Who's Your Daddy? (40 page)

I sighed. “I have to wonder about that sometimes.”

“All parents fuck up,” he said. “You’ve done the best you could.”

“Is that good enough, though?”

“Let’s put it this way,” he said. “If it’s a choice between fucking up at parenting the way you think you have with Ryan, or fucking up the way your dad did with you, then I’ll gladly take this.”

My breath caught in my throat. “Really?”

“Have you ever once thought he wasn’t good enough to be allowed the privilege of being your son?”

“What? Jesus Christ, no.”

He smiled and kissed me. “Then you’re a better father than yours ever aspired to be.”

I rested my forehead against his. “Well, let’s not start handing out Father of the Year medals until after this conversation.” I lifted my head and nodded in the general direction of Ryan’s room.

Isaac grimaced. “Good luck. I’m sure you’ll be fine, though.”

“I hope so,” I whispered.

“You will be.”

With one last parting kiss, Isaac went back upstairs. I leaned against the kitchen counter, sipping my coffee in the silence while I waited for my son to get up.

Carmen’s comment about my own father kept reverberating through my head. I knew exactly how he would have responded to this situation. He’d have berated me for dragging him out of the house in the middle of the night, not to mention throwing it in my face that my mother would have been
so
disappointed in me. He would have screamed at me the whole way home last night, then gotten up this morning and repeated it all so I didn’t forget a word. Once his voice gave out, I’d be grounded until I was dead.

That was on a good night. In reality, had I pulled a stunt like Ryan did last night, my dad wouldn’t have helped me to bed so I could sober up before he let me have it. If I was too drunk to listen to him, he’d have let me pass out and lie where I fell until the next morning. Then, before long, I’d be in the bathroom dabbing blood from my nose and mouth.

Pouring myself another cup of coffee, I couldn’t shake the sick nervousness in my gut. Last night was a wake-up call. Something had to change, because with every clash, things were getting colder between us. The distance kept growing, and while I couldn’t let what happened go unaddressed, I also couldn’t let the rift between us get any wider than it already was. Another shouting match punctuated by slamming doors wouldn’t bring us any closer together.

God, please, let this be the right thing to do.

Around ten thirty, Ryan’s bedroom door opened. Slow footsteps padded across the hall downstairs, and the bathroom door closed. I waited in the kitchen, sipping my coffee and dreading the conversation that inched closer with the start and stop of the shower, more opening and closing of doors, and more footsteps. When the stairs squeaked beneath his feet, the hand holding my coffee cup shook too much to drink it without dropping it.

I set my cup on the counter as Ryan shuffled into the kitchen. He looked at me for a second, something like fear and contempt mingling with an expression of fatigue and the pain of a hangover. His eyelids were heavy, the shadows under his eyes dark. His lips pulled tight like he was this close to puking.

“Coffee?” I asked.

He nodded, wincing from that simple motion. He took a seat at the kitchen table while I poured the coffee. Neither of us spoke as I set the cup in front of him, though his posture stiffened slightly when I sat across from him.

Looking into his coffee cup, he muttered, “So how grounded am I?” The sarcasm in his voice didn’t quite mask the nervousness, though. It might have been embarrassment or maybe a little of both. I couldn’t be sure.

“You’re not.” I set my coffee cup down.

He stared at me. “I’m not?”

Shaking my head, I said, “I just think we need to talk. About a few things.”

“Like,” he paused. “Like what?”

“You tell me.”

That caught him off guard. From the half-confused, half-terrified look he shot me, I guessed he was wishing I’d just chewed him out, grounded him and called it a day.

Returning his gaze to the safety of his coffee cup, he said, “I don’t know. You’re the one that wants to talk.”

“Seemed like you had a few choice words for me last night.”

His cheeks darkened, and he inclined his head even more, as if to hide the extra color from me.

“How much did you have to drink last night?” I asked.

He shook his head slowly. “I don’t remember.”

