Dax and Rusty picked up one of the vans at the clubhouse and drove a couple miles further out onto the ranch. Dax gave him what he called the five-dollar tour along the way, pointing out the teen center and a few other things. The sheer size of the ranch itself astounded Rusty. He had no idea how much they'd expanded it over the past several years. The housing section alone was nicer than most of the neighborhoods in Boston. Rusty knew some people in town referred to it as “the compound” and insinuated Dax was like one of those crazy preachers that had sex with all the women on the ranch and would ultimately talk them all into drinking the poison Kool-Aid. But Rusty didn't buy into any of that, especially because of his own father's high opinion of Dax.

They drove up in front of a white, two-story house. It was like something you'd see in the movies. It had a wide porch on the front and small balconies that came off of two of the rooms upstairs. The downstairs windows had flower boxes in them, filled with colorful purple and yellow flowers. It was almost like being in a time-warp when Rusty considered just moments before he'd been in what appeared to be, by all accounts, a hard-core biker clubhouse and a garage filled with things that may or may not have been stolen. It was like leaving Westside Story and driving two miles into Mayberry.

Dax parked the van and Rusty followed him up onto the porch and into the house. The living room was big, and cozy looking. The floors were polished wood with plush, colorful rugs scattered here and there. Pictures of a little girl with bright red hair covered the fireplace mantle and a dollhouse that had to be five feet tall sat against one wall. Barbie sat outside of that in her pink van, either coming or going, Rusty wasn't sure which. His head was practically spinning however by the time they stepped out onto another porch on the other side of the house. This one was enclosed with glass and filled with green plants. There was a hammock in the dead center of it and a very thin, pale man with longish light brown hair and two or three days growth of stubble on his face was lounging in it with his eyes closed. Blue was there with a book in her lap, sitting next to the hammock in a chair.

“Hey guys,” she said in a whisper.

“He's asleep?” Dax asked.

“Yeah...”

“I ain't sleeping.” The voice was deep, and dry. He cleared his throat and opened his brown eyes and looked up at them. When he lifted his head, Rusty saw that a gold cross dangled from a thin chain around his neck. It looked almost identical to the one that Rusty had worn since his Mom bought it for him when he was only ten years old. “Blue, can I have some water?”

“Sure!” Blue jumped up and got a glass of water that sat on a small table next to the back door. She stuck a straw in it and held it up to the man's lips. He took a few sips and then nodded at her and she took it away.

“Saint, how you feeling, buddy?” Dax asked him.

Saint smiled and said, “Like a million fucking bucks boss. How are you?”

Dax chuckled. “You know if Angel hears Blue spreading that language around, she's gonna come looking for you.”

Saint chuckled and said, “What's she gonna do...kill me?” He laughed again and then had a coughing fit. Blue gave him a few more sips of the water and when he could speak again he looked at Rusty and said, “Quarterback, right?”

Rusty smiled. “Used to be. Now I'm just plain old Rusty Daniels.” Saint shook the thin blanket off one thin arm and held out his hand. It was shaking as Rusty took it, but that was okay, maybe it would distract from his own tremors.

“Pleased to meet you,” Saint said.

“Likewise.”

Saint dropped Rusty's hand and looked at Dax. “You gonna take Blue back up for the Easter egg hunt?” Rusty saw the two men communicate something with their eyes. Saint hadn't even asked why Rusty was there...it was as if he'd been expecting him. He was beginning to feel a little anxiety about what he was really doing there.

“Yeah, if you don't mind, Rusty? I'll run her up to the clubhouse and I'll be right back. Maybe you can visit with Saint while I'm gone?”

“Sure...yeah,” Rusty said. It wasn't like Dax really offered him another choice. Blue grabbed her backpack and gave Saint a high-five before she left. The man in the hammock waited until they were gone and then he told Rusty,

“You may as well have a seat, it'll take him a while.”

Rusty sat down and going with his theme of the day...the one where he just wanted to get everything out into the open once and for all he said, “You know why I'm here?”

Saint smiled and said, “Dax wanted you to talk to me.”

