Chapter Twenty-eight
Rogue
A week after Dad passed away, we started preparing for the funeral. Hannah was so distraught over the whole thing that all three of us had to get involved with burying Dad.
There was a part of me that felt like, since I was doing this, in a way, I was making up to my dad for being a disappointment. We didn’t get to talk much since I got out of prison, even though I’d gotten to visit him a few times. It wasn’t that I didn’t want to, but either Hannah was talking with him, or he couldn’t speak, even when he was awake.
I’d gotten him to look at me, and he didn’t look at me with the disappointment from before, but because he didn’t say it out loud that he forgave me, I couldn’t take it as if he did.
At least, he’d looked at peace the last time I saw him, and he seemed to be glad that Claire and I were getting along well when we showed up at his room together.
Still, I hadn't done enough for him. Hell, I hadn't done a single fucking thing for him.
It was too late to make things up to him. But I was going to change myself.
I was going to do good with my life, just like he would have wanted.
In the time since the burial, I thought about it a lot. Getting over Dad’s death wasn’t something easy, but with a direction to follow, I could pull myself out of my grief, and I tried to be there for Claire and her mom as much as I could. I didn’t know if we were still a family with Dad gone now, but that was what they were to me.
The only family I had left.
One morning, I woke up earlier than Claire to make breakfast for the two of us. A week had already gone by since the burial, and while I thought it was still too early to move on, I knew I couldn’t keep wasting time, like I had when he was still alive.
Ever since I’d gotten out of prison, I’d known I would have to look for a job to look after myself. Now, I wasn’t thinking only of looking after myself, but Claire, too. So I would definitely need to find work. It felt like I’d suddenly woken up and could see everything clearly.
I knew what I wanted to do.
Now, I just needed to talk it out with Claire.
Because going on from now on, definitely, it would be her and me together. I would make sure of it.
Claire woke up while I was in the middle of cooking, probably pulled by the scent of food. She was loosely wrapped in a robe, her hair in disarray, a hand covering her mouth as she yawned. She looked half asleep as she walked over to the table and sat down, and I chuckled at the image she made.
It was the first time I’d laughed in a really long time.
“Morning, Claire,” I said gently, setting up the table for us.
She looked at me through half-lidded, drowsy eyes, elbow braced on the table and chin leaning on her hand. She blinked at me, and yawned again.
“You look like you’re in a good mood this morning,” she said with light suspicion, arching an eyebrow at me as she pulled her plate closer to her.
“I can't say I’m in a good mood, but I do want to talk.”
“Oh?” she said, her other eyebrow going up. “What would you like to talk about?”
“I’ve been thinking about the future,” I admitted. “I…want to go back to school.”
She had her fork half way to her mouth, and paused at my words, before slowly lowering her hand. She looked surprised, and I was just glad her expression was looking more animated.
“Are you sure?” she asked.
I nodded slowly. “I’m sure. I quit after high school because I didn’t think there was much point in it. I was good enough at basketball I figured I could work harder and make it to pro. Because the injury happened at the end of school, I already had some colleges after me on a sports scholarship…”
“And with the injury, you lost them all,” she finished.
“Exactly. I didn’t completely neglect my studies, but I wasn’t that great at school stuff. But I can handle community college at least. It won’t be as expensive, either.”
“Do you already know what you plan to do?” she asked curiously in between bites.
“I have an idea,” I murmured, looking down. “Only time will tell if it’s the right thing or not.”
“Just go along with whatever your heart wants you to do,” she encouraged. “That way, you won’t get bored as easily and you might stick it through.”
I mock frowned at her. “You really don’t think much of me, do you?”
She chuckled at me. “What are you talking about? I’m going to back you up, of course. I have complete trust in you.”
I didn’t know if she was teasing or not, but it was decided just like that. And as I went on to focus on going back to school, Claire focused on getting back on her own two feet again, going back to looking for a job.
She looked totally invigorated too, and when I asked why she was different from before, she said cryptically that she was taking a slightly different path from before that would be easier in its own way. I didn’t know much about it, so there wasn’t much help I could give her, but she’d encouraged me at least, and I could only do the same for her.
A few weeks later after Dad’s death. I didn’t hesitate in enrolling in a community college. It wasn’t that great a distance from the apartment, so the commute to and from school wouldn’t be too much of a pain. There was a bus that ran along the route, too, so I wouldn’t always have to waste cash using taxis, or getting Claire to take me.
She backed me up like she said she would, supporting me in big ways and small. When Dad passed away, there had been life insurance that Claire had gone with Hannah to collect, not to mention his will. I had a separate account where she’d left funds for me, and I still had the debit card that got topped up each month, and I used it to budget my day to day and other school expenses.
I had an idea what I wanted to do, and when I enrolled, I discussed it with Claire, then with a councilor that worked at the community college I was going to be attending so I would take the right classes.
Community college would go along a lot faster and it wasn’t like I had any big aspirations like Claire, so it would be enough for me.
Even as I started going, it still felt a bit surreal. I never thought I’d be able to pick myself up to this point. I’d thought I was a lost cause, like a lot of people thought after I got out of prison. Hell, before that. But I was doing this for my dad, for his memory.
I wanted to continue his legacy and make him proud. It would have been great if he could have been there to see it, but the least I could do was do good by him now, so I wouldn’t feel too ashamed to face him when I joined him and my mom in the afterlife.
Most of all, I wanted to pick up where Claire and I had left off. We never did get to have that talk to define what we were with each other, but I didn’t think it was something so necessary anymore. We still lived together, and I hoped we would continue to live together. We depended on each other in small ways, taking care of each other, helping each other through our troubles.
Claire felt the same way that I did.
The whole thing was kind of crazy, when I stopped to think about it.
The one person I had ignored for so long turned out to be the woman who was right for me all along, in every way.
I wondered if Dad knew it and if that was the real reason he’d asked Claire to look out for me.
I’ll never get to know.
Still, I could live with that, as long as I got to live with Claire for the rest of my life.
We’d both decided, though we hadn't talked about everything going forward. It was helpful that we didn’t have any other relatives, or friends between us, really. All the ones I’d had before, I pretty much ignored since I left prison. There was still her mom to deal with, but after that, the future was going to be really clear for us.