cheekbone and bounced back onto the table, landing on the table next to a very amused Trent’s plate. “Go. Home.”

  One of the men to my left started to chuckle, but I didn’t dare take my eyes off of the man.

  “Didn’t realize you let women fight your battles, Son.” Truth’s father backed away, taking a hold of his wife’s arm. “Though I guess I shouldn’t be surprised that you can’t handle your business.”

  “I can handle my business,” Truth said, leaning back into his chair. “It’s just sexier when she does it for me.”

  His dad sneered, downed the rest of his wine and left, dragging his wife by the arm as he went.

  “So…” Trent broke the silence after they’d left. “Who wants dessert?”

  ***

  I turned at my door, smiling slightly when I saw my cat through the window, tangled in the blinds and likely about to pull them down again.

  “You have a cat,” Truth murmured.

  He said ‘cat’ like it was something disgusting that he didn’t want to get anywhere near.

  “Yes,” I confirmed. “Do you want to come in?”

  “Where was the cat last time I was here?” he asked.

  “Mr. Stiffy doesn’t come out much,” I admitted. “And when he does, it’s only to eat or sit in the window and watch the birds.”

  Truth frowned. “I’m not ready to talk about my life yet.”

  Would he ever be?

  I tilted my head. “You’re a big boy, Truth,” I said. “If you want to keep secrets—as long as they’re not hurting our relationship—then keep them. In the meantime, I’d like you to come inside and watch the rest of the ‘How To Get Away With Murder’ marathon we started watching the other day.”

  He stared at me for a few long moments, then nodded once, his shoulders stiff.

  He had lines on his face and bags under his eyes that spoke of the stress he’d been under during the last week since he’d been here, and I wished I could smooth them away with my lips.

  I wasn’t sure he was in that kind of a mood, though.

  He struck me as a suffer-in-silence kind of man.

  I’d likely never know if he was hurting unless I witnessed him grimacing in pain or he received the injury while I was there to witness it.

  Holding the door open for him to enter, he did, and walked straight into the kitchen where he got down two wine glasses, a bottle from where he’d seen me pull them down from last time, and poured wine to the brim in both glasses.

  I didn’t think it’d be a good idea to mention he’d just used half a bottle of four-hundred-dollar wine.

  Instead, I walked down the long hallway that separated the bedrooms from the large living room, and headed to my room, which was at the very end of the hall.

  My eyes stayed on the badly-in-need-of-repair wood floors as I walked.

  The moment I flipped on the bedroom light, I saw Mr. Stiffy bound into the hal
lway past me, causing me to gasp.

  “Jesus Christ, you little fucker,” I growled, glaring at the empty hallway behind me.

  “You all right?”

  “Yes,” I yelled back to the stubborn man. “Cat scared me, is all.”

  I walked into my bedroom and rid myself of the horrid dress that felt like it was strangling me and tossed it into the pile that I reserved for the things that needed to go to the dry cleaners…though, I wouldn’t need that anymore.

  Not when the only clothes that I got dry cleaned were the ones that I wore to work at the newspaper—a place where I no longer worked anymore.

  I was standing there, contemplating whether it was acceptable to put on sweatpants, when I felt eyes on me.

  I turned my head slowly, unsurprised to find him standing in the doorway to my room, staring at me.

  “Yes?” I asked, reaching for the sweats.

  He’d have to get used to them eventually.

  When I wasn’t working, I was in sweats, comfy shorts, or no pants at all.

  I hated wearing real pants almost as much as I hated my old job.

  He watched as I slipped my feet into my sweatpants, and continued to watch as I pulled down an old t-shirt that I’d cut up and made into a work out shirt.

  The next thing I did was bend over and put my hair up into a messy bun, snagging the black hair tie that was on the floor next to my feet as I gathered all my hair on top of my head and stood up.

  As I stood, I came face-to-chest with Truth and froze.

  “What’s wrong?” I whispered.

  “I had one of the shittiest days of my life today,” he swallowed thickly. “And then you defended me in front of my family and friends. I appreciate that more than you will ever know.”

  I smiled and leaned forward, wrapping my arms around his hips and hugging his big body to me.

  My face laid flat against the leather of his biker vest, and I felt at peace for the first time since I’d read that meme and seen my ass hanging off the back of Truth’s bike.

  Though, I hadn’t felt all that great before that with the way he’d left so abruptly.

  But now, standing in the man’s arms, I realized that none of that mattered right now.