Fathers

by Matt Rogers

All these thoughts swirled in King’s head.

  He stood up suddenly and went out of the room, leaving Alexis perplexed.

  Out in the corridor he dialled Alonzo.

  The man answered with, ‘I already heard. Are you excited?’

  ‘That’s not what I’m calling about,’ King said. ‘Are you sure you did this right?’

  ‘Did what right? The security measures?’

  ‘Yeah.’

  Alonzo said, ‘You’ll be fine, King. You’ll all be fine. I made sure of it. Have I ever let you down yet?’

  ‘No,’ King admitted. ‘I think it’s just … in the past, it was my life on the line. Which I’m fine with. I came to terms with my death long ago. But now it’s my kid. I’m going to be responsible for him. And if I didn’t double check, and there was a flaw in all this, and I missed it … I’d never forgive myself.’

  ‘It’s the same deal as when you were living in Vegas,’ Alonzo said. ‘And that was airtight.’

  ‘Airtight? They found us there…’

  ‘They found you through that young intelligence kid, Connor Wright, who was a slave to Mother Libertas. He didn’t find you through public record, because that’s an impossibility. He traced your flights back from Wyoming because he knew you were in Thunder Basin at the commune. You exist in the system, you have social security numbers, but the government can’t see you. It’s a work of art what I’ve done, if I may say so myself. Remember that blanket analogy?’

  King did. They were there in the records, registered citizens of the United States of America, but any attempts to search for them would turn up nothing. Alonzo had draped a digital blanket over all their movements, all their activities, so they could go about their lives without getting flagged every time they used their real details.

  King said, ‘Thanks, man. I know all this. Just on edge today.’

  ‘Wouldn’t expect anything else,’ Alonzo said. ‘How do you feel?’

  ‘Excited.’

  ‘Can’t wait to meet the little guy.’

  King smiled into the phone. ‘I’ll let you know when he’s here. Then you can come see him. I think Violetta just wants it to be the four of us here for labour.’

  ‘Of course. I’m sure Slater’s steadying your nerves. He’s good at that.’

  King didn’t answer.

  Alonzo said, ‘What is it?’

  ‘Nothing,’ King said. There was no point raising the alarm yet. It was still likely paranoia on Alexis’ part, and by extension King’s. ‘I’ll call you back with an update.’

  ‘Stay strong, soldier.’

  King hung up and went back into the room, in time to see Alexis jolt as her phone vibrated in her hand.

  She looked down at it, then up at King. ‘It’s Will.’

  17

  Slater pulled up outside the tiny house.

  Calling it a house was generous. It was a shack.

  Tyrell had directed him east out of Roxbury, and they’d driven in the direction of the grey water of the North Atlantic until the tree-lined avenues turned to cracked and potholed streets framed by public housing complexes. Tyrell told him to stop when they were in the heart of Jones Hill, then pointed out the house wedged into a small parcel of land behind a massage parlour. The fence was high, as if the suburb was ashamed of the residence, but through the gaps Slater could see knee-high weeds and trash strewn everywhere. He didn’t need to roll his window down to smell the stench of hot garbage — he could imagine that on his own. The weatherboard house was visible down the short driveway, half of it obscured by a rusty old clunker of a pickup that looked to have done at least two hundred thousand miles. There were ugly floral curtains yanked shut behind each of the barred windows.

  Slater said, ‘This is Zeke’s?’

  Tyrell nodded, chewing his bottom lip.

  Slater said, ‘How’d you know how to get here by memory? You didn’t even look at your phone.’ A pause, then, ‘You got a phone?’

  A shake of the head. ‘I thought my dad might know how to track me, so I threw it away when I ran.’

  ‘What’ll your friends at school think? You just ghosted them all?’

  Tyrell didn’t answer. Then he said, ‘I haven’t been to school in ages. And when I did, I didn’t have friends.’

  Slater masked a wince, changed the subject back to what it was supposed to be. ‘So how’d you know how to get here?’

  Tyrell shrugged.

  Slater could see, clear as day, that the boy had clammed up. The faster this was done, the better. ‘You want me to come in with you?’

