The Oddities Of Grand Marquis - Book 1: Galactic Seed 🪼✔

Sixteenth

"Max, please talk to me."

"You'll just get mad."

"Why would I be mad?"

"Because it's the same thing... it's just... it's just the same thing that keeps happening. I know I'm annoying and I keep repeating that I'm sorry and all that but... but..."

Dad sighs again and I just keep staring out the window.

"It's becoming pretty clear that no matter how many times we think we're going to resolve this rift, we can't seem to make the bridge stay over turbulent waters. I don't know why that is, but I think we need to come to the conclusion that we can't mend this rift as quickly as we thought."

I hiccup on accident, feeling my heart crumbling to pieces. He's giving up on me... I knew it... I knew eventually it would be too much for my parents to handle... He's giving up on me... I tried to keep myself together but the pain of his emotionless explanation just...

"Max... Max... Are you listening to me?" I nodded. "Whatever is holding us back from mending this rift between us is only getting bigger if we don't try. One little thing and it's just like someone sawed off one side of a swing bridge. We're hanging on but barely... "

"Then what do you suggest?" I said thickly.

"We haven't been completely honest with one another. There is something we're hiding from each other. Nothing exactly bad, but a deep rooted feeling that we haven't been able to pull up-"

"Stop the car."

"Huh?"

"Stop the car."

Dad pulls over to the side of the road and I open the door, waddling a little ways into the grass and then vomit onto the ground. I throw up a few more times before I feel a little better. I wipe my mouth and head back to the car. As I sit, I start to shiver, a cold spell coming over me. I feel someone touch my forehead a little.

"You've got a fever again..."

"I'm sorry..."

"Don't be sorry, it's not your fault."

"I'm sorry I'm not a good son."

"What do you mean?"

"I just want you to be happy that I'm your son..." I say, feeling my mental faculties dizzying and trying to grasp for straws. "I know you still hate me for everything I said and did before the aliens took me. I annoy you... You hate that I keep apologizing, you hate that I'm your son and you wish I was gone. You hate me more because I can't get past the past and still see you as you were when you were yelling at me... I'm exhausting in the worst way and you don't want to admit it to Mom but, you're completely disgusted by me. You force yourself to stay with me because of Mom, not because you want to."

I don't know why all of this is spilling out of my mouth and out into the open. I guess maybe because I can't think straight, the fever encompassing my thoughts and making my filter not work. To be honest, I didn't think I was still feeling this way about my Dad. I thought when we had that really nice heart-to-heart that we had gotten over everything but... I guess not...

Dad didn't say anything and I felt myself begin to panic. What exactly did the silence mean? Was he trying to find a way to tell me the truth? Have I hurt him even more than I have been?

"Say something..." I said, as if I had the right to ask him.

"What is there to say, Max?" he said softly. "It seems that no matter what I do to try and help, I end up causing a problem... so... I don't know what to say that will make you feel any better."