He was on his feet in a flash, forcing me to blink and stare at him in shock as he grabbed my shoulders and leveled me with a stare.
“Don’t you dare,” he hissed. “You are not crazy,” he ordered. “You hear me? You are not crazy and don’t ever…,” he paused, shook my shoulders to drive his point home. “Don’t you ever let anyone tell you otherwise!”
He released his grip on me and took a step backward, pacing the small area in front of Jack’s grave.
“It’s not your fault,” I called out to him. “You didn’t do this to me.”
He turned around, and I peered into the eyes of the mentally ill man who tried so hard to escape his maker. I saw determination and anger fight to break through the sorrow and grief reflected in his eyes.
“Sure I did,” he rasped.
Freedom has a price.
The price of my freedom became my father’s torment.
I’m sorry, daddy.
I’m so very sorry.
Chapter Twenty-nine
I’ve lost one child.
Held him in my arms as his body turned cold.
Watched his Mama kiss him one final time.
Kissed his lips before they closed the coffin.
Had my brother’s hold me down so I wouldn’t follow his casket into the earth.
Burying your child, knowing your life goes on and his doesn’t is hell in its purest form.
I wake up each day and it’s the first thing on my mind.
Another day I’m here and he isn’t.
The day ends and I close my eyes only to see his face.
Since Jack Jr.’s death I have told myself there is no greater pain, nothing worse than knowing my illness and my pride is what took my son’s life.
But there is a pain that might not be greater but just as harsh and just as annihilating.
I didn’t see it coming, or maybe I chose not to see it. Who wants to believe that their child is sick? My ex-wife voiced her concerns months ago when I dropped Lacey off after that shit went down with Blackie but I ignored it.
I told Connie she was crazy.
Lacey was just feeling some girl shit for my vice president.
She was a typical girl with a crush.
What the fuck did I know about any of that?
Nothing.
I knew nothing.
But I know what it is to be manic-depressive. I know the villain that lives inside my head, someone I call my maker.
And I know that motherfucker well.
So does Connie, she’s the one who pleaded with me for years to get help. I ignored her then just as I ignored her now when she told me she was concerned Lacey may be manic. I blew her off, told her she couldn’t blame my illness on everything wrong with the world.
I didn’t want to believe that I could be the reason my daughter lives in eternal darkness, the lights were already turned down for one kid and as fucked up as it sounds, at least he was at peace.
Lacey doesn’t know peace.
And I know what that’s like.
Hearing her say the words, watching the pain in her eyes as she introduced me to her maker made it real and broke every chamber of my heart.
As a parent we want what is best for our children. We want to give them a shot at life, one we weren’t granted…at least that’s the kind of parent I tried to be to Lacey. I wanted to protect her from the evil. I tried so hard to keep her away from my club. I thought that shit was evil and destructive but, all the while she had evil and destruction living inside her head.
Lacey lives and suffers with a mind that feeds her uncontrollable temptations, forcing her to swallow what she knows and believe the doubt that her maker inflicts. She can be happy for a little while but then her mind takes over and shatters her happiness by making her think it wasn’t real or she didn’t deserve it.
She crashes and when she does all there is darkness.
And a bottle of lithium.
Or in her case nothing.
Connie had called me earlier in hysterics and after listening to her plead her case I went downstairs and stared at the photos that covered my walls. I slowly removed one of the frames and stared at the gaping hole in the wall, a reminder—I’m a manic depressive and I waited too long to get help. A hole that mimics the one left behind when my son left this world.
Jack I’m telling you, she’s not right. I know the signs I lived them—with you. You need to talk to her. Please. You’re the only one who can help her.
I called Mack, and he told me Lacey was at the cemetery. I knew then that Connie was right. I don’t know why, but in my heart I knew there was something wrong with our girl. I wasn’t prepared to find her sobbing, blaming herself for Jack’s death. I wasn’t expecting to hear her tell me she was in love with Blackie.
But the thing that killed me was when she finished my sentences.
She confirmed my nightmare.
Then my precious girl told me it wasn’t my fault.
But it is.
If I didn’t have this shitty illness, she wouldn’t either.
I gave it to her.
And now I had to make it better.
I had to help her find her sunshine and pull her back from the darkness.
I had to protect her from her maker.
Because being her father meant being her protector, the one person who was never supposed to hurt her.