“How much do you remember drinking?”

“Enough to fuck myself up,” he snapped, wincing and rubbing his forehead. Normally I’d have gotten on him for cursing, but that was the least of my worries at the moment.

Trying not to let my voice betray my own nerves, I said, “Were you trying to fuck yourself up?”

He looked up again, eyebrows jumping slightly as if he hadn’t expected the question. “What?”

I tapped my thumb on the handle of my coffee cup. “Did you have that much to drink because you wanted to get that drunk? Or did you just lose track?”

Rubbing his forehead, he closed him eyes and sighed. “I don’t know.”

“You don’t know or you don’t remember?”

“Does it matter?”

“It matters to me.”

“Why?”

“Because I’d like to know why the fuck you were three sheets to the wind with your hand up some random girl’s shirt last night,” I growled.

Surprise flickered across his face.

I suppressed a groan. “Tell me you remember at least that much.”

He said nothing, and the silence spoke volumes. I remembered all of last night with painful clarity, but I had no doubt the booze had blurred his memory a bit. Much like a hell of a lot of wine had blurred my memory of one particularly fateful night.

“How many times have you been to the Temple?” I asked.

He shrugged. “A few.”

I thought of the way I’d found him last night, drunk off his ass and tangled up with that girl. The questions were on the tip of my tongue, but I wasn’t so sure I wanted the answers to all of them. Any of them, really. I wasn’t even sure I could articulate the questions. No matter how many times I’d rehearsed this conversation in my head, I was lost. Totally lost.

Finally, I took a breath and hoped for the best.

“Ryan, I want you to be honest with me.” I folded my hands behind my coffee cup and kept my voice low and even. “I’m not asking because I want to punish you or embarrass you. I just want to know.” I paused, wondering if I could get the words out at all. “Have you had sex with Kristy?”

He stared into his coffee cup. My question hung in the air, and his silence answered it more succinctly than any word or nod could have. Finally, he released a long breath and nodded. Just a single, slow nod, but enough to confirm what I’d been afraid to hear.

I leaned back in my chair, exhaling and letting my own coffee cup hold my gaze. After a moment, I said, “For how long?”

“A few months,” he whispered.

“Have you been—” I hesitated. “Careful?”

“Yes, always,” he said quickly.

“Good.” There were more questions, more that I needed to know and needed to say, but first I needed a moment to get my head around this.

“Are you mad?” he asked.

The words reverberated through my mind. Had I found this out in the course of any other conversation, I’d have been furious. I’d have formulated a dozen ways to punish him before the words were even out of his mouth. But in light of everything he knew about me now and everything I’d seen last night, I was just glad to be having this honest, if awkward, conversation.
So this is what cold comfort feels like
.

“Dad?”

I shook my head. “No. No, I’m not mad.”

“Just disappointed?” There was a hint of humor in his voice, and when I looked at him, his eyes begged me to find that humor. If only to break some of this ice, I managed a halfhearted smile.

“Something like that,” I said. “Actually, if anything, I was just worried last night. When I couldn’t find you, it—”

“Jesus Christ, you’re talking to me like I’m a girl, Dad. I can take care of myself.”

“I’m talking to you like you’re a sixteen-year-old
kid
,” I said. “Guys can be taken advantage of too, you know. You’re not invincible. What about that chick you were fooling around with? Do you even remember her name?”

He blinked, then shifted his gaze away.

My stomach turned. “You didn’t know her name, did you?”

He set his jaw. “She wasn’t taking advantage of me. I wanted it.”

“You were drunk. You couldn’t even stand up. Even if you were an adult, you were too drunk to give consent, and if she had a responsible bone in her body, she wouldn’t have touched you while you were like that.”

“What would you know about being responsible?” he snarled. We stared at each other. Then he looked away. “Sorry, I—”

“No, you’re right.”

“What?”

“You have every right to question me,” I said.

Once again, he was caught off guard. “I do?”

