Bad Son Rising (21 page)

Mia slit open the next envelope and opened the card, “Look, Toys R Us gift cards.” She held up the two cards. “This is from Uncle Henry in California.” Ignoring the plastic gift cards, Portia retrieved the card from her mother and made her way to her step stool by the fireplace to hang it.

As Mia silently read the next card, her cheek muscles twitched and she inhaled sharply. Without a word, Mia handed the card to Zac.

Flipping open the iconic Courier & Ives Christmas image, the blank card contained a handwritten note.

Dear Schooner, Mia & Family,

I hope this letter finds you all well and enjoying the holidays. This has been quite a year for both our families and we are very fortunate to all be safe, healthy and together. The last few months have been trying as Liliana reacclimatizes after the trauma experienced in the Congo, but every day we see her growing stronger. I hope that you are seeing Zac’s continued progress in his healing. Hopefully in the coming year we will all be able to reunite and celebrate our blessings.

Happy holidays,

Berto Castillo

Zac sat there for a long while rereading the note. This was his first news of Lily in months. From her father’s words, she’d been having a tough time.
Maybe I should reach out to her,
he wondered,
I want to help her. I want to make it better. Take back everything I did and said to cause her pain
. But Berto said that every day she was growing stronger.
I should just leave her alone, let her heal and move on with her life. She doesn’t deserve the crap I bring her.

Rising from the couch, Zac left the living room, Berto’s card still in hand. Lying on his bed, he read it over, two, three, four times. Berto’s words made him feel closer, connected to Lily.

“Lils, please don’t hate me,” he said to the card. “I did what I did because I love you. I hope someday that you’ll be able to see that. Maybe someday I’ll be able to tell you.” His heart hurt from the thoughts. “Merry Christmas, Lils,” he said to the card.

Slowly, Zac rose from the bed, the pain more acute than it had been in weeks. Slipping the card into the cover of the journal his therapist had him keeping, he stood for a moment with his palm on the journal’s cover, fingers spread wide.

Rejoining his family, Zac readied himself for their Christmas Eve festivities.

Back in school at CCNY, taking a double course load to make up for lost time, Zac threw himself into schoolwork, time with Nathaniel and Portia, and workout sessions to continue to strengthen his body. Working himself day and night helped him forget that last day of violence in the Congo for a few minutes at a time. Sometimes he’d even make it through an hour or two without hearing Lily’s voice in his head telling him that he wasn’t worth loving.
I didn’t need you to tell me that,
he would think,
I already knew that.

He asked out on dates a few girls from school and a few from the gym, hoping to find that elusive connection that he had felt with Liliana, desperately needing to prove to himself that he was capable of connecting with someone on a level deeper than just physical. With every date ending in sex, Zac became more and more despondent and convinced that he just didn’t possess the basic human ability to love properly. After the first date, he never called the any of the girls back. He was alone, but he was safe.

Eventually, school, family, and the healing of his body became Zac’s sole focus. At the insistence of his father, he religiously maintained twice a week visits with a therapist to help him rid the constant thoughts of the Interhamwe and regularly occurring nightmares where the abduction and shoot out yielded very different results. Together, he and his therapist were making great strides in laying those demons to rest. The area in which his therapist wasn’t making headway, was in helping Zac to successfully relate in one-on-one relationships with women.

Jack Stein looked like a shrink. Bearded, with dark hair and warm, probing brown eyes, he was always dressed in a plaid cotton shirt and worn jeans.

Zac was convinced that Jack Stein had perfected silence.

“Has it occurred to you that you pick women with whom you know you can’t relate?” Then he shut up.

Zac shrugged.

“They’re girls I know from school, so you’d think we had something in common.”

“What kind of interactions had you had with them leading up to asking them out on dates?” Jack’s voice was very calm and serene.

Again, Zac shrugged and slouched down further into the big leather recliner.

“I guess not much,” Zac finally responded.

Silence followed.

“I see,” Jack nodded and fell silent again. He let a few moments pass, “Zac, have you considered getting some closure with the woman you were in love with, so that you might be free to move on and experience success in another relationship?”

