Meet me in the Middle

Chapter 43

"Can I get a whiskey neat, please. Any brand." I don't recognize my own voice. The gravel in my voice only reminds me of how all the cries I had to swallow down throughout the day. My neck hurts from where my dad had his hands around it and the lump in my throat from my mom's barbed words were taking its toll on my vocal cords. My body was on fire from its need to go for a run but the suffocating cloud following me around won't give me the energy to escape it. Trapping me in an endless loop of darkness.

I swallow the amber liquid in the glass the bartender hands me and ask for another while taking my seat. The alcohol burns its way past my throat, and I exhale the smokiness of it through my nose to keep the bitter taste on my tongue for a few seconds longer. Any taste would be better than the lingering trace of the self-loathing I vomited up back at the station. Hopefully Johnson will adhere to my pleas and keep what had happened to himself. I don't need the whole of Seattle to know that I got my ass handed to me by 'n pathetic excuse of a human being twice my age.

I called the precinct they took my dad to, on my way here, to ask that they release him. They were not happy and wanted to keep him overnight, but I paid for his bail and booked a ride for my mom to fetch him. Who was I to stand in the way of true love? To tell my mom what to do? She was a grown woman who has the same free will as everyone else on this planet. She made the choices that got her here and she has to make the choice to walk away, no matter how much I want to save her from that narcissist that believed he had the right to assault his wife.

I look down at the liquid in the glass and the slow movements the light reflects on it. I don't need to close my eyes to see how bruised she was in my mind's eye. How monstrous my dad became when I lost my temper on him. 'You're the root cause of all of it.' I can feel the lure of dread dropping into my stomach at the torturous return of the voices in my head. I can see the whole scene playing out in the reflection of my eyes in the golden liquid like I experienced it as an observer and not a participant in the horrendous acts that transpired.

I wish I knew my dad as the man my mom was holding out hope for. I wonder if he started out like me too. Trying to be the best version he could think of for the woman he loves while his demons chewed away at him until gradually, he turned into one himself. Someone so far removed from the person that he was, that no one in his life recognized him anymore. Did he try to change, try and be a better person. How long did it take him to come to terms with the fact that there was no saving the wicked and lost? Did he push me as hard as he did because of everything my mom said or was he trying to protect me from the demons he saw swirling around in my head from a young age. To not fall into the abyss of failure and the void of loneliness it ensues.

Or was it all my fault? Was he truly a good man before I was born? Did this darkness live inside of me from the get-go? Did it affect him like it does everyone around me? Was my mom right, did I turn him into this savage beast that preyed on the fear and failures of those closest to him? Can I really blame my father for the cracks in my soul if I inflicted them myself? Can I condemn him for the pain he's caused my family when his moods depended on my success? I was so focused on the finish line that I never realized my world burning down around me. My mother's desperation for love, Mason's need for an escape from the depression I played a hand in, Carina's struggle to help someone like me, my team's fight to get back the station I stole from them. Was it all because of who I was born as?

I thank my lucky stars that Carina let go of me when she did. Before she turned into the shell my mother became, while I exceeded my father's expectations of becoming just like him. He shut me out when I tried confronting him about it. All Carina ever wanted was to be let into my mind. To know what I was thinking and feeling so she could be there for me, so she could try and save me. But instead of giving her what she craved, I pushed her to the sidewalk and ran ahead. He ignored my calls after he forgot date nights. We were trying to have a baby! I was foolish enough to think that I can be a better parent than the man who raised me, to believe that I can be a stable partner for Carina's family. I couldn't even answer the phone when she called to come home so we can take a pregnancy test together.