“Why? I mean, it's nice to meet you and lunch was great and everyone's been really nice...but there's more going on here, isn't there?”

Saint nodded and then started coughing again. Rusty picked up his water and held it until he finished coughing before offering it to him. Saint sipped the straw a few times and then as he had with Blue, he nodded to let Rusty know he'd had enough. “First off, I'm not sure if they reassured you before they brought you out here or not...but, I'm not contagious.”

Rusty smiled. “Good to know.”

“Yeah, it's my liver. It's shot. It sucks too because everything else still works. It's like staying in a motel where they have continental breakfast. They give you one of those big old fat bagels and a tub of cream cheese that only covers like a bite of it. So, you take that one bite and you're left with this whole other half of a perfectly good bagel...but without the cream cheese, it's worthless, right?”

Rusty laughed again, “Yeah, I guess that makes sense.” He sobered then when he realized they were laughing about this young man getting ready to die. It made Rusty suddenly take stock of his own problems and realize that he'd been feeling sorry for himself when he had something that other people couldn't take for granted...his health.

“Anyways, I killed my liver with alcohol. I started drinking almost ten years before I was old enough to drive. Back then, it was an escape from my shitty life. After a while, it was just who I was. My body wouldn't function without it. There was a time there when I actually convinced myself that I was better at everything when I was drunk. I drove drunk, I worked drunk, hell, I even shot my gun drunk. I was a functional drunk...but I was a drunk and the alcohol was silently killing me all along.”

Rusty wasn't sure what to make of all of this. It suddenly felt like an intervention, but why would Dax Marshall give a shit enough about him to stage an intervention? “I'm sorry,” he said, unsure of what else to say. “I can't imagine what you're going through...”

“Don't feel bad for me,” Saint said. “I ain't got nobody but me to blame...and I think me and the big guy upstairs are okay. He might take umbrance at my filthy mouth, and maybe the amount of women I've fucked...and yeah, he might have a few issues with some of the jobs I've done since I joined an MC…but all in all, I think we're okay. I mean, I'm not looking forward to being dead, don't get me wrong, and if I could fight this, I would...but I can't and nothing I do is going to make me better. So, when Dax came to me and asked if I'd be willing to talk to someone else that might be on the same path of self-destruction, I figured why the hell not, you know?”

“So…this is an intervention?” Rusty asked.

“Of sorts...but, I know us alcoholics hate that word.” Rusty almost protested the word, “alcoholic,” but it took one to know one, he guessed...he'd just be wasting his breath. “I'd rather think of this as saving a life, since I can't save my own. We all drink for different reasons. For me, it was to hide the pain and the scars that I carried around with me...the guilt and shame of not being good enough for my own parents and worrying constantly that I wasn't going to be good enough for the man upstairs. I've been told more than once that could never be the case...but do you know who finally convinced me it was true, that God was going to keep loving me, no matter what?” Rusty shook his head. He was thinking about just walking out, but Dax was smart, sticking a dying man on him. That would only make it that much harder. But, he stopped drinking...sort of...yesterday. He looked down at his hands that he had folded in his lap and he watched them gently shake. Just the sight of them trembling, made him want a drink. He sighed and focused his attention back on Saint.

“It was your father. See...I grew up without love, or at least I thought I did. That messed me up in so many ways. I passed up the opportunity to be loved so many times because I was convinced that there was something about me that was inherently unlovable. I never told anyone that though. I had to be this cool, tough guy so that even if no one would ever love me...at least everyone would like me, right? I was the life of the party. I was the biggest sinner in the room, and ultimately that started to make me believe that not even God loved me. No matter how often I read that old bible I carried around with me, I couldn't find anything that convinced me that God loved me. And then along comes this preacher. I have a little chip on my shoulder about preachers because my daddy was all about the fire and brimstone. He preached up a firestorm, but he was all about the do as I say and not as I do...So anyways, I didn't take to your dad right away. I wouldn't even agree to see him...but that sneaky little Blue, she asked him to drive her up here one day to sit with me...and then, when she got here she suddenly had a bellyache, and she asked him not to leave while she was in the bathroom, supposedly throwing up. Your daddy was as onto her as I was, but he didn't seem bothered by it. He sat down next to me and picked up my bible and said,