  Tyrell shook his head emphatically. ‘You do that and it’s all screwed, man. Zeke won’t give me shit with you standing there looking all scary.’

  ‘I’ll look normal.’

  ‘Even when you look normal you scary.’

  Slater chuckled. ‘Go on. I’ll be right here.’

  He wanted to accompany Tyrell, but was he supposed to coddle the boy? This kid had lived his whole life without Slater’s protection, and he was adamant it was safe.

  Tyrell opened the door, then shoved his hands in the pockets of his cargo shorts as he stepped out. He slammed it shut behind him and started for the shoebox house. Slater kept his eyes on the kid’s back as he walked up the driveway, then lowered his gaze into his lap. He didn’t quite know what he was doing, or why.

  He pulled out his phone, which he’d had on silent.

  Eleven missed calls from Alexis.

  He swiped right on the latest notification to return her last call, and she answered in seconds. ‘Hey. Where are you?’

  ‘I got tied up with something. It’s hard to explain.’

  Through the Porsche’s windshield, he watched Tyrell’s knock at the front door get answered by a shadowy figure. Tyrell stepped into the murky house, and the door slammed behind him. The hairs on the back of Slater’s neck rose.

  Alexis asked, ‘Trouble?’

  ‘There was trouble.’

  ‘Then hurry back.’

  ‘Are you okay? What’s happening?’

  ‘It’s not me,’ she said, and he could hear the smile in her voice. ‘Your best friend’s about to be a dad.’

  Slater’s chest tightened, but it was a happy sensation. Excitement, not fear. ‘Give me an hour. I’ll be there.’

  ‘What’s going on?’

  He’d never lied to her, and he wasn’t about to start. ‘I helped out a kid. A twelve-year-old boy.’

  ‘With what?’

  ‘He was the lookout for a drug deal. I spoke to the crew that was using him.’

  ‘Am I going to see something on the news about that?’

  ‘You might.’

  ‘Christ, Will. Just get here safe. Don’t get yourself killed on the day Violetta gives birth.’

  ‘For Violetta’s sake?’ Slater asked. ‘Or for yours?’

  ‘You know what that would do to me,’ she said. ‘Hurry back.’

  Slater said, ‘I will.’

  He hung up and lowered the phone.

  Just as the gunshot blared behind the curtains.

  18

  As Violetta dozed between contractions, King managed to hear everything Alexis said.

  ‘Don’t get yourself killed.’

  As soon as she hung up he was on her, but he kept his voice down so Violetta couldn’t hear from across the room. ‘What’s he got himself into?’

  ‘He went to the rescue of some boy,’ Alexis muttered.

  ‘What?’

  ‘A kid, a twelve-year-old. In danger, I think. Sounds like he intervened and now he’s right in the thick of it.’

  King’s response was involuntary, his quads tightening, anticipating shooting out of his chair and hustling to his truck. It was his primal duty to help his brother-in-arms, and there was nothing else to think about. But the second his butt lifted off the seat Alexis put her hand on his chest and pushed as hard and as subtly as she could, forcing him back down. He was off-balance so it worked. At least, that’s what
he told himself. In reality she was getting stronger by the day, her body steadily shaping into a lithe powerhouse.

  He could have brute-forced his way to his feet with minimal effort, but he didn’t.

  Her interference made him reconsider.

  ‘Are you crazy?’ she hissed.

  He stared at her. ‘It’s your man. I thought you’d want this.’

  Alexis jerked her thumb at Violetta, whose eyes were closed. ‘It’s her time. Will made his own mess, so he can clean it up on his own, too.’

  ‘What if he doesn’t?’

  Alexis shrugged. ‘You’re here, at the hospital, about to become a dad. And you’re going to run off to help drag your airhead buddy out of whatever carnage he’s got himself into. You’ll regret missing the birth of your child for the rest of your life. Trust me.’

  ‘You know that?’ King asked. ‘Being a mother and all…’

  Alexis elbowed him in the side, but it was half-hearted and half-playful. ‘Stay where you are. That’s an order.’

  Violetta’s eyes came open. ‘What’s going on?’

