Chapter Nineteen
Ashley
Throughout the ride to the amusement park, there was a looming sense of faked emotions and an underlying sense of aggravation.
The car ride was slow and almost painful. I hadn’t been in the car with my father in years and this was not exactly the situation I was looking forward to, especially in light of his current attitude. There was nothing that I wouldn’t do to get him to just turn the car around and take me back to the beach house.
I would love to have a day where the family, where his family, left me home to enjoy the solitude and pretend my life wasn’t falling apart around me. But of course, my father wanted to include me and like an idiot, I had gone along with it.
Why is it that the second he is nice to you again, even a little, you crumble into a million pieces and everything is forgiven? I asked myself as I crossed my arms and tried to ignore virtually everyone that was in the car with me.
Granted, it wasn’t all that difficult, seeing as how no one spoke, except for Theresa trying to keep the peace and asking us questions every once and a while.
Those questions usually remained unanswered, or just returned with one-word responses, but this was the life she chose. She had a son who was one of the most awful people I had ever had the displeasure to meet and married a man who was certifiable.
I had to admit that his daughter wasn’t much better, but I certainly wasn’t as bad as my father or as evil and conniving as Tyler; at least not yet and therefore, I did feel slightly bad for her.
Even though I wasn’t with her all that much, whenever I was, I couldn’t help but notice that the world seemed to almost forget her. Everyone did their own thing, even my father, and although she tried, she was always cut out or just stuck in the middle.
Perhaps not to the extreme that Theresa seemed to find herself in, but I felt badly for her because in a way, I knew that I could relate to her. When my parents would fight, I would always try to be the peacekeeper and it while it never worked, I always ended up feeling worse than they did. But that didn’t mean that I was willing to accept her as anything more than my father’s child-wife, along with her lunatic son.
When we arrived at the amusement park, I was at least happy that there was something fun going on today. After the past few weeks of having my emotions rocket up and down, with very little change in what was actually going on, it was nice to at least be in a newer place.
Every year we would go to the amusement park at least once and I would always love it; but this memory, although it involved my mother, it did not center on her, like the others on the beach and in the house.
Rather, this was a memory that I associated more with my father, even now that my mother was gone. She never did like rides. Like long car rides, my mother would often get sick when she decided to go on even the gentlest ride and therefore, even as we made our way through the gates, it gave me a sense of nostalgia that for once wasn’t painful.
After all, my father was with us and we were probably going to have a good time, just like we used to; that is, if I had kept my father’s sense of adventure for these things.
Five years was a long time and I couldn’t quite be sure.
“Do you like rides?” I asked Theresa.
She laughed at me, as though her answer was obvious; that or the mere mention of rides made her sick to her stomach. “Oh, no…Tyler has always loved the thrill, but me personally, I have never been able to get into them.” She smiled back at me, turning her body with interest as she answered, “I just wanted to tag along and watch you three have fun.”
I smiled back at her before I let my eyes wander up to the large rollercoasters that I remembered so easily from my youth.
Hopefully I would be right and I would be able to find solace in this place. I even thought, that by going to a place that both my father and I enjoyed, I would be able to have a breakthrough so that this summer didn’t completely suck.
If I could connect with my dad on any level, after the lack of relationship we had sustained so far, I would have counted it as a win. Right now, I was hopeful that this daytrip might actually do the trick.
After we paid our admission and made our way into the park, I was once again struck with a sense of excitement and pleasure. I hadn’t wanted to come this morning, because I had next to no interest to spend time with my father and the others that seemed to be attached at his hip, among other places. But now that we were here, I was glad that I hadn’t fought to go.
I looked over at the sparkle in Tyler’s eyes as he caught sight of the whirling rollercoasters and other thrill rides, realizing that I was once again not alone in my feelings.
“So, what do you say we start with our favorite coaster?” my father asked, placing his arm around my shoulder and hugging me into him.
The hug felt strangely familiar. When I was little, he did this often, but now, we rarely were in the same room with one another and as the familiar feeling surged through my bones, I couldn’t help but smile at him, happy to have felt at least a little glimmer of the way things used to be. Finally.
“Sure, Dad. That sounds great!” I exclaimed, before we made our way toward the tallest, fastest rollercoaster in the park.
Tyler didn’t say very much, but he followed right on our heels, as though he wished that he could be closer in the connection of this moment.
If I didn’t know any better, I would actually venture to say that he was jealous of what was going on between me and my father, which was a very strange reaction for Mr. Meathead-Cool to have, but I didn’t question it.
