'Nother Sip of Gin - Rhys Ford Page 0,61
to work the pan, then tapped the spatula against its edge. “What’s on your mind?”
“Did you know what kind of person you wanted Kane to be with?” He shifted on the counter, careful not to bang his heels against the kitchen cabinet. “I mean, I hear people talk about what they want for their kids sometimes. And it’s kind of weird, because they’ve got these huge ideas about what this kid is going to be when it grows up and sometimes even the type of person they want it to be with. Did you and Brigid ever do that? Like, try to plan out their lives?”
“Truth be told, I think every parent does that.” Donal turned the fire down with a flick of the knob, then leaned against the counter, crossing his arms over his burly chest. “Funny thing about raising kids is that a parent shouldn’t go into it thinking they can mold or make what they want out of this person. Not to say that we didn’t make our mistakes. For the longest time, I’d wanted Connor to be a lawyer, but that wasn’t in the cards.”
Miki snorted. “I can’t imagine Connor being a lawyer. Maybe Kiki. Or even Kane.”
“Well, I had it all planned out. I knew what schools I wanted him to attend and figured one of us was going to have to learn how to play golf so we could teach him, when Brigid’s da told me something while we were getting pissed over a new bottle of whiskey he’d brought in.” Donal grinned. “And ye’ve been around me long enough to know pissed means drunk, right?”
“I think I know how to say drunken hangover in about fifteen dialects and twelve languages.” Miki made a face. “It’s right up there with ‘where’s the bathroom’ and ‘no, I don’t have any money’ and ‘I am not looking for a hooker.’”
“Very good life skills, that,” Donal agreed. “So we were passing a fine Sunday afternoon when he looked at me and said, ‘Ye’re a fool if ye think ye’re going to have a say about what the boy will be. Here ye are laying down a path for him to walk on when what ye should be thinking about… what ye need to be doing… is to be concerned about what kind of man he’ll become. Raise the man, Donal,’ he scolded me. ‘If ye raise the man right, the path he chooses will be the one he’s meant to follow.’
“Since they stuck with me even after I sobered up, I figured those words were a truth I couldn’t deny.” The vegetables joined the rice, but Donal held off mixing them in. “I never wanted any of my children to pick up the gun and the badge. For me it was a way to help people find justice, for me to help people who may be needing a voice but couldn’t speak up. I never imagined any of them would wear my uniform. And any plans that I might’ve had for them were set aside, because their passion for justice is even stronger than mine.
“Now to get to yer question about did I ever imagine the person I saw Kane with? The answer to that is no, because I know love hits without warning or reason.” Donal’s smile grew wistful, and he laid a warm hand on Miki’s thigh. “I never imagined I would fall in love with Brigid Finnegan, but when I finally saw she’d made a place for herself in my heart, I knew I couldn’t ever love anyone else. It was that way with ye and Kane. I knew the moment I heard him speak about ye that he’d lost himself in loving ye.”
“Wouldn’t you want your kid to have somebody less fucked-up?” Miki bit at his lower lip, looking away. He was poking at a brittle shell of insecurity he’d been avoiding for months, but the doubts about him fitting into Kane’s life and the family always resurfaced. “I mean, I’m not—”
“Yer exactly who he needed to fall in love with, Mick,” Donal said, cupping the back of Miki’s head until their foreheads touched. “Ye challenge him. Ye challenge his world and make him think. Ye tell him no when the world bows to his pushiness and force him to rethink the way he approaches people. If there is one great disservice I’ve given my children, it’s that they sometimes believe they are always right.”
“Yeah, I don’t know where they got that from.”