‘It looks like this book is well-loved.’ I was in a pissy mood that day...you know, dying kind of pisses you off some days. So I looked at him and said, ‘I reckon something around here should be.’ He just smiled and he sat that bible down and said,

‘What you're going to find in there are words. Sure, they're powerful words that mean a lot to a lot of people. But, if you don't feel it,’ and he put his hand on my chest then, right over my heart, ‘Right there, none of it will ever make sense.’ I kind of laughed and said,

‘Well then I guess I'm just shit out of luck, ‘cause I don't feel it.’ He smiled again and said,

‘Let me tell you a story about a man who has lived a lot of his life outside the law. A man that found out he was dying and was taken in by a whole group of people who have spent most of their lives outside of the law and doing things that most people consider amoral. These are people that have been shunned by their community and maybe their own families...these are people that other people cross the street to get away from. But yet...these amoral, unlawful people still have enough love in their hearts that they took this young man in...they keep him warm and comfortable. They feed him, they read to him. They take time out of their own lives for no other personal gain than the pleasure they get by spending time with him. Buddy...if that's not love, then I guess I must not know what love is. And anyone who tried to tell me that God doesn't love these sinners, would be wrong. Because even if they misinterpreted what they read in that bible, or what the preacher said in church last Sunday...the evidence that God loves these people is all around you. People without God's love in their heart have no need to help others. We all make mistakes in life. We all choose to do things sometimes that we know God is going to disapprove of. But in my opinion young man, what we do for someone else, giving no thought at all to our own personal sacrifice or gain...that's what puts that feeling of love for ourselves and those around us in our hearts, And ultimately, that's what we're going to be judged for in the end…not those silly mistakes that we made...because we're human. You can tell me a lot of things, Saint, but I won't ever believe you're unloved, because I've seen it with my own eyes.’ Blue walked back in the room about then and he said, ‘I'm looking at it right now.’

You know, I didn't say anymore to him that day, and he didn't say anymore to me...but those simple words, after all the searching I've done my whole life...they finally sunk in. I've been walking around my whole life thinking I was cursed somehow, when in reality, I've been so blessed. I was given a second shot at having a family that loved me...and look at me, I'm surrounded by it.”

Saint put his hand over his heart then and said, “Once I realized that your daddy was right, I started being able to feel it in here. God loves me, or he wouldn't have ever sent these good people into my life. And boy if he loves this sinner right here, he loves you too. You just have to believe that and once you do, you'll start loving yourself and then you'll stop trying to kill yourself...before you're like me and it's too late.”

“Well...I appreciate that,” Rusty said. “I do have a question though. Did this all come about after Dax saw the video of me at the park?”

Blue walked in just then. “Dax is here to take you back to the clubhouse,” she told Rusty. Then she looked at Saint and said, “I'll answer his question, before he goes.”

“You sure, darlin'?”

She nodded and then looked at Rusty. “I'm the one that told your dad, and he talked to Dax and that's where all this came from.”

Rusty frowned. “You called my dad, in Africa?”

She nodded. “He told me that if I ever needed to talk, I could call him. Sometimes I just need to vent about my old man, you know? Your pop is a good listener. You know why my dad's in jail, Rusty?” Rusty shook his head. “He hit a lady with his bike. She was just out taking her walk...and now she won't ever be able to walk again. He was drunk. And don't get me wrong, my old man is a good guy, at heart. He took good care of me when I was little. Everyone around here liked him a lot...but, he was always drinking. It didn't matter if it was day or night, it was like he always had something to celebrate. And he was happy too...right up until he hit that lady. He already had his license taken away and he wasn't supposed to be driving. So they threw the book at him. He won't even be eligible for parole until I'm eighteen. He missed my whole life, Randy...because he couldn't stop drinking. So yeah, I told your pop, hoping he could do something for you before you were like my pop, or Saint here, and it was too late.”