My dad needed me.
I needed me to start moving on. Or, honestly, move back. Things were easier when I was just Darrell’s daughter in the shop and the girl who made the fishing lures. Plain old Mutt O’Fallon.
“I saw Vaughn the other night,” my dad said one night a few weeks later.
I’d seen him too. We passed on the road and he waved. I pretended not to see him and messed with the radio in my truck. Then I got drunk and cried in my shed.
Not my finest, but I had my days.
I had days when I didn’t see him, didn’t hear his name, and didn’t sit in the Astro van. Days I couldn’t taste his lips in every sip of Newcastle I drank. Days when the radio played only songs that didn’t remind me of him. Days I didn’t think about all of the things that were still at his house and wonder if he was sick of looking at them, or if he just threw them away.
Days I didn’t wish I wasn’t someone else.
Or at least I pretended pretty well.
“Vaughn? Since when do you call him that?” I asked. If I acted like it was no big deal long enough, maybe it would become the truth.
“Van. Vaughn. Astro. Whatever. I saw him. You too cooled off a bit, huh?” He passed me a can of cheap cheerleader beer from the cooler he was sitting on.
It was becoming a nightly thing. Me. My dad. Sitting in the back of the shed drinking shitty beer.
I had a new respect for him. As I licked my self-inflicted wounds day after day, I realized just how tough he was.
Love is a bitch, even for Mutts like me.
I swung my feet off my lowered tailgate as I wondered about what to say, if I could actually talk about it, and if we had enough beer.
“Yeah, didn’t work out.” There. Short and simple.
“That’s a shame. You got on pretty good there.” His expression kept talking when he stopped. Wrinkled, brown eyes rooted around for information and his puckered mouth waited for more.
“We did, Dad. It just…” I paused.
Talking about that shit made me sound so stupid.
“…I don’t know. It was too much. He wants different things than I do.”
“Things like what?”
An adult relationship. A woman who could stick around. A lady who looked good on his arm. Someone who knew more about culture and the world than she did about open cast fishing poles and stink bait. Someone good enough.
I took a drink from the ice-cold can.
“Just things.”
“So. Want different things. What’s that got to do with being together? Want whatever the hell you want.”
“Doesn’t work like that.”
“I know how things work—and I sure as hell know why they don’t—I’m a mechanic. It’s my job, kid.” If only it were as simple as replacing a few parts here and there and everything would work fine.
“There’s just too much shit.”
“I doubt it.”
He doubted it? What did he know?
“You know, we’ve been needing this talk for a while now. You know I’m not one for rambling on about shit. I was taught actions speak louder than words.” His right hand lifted his cap, wiped the bald spot on his head, and replaced it with a few jerky adjustments. He was nervous, but went on. “Sometimes I wish I would have said more to ya, dammit. Talked to ya.”
I tightened my ponytail and took another drink. I didn’t know what he was talking about.
My dad continued, “I figured if I was there for you, provided for you, made sure you had everything you needed, then you’d be fine.”
“I am fine.”
He stood and looked me dead in the eye.
“No. You’re not.”
Well, maybe I wasn’t at that minute, but I was okay. I wasn’t falling apart.
“You’re drunk.” That had to be the root of all of this.
“Oh, kid, I’m sober as a rock. I messed you up.”
“You did not. Sit down.” I wasn’t in the mood to deal with him. I wasn’t in the mood to deal with anything.
“I thought if I started slacking off at the garage, you’d get sick of it and finally start on your tackle shop. You didn’t say anything though. Just kept on going. You just take it and take it and take it some more. Always have. From everyone.” He sighed and added, “I think I’m selling it to Dean.”
Selling the garage? What the hell?
“Dean? Are you losing your mind? I don’t have a tackle shop!” I shouted, feeling so out of control.
“No, but you could, if you weren’t stuck there all the time. Dean wants the garage and, frankly, I’m tired of hassling with the business end. I just want to work on cars and go home.”
I didn’t know how I felt about that. It was our garage.
What if I’d wanted it?
I didn’t have to think long though because I knew deep down I didn’t.
I looked at him dead in the eye. “Have you really thought about this?”
“Damn right I have. You don’t want that place. Do you?”
“Not really, but are you ready to give it up?”
“I love the work, I do. But I’m not cut out for all of that other stuff anymore. I did it while you were coming up because I needed to, but I’m sick of fussin’ with it.”
Where did that leave me? Surely Dean would want me to work there. Wouldn’t he?