“I got closure with her in Africa, Doc.” Zac’s shoulders visibly tensed.

Jack watched Zac unconsciously rub the spots on his abdomen and chest where he’d been shot. His fingers stroked back and forth over the spots. Back and forth. Back and forth.

“No Zac, you didn’t get closure. You ended your relationship under false pretenses. I understand it was for the greater good, but you did end it with a lie,” Jack paused. “Is it possible that you cannot successfully move on until you clear the slate?”

“That slate’s been shattered into a million pieces.”

“Well, what do you think is holding you back from having another successful relationship?”

“Maybe I just don’t have the capacity to love.”

“That’s flawed thinking. You’ve already proven that you do.” Jack dismissed Zac’s excuse.

“Maybe I could only love her.”

“Maybe you’re still in love with her,” Jack countered.

Zac hated when his shrink sounded like Liz. Finally, he stopped dating altogether, focused on his studies, determined to graduate on time and get into a good graduate school program. He spent weekends studying or with his family or with Liz and her family. Their friendship and the fun they had together was more fulfilling than attempting a relationship he knew was going to bomb out. Liz had become just as much as a beard for him as he had always been for her.

Release for Zac came in the form of intense exercise workouts or sexually as trysts against bathroom walls, in locked classrooms, or on the beach. They no longer involved dates or phone numbers or any of the pretenses that he was going to try and make things work. It was about fucking and release. He fulfilled a physical need. Nothing more.

If he had been able to be honest with himself, he didn’t want to make things work, for he had convinced himself that would just prove that he was the failure he knew himself to be. Descending into his comfort zone, use and be used was a place Zac Moore was a master. And that got him by.

Sunburned and tired from a day on the links with Richard van der Hayden and his cronies, Zac was looking forward to kicking up his feet after the club’s formal dinner to watch their fireworks display over the Long Island Sound. So much business had been done that day over the course of eighteen holes that his head was still spinning. The finesse with which these deals were made was like taking a master class in negotiations. He had learned so much in those few hours and was smart enough to keep his mouth shut, and let these masters of the universe take center stage, while he took copious mental notes and tried to absorb their well-practiced nuances. He’d only wished his dad had been on the fairways with them, so that he could have seen him in action with these wealthy scions of industry.

“Don’t you look handsome,” Neelie came and sat down next to him.

“I only look good because you’re sitting next to me, Mrs. V.” Zac graced her with his gorgeous smile and a conspiratorial wink.

Neelie laughed, “If you weren’t so damn good looking, I’d call you Eddie Haskell.”

Zac joined in her laughter remembering the ass-kissing character from the old-time show,
Leave It to Beaver
. Eddie was always at the center of trouble and would turn the charm on for Beaver and his older brother Wally’s parents, to deflect his guilt.

“Mrs. V., you don’t really think I’m a troublemaker, do you?” Zac chided the older woman.

“Think? There’s no thinking, Zac. It takes a special man to get tossed out of Bryson College when you’re parents are paying full tuition.”

“I’m not sure if I should be proud or deeply embarrassed,” he confided, his grin revealing little embarrassment.

“Go with proud.” Neelie was barely containing her laughter, “You’re quite the young entrepreneur. And diverse business lines, too. Very impressive. I look forward to seeing you at thirty-five.”

“My father was all kinds of pissed when that happened.” Turning to Neelie, “Every family needs a black sheep, right?”

Rolling her eyes, “Look around this room. You’re not considered a man until you’ve been kicked out of a fine educational institution. There are more Andover and Hotchkiss expellees here than anywhere else on the planet.”

“I’m suddenly feeling very at home. Maybe I should apply for a membership,” he laughed. “I wonder where Liz is.”

“Probably in a bathroom stall with that cute cocktail waitress.” There was a hint of amusement in Neelie’s tone.

Zac had just taken a sip from his crystal water goblet and began to choke. Neelie patted him on the back of his navy blazer.

“Yes, I know,” she confessed, her blue eyes relaying sympathy.

“Wow. For a long time?” Zac continued to clear his throat.

“I’ve suspected for a long time. My daughter has the most handsome beard in Connecticut, but I don’t anticipate that I’ll be making a wedding for the two of you anytime soon.”

