“Oh,” she says, her voice dropping low. “I can understand how being abandoned would leave a bad taste in his mouth.”
And in that moment, I remember what she told me about her own father leaving. Of course, she’d understand what it felt like for my dad to have his father walk out on him. I hate to see that pain so evident on her face, but I love her sensitivity and how she’s letting herself feel it.
What I don’t love is the idea of her having empathy for my father. In fact, I would hate for there to be any connection between the two of them, and it’s not like this is the first time I’ve thought about that.
“A few years later,” I continue, scrubbing the thoughts from my mind, “Atlantic dropped him and he went over to the Red Bird label, but then that closed after only a couple years. He went back to playing in honky-tonks, but wasn’t on the radio again. Still, he never came back home. Whether that was pride or shame…”
It’s not pride or shame keeping me from going home. It’s not like that with me.
“That’s terrible,” she says, “but why should your dad hold it against you? It’s not your fault what your grandpa did. It’s not your dad’s fault, either, for that matter. He’s got to see—”
“Who sees clearly when love is involved? My grandmother saw it as her husband loving music more than his family. She blamed her son, my dad—said if he hadn’t been born, she could have traveled with her husband. Dad doesn’t talk about it, but I can guess how things were for him at home based on how he treated me.”
“Bennet.”
I stare into her face and consider telling her everything. Then she’d understand. But after all I’ve told her about standing up for herself, what would she think of me? What would she think, knowing I let all that bad stuff happen to me? That, even after I wasn’t a little kid anymore, I still waited over a year to take control of my life?
“See this scar?” I ask, placing my index finger along my eyebrow. “I got that for auditioning for choir instead of forensics, like my dad told me to do. He backhanded me and his ring got me.”
Katherine’s face contorts with dismay. “I’m sure he—”
I pull back my T-shirt and show her my tattoo. “See there? In the E?”
She leans in. Her breath is warm on my skin. I know she can see it. The round scar, now nearly obscured by the black and gray lettering. “That’s from a cigarette being put out against my skin. That’s what you get when you win Battle of the Bands at my house.”
I hear the air catch in her throat, but I go on.
“Remember you asked me about my little finger?” I lift my left hand off the steering wheel to remind her, but she doesn’t look at it, so I guess she’s noticed the weird way it juts out.
I hold my hand there in front of me and directly in her line of vision. She takes it in hers, turning it over, running her fingers over the bump where my little finger meets my hand. I watch while her eyes glass over.
“My dad sees his own father in me, and he sees that as a huge betrayal. When I told him I was leaving college to pursue my music…”
I give the finger as much of a wiggle as I can. I mean to make light of it, but Katherine looks horrified. I shrug.
“I told you about the night he threw the bourbon bottle at my head? Well, it was a bigger fight than just that. He kept going on and on about how he was going to ‘break the cycle’ once and for all. But all he ended up breaking was my hand. It hurt like hell, but I didn’t realize it was actually broken right away. Maybe if I’d gone to see a doctor, but…anyway, I woke up one morning and it didn’t hurt anymore, but it was stuck like this. This one was bad, too,” I say, indicating my ring finger, “but it healed up better.”
Katherine lifts my hand to her mouth and kisses my knuckles. Her lips are warm, and the windows are fogging over, and the rain is still coming down, and it drowns out all other sounds but the pounding of my heart against