25
Secret meetings
[Midge]
To my surprise, Hank doesn’t try to kiss me when he leaves on Friday night, but he shows up on Saturday for Liam’s second game of a doubleheader and then takes us out for burgers. I see Liam falling for Hank like I have. Hank pays attention to details, and he asks Liam all kinds of questions about baseball. In true ten-year-old fashion, Liam sways the conversation through a plethora of topics before we finish eating.
“I’m sorry about that.” I giggle as we exit the diner.
“He’s full of energy, but I enjoy him.” I like how he says this about my son. Hank only hugs me, and we part. I want to call him. I want to know what he’s thinking. I totally messed up by saying I loved him. The words simply escaped, creeping against his skin. He’s playful and carefree, and the spontaneity of him gets to me—in a good way—but I took it one step too far. I went for it, which is out of character for me because I typically take things too seriously and I can be uptight. I’m responsible, I tell myself, but the truth is I’m choking. Suffocating from commitments. I want a little room to breathe, be free, be silly, and I thought Hank was all those things for me. Instead, another trait of mine takes over—I’m worried.
When he picks me up on Sunday, I’m a bundle of nerves. As we drive through the hills north of Los Angeles, Hank takes my hand and holds it on his thigh, but he’s quiet. It’s early evening, and I have no idea where we are going. My mouth opens to speak, but I don’t know what to say. Hank seems lost to me, deep in thought as we wind through the streets.
Eventually, we arrive at a large gated home. I’ve never visited this area as I don’t mix with the rich and famous. The gate opens, and we creep up the circular drive. The house appears to sit sideways on the lot, shielding the front entrance from the road. A large ramp zigzags next to the front steps.
“Where are we?” I question, a touch of wonder in my voice. Hank parks and brings my hand to his mouth. His eyes close as he kisses my knuckles.
“This is Kit Carrigan’s home.” He pauses, and my stomach twists as I glance back at the house—a sprawling 1970 ranch which looks a little outdated. The bright white brick reflects in the late afternoon sunlight, and the house makes me think of a hospital for some reason. Large wooden double doors stand at the top of the front steps. The dark wood is a sharp contrast to the whiteness surrounding it. I’m waiting for Hank to explain, air building in my chest.
“I know it seems strange to bring you here, but this is where I’d like you to meet someone. Tommy and Edie will be here as well. He moved pasta night here tonight.”
My brow pinches. I’ve heard of the Sunday night pasta ritual, something practiced when the boys were on the road. Tommy wants Collision, the band he manages, to have a homecooked meal and hang out like a family. The practice is more sporadic when they are home as Tommy and Gage have their own families to spend time with on a weekend. I’m not certain if I should be honored or concerned by the tension in Hank’s voice.
“Who are we meeting?” If I ever believed people could rise from the dead, this moment was one of them. For the briefest minute, I feared Kit Carrigan was actually alive and living in this house, and for some sick reason, Hank wanted me to meet her. What he said next floored me almost as much as my original thoughts.
“We’re meeting my son.”
+ + +
As Hank leads me toward the house, he remains quiet and doesn’t offer an explanation. My insides roil in turmoil at the omission of his having a son, and from what I surmise, it was with Kit Carrigan. The oddity is Hank seems just as tense as I do, squeezing my hand enough to cut off circulation.
“What is it?” I ask as we wait at the front door. His mouth opens, but he closes it once the door opens. Edie welcomes us inside, kissing Hank on the cheek and hugging me.
“Deep breaths,” she warns. “It will be okay.” I’m not certain what to think until we enter the living room. Tommy greets me next, kissing my cheek and shaking hands with Hank whose eyes can’t leave the young man sitting in the center of the room.
Tommy waves us forward. “Lawson, this is Hank. Remember me telling you about him.”
A device projects the answer. “Yes.”
“Hank, this is Lawson Carrigan.” Lawson Carrigan sits in a wheelchair, his curled hand over what looks like a laptop. Hank stares, unblinking, as if he’s never seen his son before. Dawning comes slowly as I realize Hank hasn’t met his son before. Stepping forward, I crouch before the chair.
“Hi, Lawson. I’m Midge,” I say quietly, trying not to stare at any one feature other than his eyes, which don’t focus on me. They match Hank’s steely gray. A computerized voice replies with a greeting. I turn back to look at Hank and see him wiping his eyes. He takes a seat on an extra-large white leather couch. It’s circular, ancient, and sterile like the rest of the room. A large white brick fireplace centers the space with uncovered windows on either side. No affects decorate this space. It’s massive…and cold.