  King whipped his gaze over to meet hers at the same time as Alexis did. But Violetta wasn’t looking at Alexis. She was looking at King.

  King said, ‘Slater’s been held up. But he’s on his way.’

  Violetta waved a hand dismissively. ‘I’m sure … it’s important. He’ll be here. Don’t worry.’

  King moved back to the bed, bent down and kissed her forehead. There was a glow to her skin, and her face was pinker than usual from the tensing.

  When he took her hand, she gripped it tighter than he’d ever felt before.

  Her eyes were closed now, so he had relative privacy when he looked over his shoulder and met Alexis’ blazing green eyes.

  He nodded slowly.

  I understand, he silently said to her. I’m not going anywhere.

  Slater could handle himself anyway.

  He was glad he made that decision when Rebecca came into the room, a couple of delivery nurses behind her. ‘We’re moving her to Labor & Delivery now. Based on the cervix tests we think she’s close.’

  19

  Slater ripped the Glock out of its holster unconsciously, a built-in reaction to the sound of a report.

  He was out of the Porsche and up the driveway in seconds, and didn’t even try the front doorknob. Instead he shouldered his weight into the centre of the door without slowing down at all and simply mowed straight through it, splitting the thin rotting wood in two. It looked more impressive than it actually was. Adrenaline made him oblivious to pain, and the structure was already weak. He spilled through into a dual living/dining area, furnished with nothing but an old television on top of a milk crate and a shitty old sofa with mould on the armrests that nobody had bothered to scrape off.

  Slater was about to scream Tyrell’s name when he spotted the boy in the entrance to the kitchen.

  The kitchen itself was a bloodbath. Crimson stains everywhere. The floor, the cabinets, even the countertop. A dying man lay on the tiles. As Slater skidded to a halt, the guy gave his last couple of kicks and the death throes subsided. Replaced by the final stillness.

  The sole bullet wound in his thigh still poured blood, the artery severed.

  Tyrell held a six-speed revolver, its barrel still smoking.

  Slater sucked in a breath, taking stock. He couldn’t quite believe what he was seeing. Tyrell hadn’t so much as looked up, not even when Slater broke the door in half crashing through it. The noise must have been colossal in this tiny dwelling. Instead the boy was fixated on the corpse. He was wide-eyed and hyperventilating.

  Slater walked to the edge of the kitchen and stood beside Tyrell. He looked down at the body. The dead man was short and fat, with bad skin. His skin was darker than Slater’s. Fatty jowls hung under his chin, and his jawline was riddled with acne. He wore glasses and a white tank top stained with the remnants of meals consumed long ago. He looked fifty, but he could have been thirty, given what poverty can do to one’s complexion.

  Slater studied Tyrell, who was still frozen. Wordlessly, he reached out and took the revolver off the boy. Tyrell offered no resistance. Slater put it down on the kitchen benchtop, out of Tyrell’s reach.

  Slater said, ‘Where’d you get the gun?’

  When Tyrell spoke, his voice was soft. ‘I k-know where he k-keeps it.’

  Slater glanced down at the body, who stared up at the ceiling through lifeless black eyes. ‘Zeke? You know where Zeke keeps his gun?’ He paused. ‘You killed Zeke. Goddamnit, kid, you told me this would be simple.’

  Shocked to his core, Tyrell whispered, ‘I just … shot at him, man. As a warning. He rushed me. I thought he’d kill me. I shot low ‘cause I didn’t want to hurt him bad. Hit his leg. Is he…?’

  Tyrell lapsed into silence.

  Slater found he couldn’t take his eyes off the body, but when he eventually did he looked over to see Tyrell slowly shaking his head.

  ‘What?’ Slater asked.

  ‘Look, man, don’t hurt me…’

  Slater’s insides constricted. He felt the hairs on the back of his neck stand on end. He started to get a dark suspicion about what had happened here.

  He reached out and gripped Tyrell’s shoulder. For two reasons, he realised. He didn’t want the boy to run, and he knew soon Tyrell’s tough exterior façade would crack as he faced the consequences of what had happened to him over the last hour of his life.

