My heart ached as pieces of Weston Turner clicked into place for me. Not an asshole, but an abandoned, bewildered kid, grown into a man, chasing that car, always.
“It must’ve been so hard for you, not knowing why he left,” I said.
“Why doesn’t bother me,” Weston said. “The why is he’s weak, cowardly, a pathetic excuse for a man. Plus, a million other insults I’ve called him over the years. Why is easy.” He flicked the edge of his empty plate. “What now is the bitch to accept.”
“What do you mean?”
Weston watched me for a long moment.
“He left my mom with the mortgage and only a haircutting job to pay it. He left her with three kids to support. What now? It was screaming at us from inside our empty house. And that question stretches over the years: What now?”
I leaned forward, silent, listening as Weston spoke more words at one time than I’d ever heard him speak. His voice was low, gravelly, and his accent grew thicker, as he drifted away from me and the bakery, and deeper into the thoughts and memories of his childhood.
“Who do I talk to if I have a crush on a girl?” he said. “Who teaches me how to shave? Or to drive? Ma is crying her eyes out every night, and the crying becomes drinking too many beers, so what can I do? My sisters drop out of school to get jobs and have shitty relationships with shitty guys because they’ve never seen it any other way. A cycle for them, but for me, it was like a pendulum. My childhood swung between What now? and What did I do wrong?”
His long fingers toyed with his pen, doodling hashmarks, tallies on a wall.
“You didn’t do anything wrong,” I said, my throat thick. “You were a little boy. It wasn’t your fault.”
Weston glanced up, his eyes soft. “Sometimes that’s harder to accept than money.” He dropped the pen and pressed the knuckles of one hand into the palm of the other, cracking them. “Anyway, that’s my sob story. We all have one.”
Mine was a fairytale in comparison. I tried to imagine my dad leaving Mom, Travis and me. Without a word or warning. I’d blame myself, too. I’d seek protection. Build thick walls and insulate them against feeling that kind of pain ever again. A parent’s promise is unconditional love, and Weston’s father broke it.
No wonder he’s angry, I thought. No wonder he’s walled off, holding himself back. The old saying filtered into my thoughts, We accept the love we think we deserve. Sadness clenched my heart because for Weston, it seemed that meant none at all.
“Whatever,” he said, watching me. “I didn’t mean to dump all that on you.”
“I asked you to.”
Weston watched me again, the blue-green of his eyes like sea glass under the café lights.
“We all have our shit. Connor’s life isn’t any easier because he’s got money or both his parents. He’s got double the pressure bearing down on him. I have the responsibility to my mother and sisters.”
“Taking on that responsibility makes you the opposite of an asshole.”
“I know,” he said. “But…”
“But what?”
“Nothing. It is what it is. I’m pissed at my dad and I don’t know how not to be.”
I reached across the table to touch his hand, because I had nothing to say or offer but my presence.
His gaze held mine, the blue-green warm and deep, then it dropped to our hands on the table. His closed around mine, his long fingers folding under my palm, his thumb sliding against my skin. Just as it had done against my cheek in my dream…
My heart began to pound, and I swallowed hard.
“Weston…”
The wind whistled hard against the bakery windows just then. A newspaper slapped hard against the glass, then swirled away in the cold eddies of encroaching winter. Weston stiffened and withdrew his hand.
“It’s cold out,” he said. “How are you getting home?”
“Connor was supposed to meet me.” I checked my wristwatch. “Five minutes ago. We’re going to grab something to eat. You want to come with us?”
“No.”
I bit my lip, not wanting to leave him alone. I wanted to hold his hand again, or put my arms around him and give him a hug. He was a grown man, but my mind kept picturing a little blond boy, standing on an empty street and watching his father drive away.