“Hello, Lawson. I’m Hank.” He pinches at his eyes. “I’m sorry it’s taken so long to meet you.” Lawson isn’t looking at Hank, but his head shakes. Without responding by his machine, Hank looks over his shoulder at Tommy. “Does he know who I am?”
Tommy shakes his head. “I think we should talk later. Lawson isn’t deaf,” Tommy explains. “He can hear everything.”
Hank’s head swings back to Lawson. “I’m sorry,” he whispers, his eyes roving over his son. “I’m so sorry.”
After twenty minutes of awkward, stilted conversation, an aide appears to take Lawson to his rooms. In that time, we learned Lawson has cerebral palsy. Unseen to us, he has an entire wing with supports. With round-the-clock care, he lives in a working home instead of an institution. However, I wonder if he’s lonely. Hank follows the aide to learn more about Lawson’s set-up, and Tommy goes with them. I collapse on the couch and dissolve into tears.
“It’s a lot,” Edie says. Sitting next to me, she wraps an arm around me.
“I have so many questions, but the first thing I’m thinking is how grateful I am for my boys and how sad I feel for Lawson.”
“Don’t feel sorry for him, Tommy tells me. He’s amazing, and he’s had no worries. He’s taken care of. His aides are wonderful.”
“Doesn’t he feel alone, though? He’s so secluded.”
“He goes to a day school for therapy and returns home every night, just like people who work or go to school. He has a good life.” Edie pauses.
“But he lost his mother, and he’s never known his father.” I stare at Edie. “How did Hank not know?”
Edie shakes her head. “I don’t understand it all, either. I assume they all had their reasons. I’m not saying I agree with any of them, but I wasn’t a part of this world when those decisions were made. I have to respect and remember that.” Edie’s glare hints at deeper meaning. I need to accept things as they are because I cannot change the past.
My hands cover my head as if holding in my thoughts. Tommy and Hank return, and silence fills the empty space.
“I think I’ll start the pasta. Darlin’, join me.” Tommy’s directness doesn’t surprise me. Hank and I need a moment. From the stunned expression on Hank’s face, he needs more than a minute. Leaving us alone, Hank remains standing, his hands slipping into his pockets. We stare at one another before he looks away.
“I don’t know what to say,” I say to fill the quiet.
“I don’t either. My head spins with so many questions.”
“Hank, did you know?” The question comes out harsher than I intend, but I can’t grasp not knowing he was a father.
“I had my suspicions but never the answers.”
“How could she keep this from you?” I demand, my irritation at a dead woman growing.
“She had her reasons.” It hits me. Hank was an enabler; Kit played off his weakness—her.
I bit back my retort. That’s a terrible excuse. Then I think of all the times he says he asked her to marry him. How could she say no? How could she keep having sex with him, knowing he was the father of her child, and never tell him? I want to understand, but I just can’t. Something in my expression shifts Hank’s face. Suddenly, he’s on his knees before me. Cupping both my hands in his, he leans forward and kisses them.
“Please don’t leave me,” he begs softly, and my heart breaks. No, it’s already broken. It shatters and crashes like shrapnel, exploding with confusion and disappointment in someone dead. My forehead rests against the back of his head.
“I want to understand, but there are so many gaps.” Hank needs to explain a few things. Unfortunately, explanations will have to wait. Edie enters the living room with a glass of wine for me and an invitation for us to join them in the kitchen.
In an effort to pretend we’ve all known this secret and nothing unusual has transpired, Tommy entertains us while he cooks by telling stories about shared experiences with Hank. It’s like a game of Remember When.
“I left home to start a band,” Tommy begins. “Denton, my cousin; a guy we hooked up with named, Tucker Ashe, and me. We had a few small hits on our own—”
“Ever hear of ‘Wait For You’?” Edie interjects, attempting to add me in the reminiscing.
“I loved that song,” I say, smiling despite the sick feeling inside me.
“That was before Chrome Teardrops, darlin’,” Tommy corrects her. “We fell apart after that. And then my sister joined us.” The room grows silent, their memories filling with a woman I’ve never met. Edie eyes me. She didn’t know her either.
“My sister could sing like a church bell, which is where our singing career began. Our father was a pastor. We sang in the choir. Rock ’n’ roll was for sinners. Guess Kit and I wanted to sin.” Tommy winks at Hank. “She left home a year after me, catching up with her own attempts at fame.”
“Kit toughened up her sound, and after Bruce…” Tommy glances up at Hank, and I rack my brain as to who Bruce was. “…she needed a new band. Her label gave her one more chance. She wanted to start fresh. Girl rockers were popular. She needed a drummer to up her beat. We met Hank in a bar, taking out his anger at his old man with sticks on his kit.” Tommy chuckles. “Kit says it was fate.” My heart drops, and I raise my wine to my lips, swallowing the bitter alcohol so I don’t have to look at anyone. There’s a pun there—her name and his equipment to produce music. The irony isn’t lost on me. Fate indeed.
