“It'll be March first in a week,” he says, “you'll be fine. And yeah, there's water. There's a well up there.”
“Has anyone in the family been there in the last few years?” I ask.
“I'm not sure,” Dad says, “why don't you go up there and find out. Pack your truck and head up to the mountains.”
“We're already living in the mountains,” I tell him.
“I'm talking about the real mountains. You go to the Rough Forest and clear your head, son. You come home when you're ready to be a real family man.”
“You say it like it’s an ultimatum or something.”
“No, it's a deal.”
“It doesn't seem like much of a deal,” I say, angry that the secret I am keeping to protect him is hurting me more than ever. “I don't really see what say I have in this.”
“The deal is this, son: you go up there and clear your head or you're not coming back to my job site.”
“Oh, it’s your job site now? I thought it was our family business.”
“It’s my business until the day I die. Rye, I always hoped one day I would give it to you. But I'm not handing my business over to a man who is this unhappy. You need to remember what it means to be alive.”
He understands nothing. I'm holding secrets inside to protect him.
I walk past him without saying goodbye to the rest of my family because I already know what they're thinking. They're sick of me.
And I'm not going to change their minds with anything I say right now. My head's too hot. My body is all tense, feeling ready to throw down.
Since I'm not going to start a fight with my flesh and blood, I know it's better for me to just get the hell out of Dodge.
Order Now
ROUGH DEAL
COMING HOME TO THE MOUNTAIN
1
RYE
It hasn’t always beenlike this.
I used to come home for Sunday dinner and enjoy myself. Sit at the table, watch my family, shoot the shit, and think how good I had it. Think how lucky I was to be the oldest of seven siblings, living up here on Rough Mountain, my family the ones who built this town of Home, Washington.
As my father's go-to man with the world in the palm of my hand, I had the respect of anyone I wanted. Hell, I built a home of my own by the time I was twenty-two years old.
Far as anyone could tell, I had it made.
Then one year ago, everything fucking changed.
“Would you like another serving?” Mom asks, bringing me back to the present. Those bad memories are pushed aside as she hands me a platter of her chicken. She’s sitting next to me at the table, trying to fatten me up, thinking maybe if I get some more meat on my bones, I might become happier. Smile more often. I know she's worried. Everyone here is worried.
“Thanks, Mom,” I say, adding another chicken thigh to my already heaping plate of food. My mom has a few love languages. One of them is feeding her kids until they're more than full. I would never resist my mother's home-cooked meals.
She smiles at me softly but she looks tired. Like she needs a break. And hell, I'm sure she does.
Fig, the youngest of us Rough kids, is in the second semester of her senior year of high school and giving my mother a run for her money. You'd think by the end of raising all seven kids she would have this down pat, but Fig is like none of the rest of us. Wild in ways I wasn't. Which is saying something considering I know I've been a handful.
“How's work going?” Mom asks me.