I certainly wasn’t against him getting in on the moment, even though I probably should have kicked him out as harshly as I could just for spite; but instead, I slowed down and allowed him to fall into step next to us.
I know I’m a sucker. What can I say? I thought as I tried to defend my actions to myself. After all, it wasn’t like I was going to do very much to stop him hanging around with us. And despite what he might believe about me or what I might want to believe about myself, underneath all of the hurt of my own, I was still a good person. I didn’t want to have to worry about getting revenge for something that I really couldn’t even correctly identify.
Sure, I was fairly angry with them and my whole world, but by finally having a connection with my father after all of these years, I wanted to embrace it instead of trying to figure out the best way to keep that feeling from Tyler.
We didn’t say much while we were in line, but I still felt like no matter what, I was doing a lot better than I had in a long time. For once, at the very least, I was interested in where I was at the moment, instead of constantly counting the seconds until I was going back to the place I considered home. I wasn’t drunk, or doing something morally compromising. I was just having fun with my father, the only family that I had left.
When we got on the ride, I thought it was strange that while I sat next to my father, Tyler made it a point to go over and sit on the other side of my father.
I would have thought that he would have wanted to sit by me, or at the very least, right in the middle so he could continue to be even the slightest bit annoying, but he didn’t. I thought it was nice of him to finally do something for someone else for a change, but I still noticed it far more than I should have and I wanted to know why.
Yet, I didn’t care enough to ask, at least right now, and so I let whatever it was that was going on inside of Tyler’s head slide so that I could enjoy the ride…and to my utter surprise, I did, for more reasons than I would have ever expected.
When the ride was over, we went to check out the picture and of course, like most of our pictures, it was absolutely hilarious.
My dad had his tongue sticking out and I was screaming my head off, but without even noticing, Tyler had also enjoyed the crazy picture taking and looked as though he truly feared for his life.
“That’s a great picture,” my father exclaimed, before he looked over at me and asked, “Should we carry on the tradition? I know it’s been a few years…” He smiled at me, almost as though trying his best to apologize, before I nodded enthusiastically.
“Sure!” I answered and then looked at Tyler with a teasing expression. “I need some kind of leverage against the meat head, over here.”
He narrowed his eyes at me and retorted quickly, “Go ahead and threaten me. You have no idea the kind of threat I fuckin bring…”
My father looked between the two of us then and at first, I thought that he was going to reprimand us for cursing and teasing one another, but instead he just smiled and let out a chuckle. “It’s kind of cool to have two kids.” He looked at me before he added in a careful voice, “This was what I always imagined. I always wanted you to have a sibling…”
Even though I was enjoying the sentimental moment and the fact that my father really seemed to be trying, I couldn’t let that one slide. It was just too rich. So I narrowed one eyebrow before I answered, “I’m sorry, Dad…You imagined that I would have a self-righteous prick for a brother who only cares about himself…and his hair which is obviously a pet of some kind?”
Once again, he laughed and passed a glance between the two of us again before he said, “In our own right, every guy is like that at his age.”
“Dude, I’m standing right here!” Tyler exclaimed, but then smiled and answered, “Although, I’m flattered you noticed.”
I couldn’t help but chuckle as I pushed his shoulder in a playful manner. The truth was, having a brother really wasn’t so terrible. It was having a stepbrother that I wanted to strangle more than anything else that was the problem I seemed to have.
Yet, that was all right. At the moment, I was having a good time and I certainly didn’t want to ruin the mood. So I continued to banter with him and pretend that, in fact, he was my brother.
Since my dad was obviously trying, I figured that it was only fair that I did the same thing.
When I pushed his shoulder, he turned back and smiled at me, before chasing me out of the line.
We then met up with Tyler’s mother, who had become the bag lady and waited for my father to return.
The rest of the day went just as well as that first ride and I was intrigued by that. It did help that Tyler kept his asshole tendencies to a minimum and tried his best to be a brother, instead of a lover, but I also noticed a change in my father.
Instead of ignoring my existence as much as he possibly could, he tried to make the day special for me. For once, he reminded me of how he was, once upon a time, before my life was turned upside-down. Even though there was always the presence of his wife and Tyler, this particular day seemed to be more about me and him than anyone else on the planet.
I would have never admitted this, but it actually felt good being able to enjoy the company of my father, the way I remembered him, instead of the shell of a man he had become.
That day at the amusement park, I felt as though I had gotten something back that I hadn’t had in a very long time. It was unexpected and I was aware that it probably wouldn’t last, but I had waited five long years to feel this way again and it didn’t take me long to realize that it was definitely worth every second of the wait.