“Anyway, Hank was the addition we needed. Kit became Kit Carrigan and Chrome Teardrops. Denton stuck it out with us until Kit got sick.”
Silence creeps in again, ghosts roaming the kitchen.
“How is Denton?” Hank asks, changing the subject in a minor direction.
“Haven’t spoken to him in a while. Heard he might be in photography or something. Hitched up with modeling. He always was a pretty boy. Last time I saw him might have been…” Tommy thinks for a second, swiping his fingers through his hair like I’ve witnessed Hank do. “Might have been the funeral, so eight or nine years?” The comment lingers.
“Been a long time,” Hank says softly.
“Too long,” Tommy replies, shaking his head at his old friend. “You look so much better, man.”
Hank and I sit on a set of stools at a large kitchen island. His thick hand comes to my lower back, rubbing gently. “I feel so much better than I have in a long, long time.”
Tommy’s lips crook, the corner curling, and I can see him as a rock star. Girls swooning at the pebbly voice with a hint of Southern drawl.
“Love has a way of doing that,” he says. A million retorts swirl in my head, but I stay silent. Tommy steps toward his wife, kissing her open mouthed for a moment. I look away. I can’t watch. I see where Gage Everly learned to be passionate about his wife. Then I remember Edie came after Gage and Ivy married. My heart drops again. I’ve never known such passion. I turn to see Hank watching me, and I fight the tears. I thought he was it—the spark of something—but I don’t know how to feel at the moment. His hand continues to rub my back, but his touch feels so distant.
After we eat, Edie and I do the dishes while Tommy and Hank discuss Lawson.
“What’s next?” Hank asks.
“What do you mean what’s next?” Tommy replies.
“I mean, I want to see him, get to know him. Take him out of here.”
“Wait a minute,” Tommy snaps. “Lawson isn’t going anywhere. This is his home.”
“This is a prison, haunted with memories.”
“For who?” Tommy barks. “This is the only place Lawson has known for twenty-six years. He stays here.”
I startle at the age. Hank’s involvement with Kit goes longer than a few rolls in the hay and a couple of nights here and there. Twenty-six plus years to be exact. Again, I consider Hank and Kit’s relationship. He loved her for a long time, nearly as long as I’ve known Paul.
“What about me? I’m his father.” The sharpness to Hank’s tone makes me flinch.
“He doesn’t know that. You can come around and hang with him, but for how long? Fatherhood isn’t a fleeting thing. And he doesn’t even understand what having a father means. The only male figure in his life has been me.”
“Well, whose fault is that?” Hank growls.
“I did what she asked,” Tommy defends.
“We were friends.”
“She was my family.”
Edie’s sharp intake of air seems to punctuate the moment, and again, I feel like I’m missing something. She hisses Tommy’s name under her breath.
“We stopped being a band family long before we broke up, Edie,” Tommy adds, his tone still harsh.
“Family is forever,” Edie states as if reminding him of something. Tommy’s head falls before he shakes it back and forth.
“Dammit, woman,” he mutters. His hands come to the island as if bracing himself. Hank remains standing, arms crossed over his large chest. We aren’t getting anything resolved tonight between these men. In fact, it might take many nights to mend them. It took years to separate them.
“I think…” I swallow before I continue. “I think we’ve done a lot…learned a lot…” I hesitate. “For one night. Maybe let this sit and start again tomorrow.” I sound like the leader of my marketing team when we stumble on a concept. Fragile hearts fill this storyboard, and we need to step back.
“I agree with Midge,” Edie adds, her voice pitching a little stronger than necessary. “Hank met his son. There’s a lot to accept.” Edie narrows her eyes at Tommy. “Baby steps.”
“Twelve of them,” Hank mutters, and I recall the path to recovery for addiction and grief. He has a long way to travel once again. Edie smiles at Hank’s comment. Tommy’s focus remains on the granite countertop.
“We’ll talk tomorrow.” Tommy decides, and Hank tips his chin in agreement. Looking at me, I sense he needs an escape.
“Thank you for dinner. Pasta night must be a hit.” I step forward to Tommy who envelops me in a tight hug.
“Don’t let him go,” he mutters into my hair before pulling back. A thin line forms on my lips because I can’t pull off another fake smile. I reach for Edie.
“Call me as soon as you can.” I appreciate the sisterhood and her sense that I’m breaking inside. I need to spend more time with my new friend.