  As soon as Slater grabbed Tyrell, the boy started shaking.

  Slater kept his voice low. ‘That’s not Zeke, is it?’

  Tyrell shook his head again, his lower lip quivering.

  Slater asked, ‘Does Zeke exist?’

  Tyrell kept shaking his head. Then said, ‘I lied about that. My dad ain’t got no friends.’

  ‘Who is this, Tyrell?’ Slater asked. ‘Who did you shoot?’

  By now the boy’s lower lip was jackhammering, and tears wormed their way out of his eyes, and his chest started heaving like he was about to puke. But he didn’t. He just kept standing there, locked in a one-way staring contest with the dead man.

  Slater said, ‘Tyrell. Who is that?’

  Tyrell said, ‘That’s my dad.’

  And his lip stopped quivering.

  20

  In the birthing suite, Violetta threw up for the first time.

  She’d been using an upright position to help the labour progress, resting her forehead against the cool wall, leaning into it so her pelvis was tilted forward. King and Alexis were behind her, one on either side, whispering reassurances, until she retched and motioned for a bowl.

  Rebecca came forward and passed one over.

  Violetta did what she had to.

  She was suffering. The sweat on her face, the moans that drifted through the suite at regular intervals, the complaints about the pain and the pressure. King was getting exhausted, too, channeling all his energy into doing anything he could to provide constant encouragement.

  Pale and shaking, Violetta lowered the bucket. Rebecca scurried in and scooped it up.

  ‘Sorry,’ Violetta muttered.

  ‘Nothing to be sorry about.’

  Alexis leaned in, getting close to her ear. ‘You doing okay? You need the mask?’

  Nitrous oxide was nothing to scoff at. King wouldn’t have blamed her if she used as much laughing gas as was permitted. But Violetta shook her head. ‘No, no. I want to remember this. Not dull it.’

  King shook his head in turn. ‘You don’t need to be a masochist. I do enough of that for the both of us.’

  Her hands still against the wall, she turned to touch her forehead to his. He could feel her strength. The rock-solid foundation beneath the pain.

  She managed a smirk, despite everything. ‘You’d take the gas, and you know it.’

  ‘You’re damn right I would,’ King said. ‘So don’t be stupid.’

  She held out for another couple of minutes.

  Then the strongest
contraction hit her, nearly making her buckle at the knees, and she reached for the mask and said, ‘Masochism’s overrated.’

  21

  Whatever Slater had been expecting, it wasn’t that.

  He actually took a step back, let go of Tyrell’s bony shoulder, so he could get a proper look at the corpse. Then he spun a slow half-circle, seeing his surroundings in a new light.

  He asked, ‘This is your home?’

  ‘Yeah.’

  In the silence, all the steeliness had drained from him. His voice was so soft now, so vulnerable. He was recognising that no matter the awful things his blood relations had done to him, it didn’t make what happened any easier to fathom.

  Slater could usually control his bodily responses in even the most dire of circumstances, but now his heart pounded uncontrollably.

  He went to speak and choked on his words, something that never happened.

  When he composed himself, he said, ‘Kid…’

  That set Tyrell off. He’d held it together as he’d committed patricide, as he’d stood over his father’s body, even as he’d explained it to Slater, but now it was too much. He sunk to his knees and bowed his head.

  Slater pulled himself together, ran a sweaty hand over his smooth scalp, and muttered, ‘Shit. Okay.’

  He slipped his phone from his pocket and dialled Alexis. She answered on the second ring, but it still seemed an eternity. ‘You’re not back.’

  She sounded exhausted.

  ‘No,’ he said, restricting himself to a single syllable so he could flush the wavering from his voice.

  ‘And you’re calling me. So it can’t be good.’

  ‘I need to tell you something, and you’re not going to like it.’

  ‘Go on.’

  He did, but it took more willpower than he thought. This situation stretched the bond they shared, no matter how resolute it was. He would have preferred not to mention a word of it, and the very idea of telling her what he was involved in seemed poisonous, radioactive, but sometimes the right decisions are the hardest ones, so he laid it all out.