“I’m sorry,” Zac muttered, thrown for a loop by Neelie’s admission and the exposure of their subterfuge.

Placing her hand over his, she gave it a motherly squeeze. “Nothing to apologize for, Zac. This has been very selfless of you to cover for Elisabeth in this way.”

“I’d do anything for her, Mrs. V.” Zac was trying to get a read on the situation, suddenly scared for Liz.

“I know, Zac, and I totally appreciate it.” Leaning close, she whispered, “Between you and me, my father-in-law is a grand turd, and if that old ass thinks he is cutting any of my children out of his will because of his prejudices, then the old bastard, is going to have to contend with me.”

Their faces inches apart, “My money’s on you, Mrs. V. and I’m more than happy to help, Liz. She’s had my back through thick and thin.”

Sitting back in silence, they watched the lights sparkle from the chandelier’s fine crystals as a five-piece band filled the night with vintage Big Band music.

“This music begs for a martini,” Neelie mused.

Zac looked around, “I don’t see our waiter,” he continued to scan the room in a panoramic motion.

He would look back at that moment and wonder if it was just a feeling or if he actually saw light from the crystal chandelier glint off the sweep of her hair. Watching her, a mirage gracefully swaying in the arms of a non-descript twenty-something, anger and jealousy rose from a place deep in his psyche — a place he didn’t explore with any great frequency.

He was on his feet and moving across the room, a knee jerk gut reaction, with a clear mission — to get her out of the other guy’s arms, immediately, and into his. There was no forethought, no plan. This was visceral, a reaction out of his control, his heart still in knots he’d yet to untie.

She hadn’t noticed his approach, as her head rest against her partner’s chest, eyes closed.
She looks content
, he thought. They stopped moving as he tapped the guy on the shoulder to cut in. Her partner immediately began to protest, but Zac just ignored him.

“Hello, Lils.”

He could see the shock in her eyes, followed briefly by an almost smile, and as she rapidly descended into fiery anger, he took her in his arms, pulling her against his tight, long frame.

With an intimacy reserved for lovers, his fingers splayed through her hair. An “mmmm” sound came from deep in his throat that he was powerless to control as the scent from her hair permeated his senses, activating the highly emotional limbic portion of his memory flooded brain.

“You smell like a Piña Colada,” he smiled into her hair.

“How original,” her tone was cold.

Laughing, “God, I’ve missed you.” He couldn’t hold her tight enough.

“You expect me to fall for that?” Her eyes were filled with unresolved anger as she looked up at him.

“I have missed you every moment of every day since you walked out of my hospital room.”
Please read my eyes
, he silently begged.

“You think this is funny, Zac? What is this? Some let’s fuck with Lily game?”

Shaking his head, “No game, Lils,” he was amazed at the pure joy he felt calling her by his special nickname, “I swear. I’m sorry I hurt you. I had to do it.”

“You had to hurt me?” her tone was more venomous than confused, her anger quickly overshadowing any composure she may have hoped to hang onto.

Zac was nodding, his face and demeanor dead serious. “It was too dangerous and I couldn’t protect you, Lils and I couldn’t let you stay there. Not without me.”

Her brow furrowed, a deep gash forming between her eyes. The surprise on her face revealed that she had never believed anything but the hurtful lies that he had convincingly fed her — that had been the only truth she had carried with her.

“What are you saying to me, Zac? That you cared about me?”

Burying his face in her hair, he whispered, “I’m telling you that when I told you I loved you, it was real. Everything we shared was real. I did what I did so that you would get on a plane and go home. I needed you to be safe.”

Shocked by his words, Lily stopped moving to look up at Zac, “That wasn’t your decision to make, Zac.”

Taking her face in both his hands, his right thumb slowly swept across the soft curve of her cheek, “Yeah, Lils. It was. I knew you would want me to stay, and even if I didn’t, you would have stayed behind to finish your TDY on the project. If I’d stayed, I was in no shape to protect you and if I left… well, I couldn’t leave you there unprotected after all that happened. I knew the only way you would go is if you were surrounded by places that reminded you of us. If you couldn’t escape the pain.”