“Yes. I’m not infallible.”

He shifted. “So, why is it okay for you to do this kind of thing, but not me? It’s not like I don’t know what can happen.”

“I’m not saying you don’t,” I said. “I’m saying Isaac, Carmen and I are better equipped to deal with those consequences if they arise.”

“Which they did,” he growled.

“Yes, they did,” I said. “The thing is, being our age, it doesn’t magically make the consequences go away. Tell me, Ryan, what would you and Kristy do if she got pregnant?”

He blinked. “What do you mean?”

“Would you stick around?” I asked. “Pay for an abortion? Sign away your rights so she can give the baby up? Stay with her and raise it?”

“I, um, I don’t know.”

“Have you talked to her about it?”

He pursed his lips and shook his head.

“Then why are you having sex with her if you don’t know what either of you would do if something went wrong?”

No answer.

Heart pounding, I took a deep breath. “I know what I’m talking about here, son. And I know this is going to be incredibly TMI, but I think you need to hear it.”

His eyebrows jumped. “Um, okay…”

“When Carmen got pregnant,” I said, “we didn’t use condoms. None of us even thought about it.” I hesitated. “Because we were drunk.”

Ryan’s lips parted. “What?”

My face burned, and it was a struggle and a half to maintain eye contact. “We all had too much to drink, and…” I waved with one hand. “And I could spend all day telling you all the ways that came back and bit us in the ass, but I don’t think I need to.”

Once again, he fell silent, looking into his coffee cup.

“It’s not just you,” I said softly. “This can happen to anyone. It happened to me. I don’t think you want to be in my position right now, do you?”

He shook his head. After a while, he whispered, “Am I still allowed to see Kristy?”

I gritted my teeth. Oh, the temptation to tell him I didn’t want to see that girl’s face again as long as I lived. But I took a breath and whispered, “Yes. You can still see her.”

“Really?”

“I’d rather you didn’t,” I said. “But yes, you can still see her if that’s what you want.”

Closing his eyes, he rubbed the bridge of his nose. “This is really confusing.”

“What’s confusing?”

“I just don’t get it,” he said. “I’m not grounded. I’m still allowed to see Kristy.” He shook his head. “What’s the catch?”

“No catch. You know where I stand, but I can’t control every aspect of your life. You’re growing up. You have to make choices in your own life.” I paused. “And you’ll be the one who has to deal with the consequences, good or bad, of those choices.”

“You don’t want me to see her, though.”

“No, I don’t,” I said. “I don’t want you drinking. I don’t want you going to the Temple. I really don’t want you having sex with Kristy or anyone else until you’re at a point in your life where you can handle the consequences if something goes wrong.” I put my hands up. “But I can’t stop you.”

His lips parted, and he cocked his head. “What do you mean? You’ve stopped me before.”

“I’ve put down rules and consequences for breaking those rules,” I said. “But what else can I do? I can’t follow you around all the time. This isn’t a game, son. It’s not a question of telling you what to do and then trying to catch you in the act. If I make a rule, there’s a reason for it, and nine times out of ten, that reason is to keep you safe.”

“Then, if you were that worried about Kristy…” He trailed off for a moment. “Why did you let me see her in the first place?”

“Would you have stopped if I’d told you to?”

“I don’t know,” he said. “Maybe.”

“I doubt that.” I resisted the urge to nervously tap my fingers. “Look, your mother and I never told you not to see her because we were afraid she’d be even more attractive to you.” I ran a hand through my hair. “The truth is, Ryan, I’ve gotten a bad vibe off her from the beginning. It wasn’t because I didn’t want you dating or anything like that, or that I naïvely thought you wouldn’t want to do any experimenting. It was
her
. Just, her attitude, the fact that she smelled like pot half the time and was barely lucid far too many times than I was comfortable seeing. She struck me as just the kind of girl who would do what she was doing last night. And I was worried being around her, you’d end up doing pretty much what you were doing when I caught you.”