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SINISTER

16.

A glorious milestone transpired on Saturday. I graduated. It was an event full of processional music, rambling prayers and speeches that I didn’t listen to. My father drove in from Kansas to see it and, at home, I watched him chat with David and my mother, all pleasant and courteous, like they were all old friends – weirdville. My mom set out a feast and we gorged ourselves until it was time to leave. My mom followed my dad and me to his car and gave me one of her fierce, unbreakable hugs while he stowed my bag in his trunk.

“I’m so proud of you,” she said.

“Thanks,” I whispered and got in the passenger seat of my dad’s new Mustang.

“Nice car, Dad. It’s much cooler than my Citation.”

“Damn right,” he said.

“Do I get to drive it?”

“We’ll take 86 to I-70,” he said. “You can drive after that.”

He maneuvered through Manitou’s streets like he remembered them. Before we reached the highway, I saw a landscaping crew on the country club’s grounds. They’d parked a few white trucks and some other heavy equipment along the fence. Garren’s dad worked for one of those companies and I strained to see if he was out there. I didn’t see a gangly kid among the workers, so I assumed he wasn’t.

“Your mom’s still an amazing cook,” he said. “Her enchiladas and a six pack of beer was my favorite seven course meal.”

“Yeah,” I said, thinking it was becoming one of my favorite meals, too.

The car’s engine was a deep rumble. The tires hummed against pavement. Otherwise, it was quiet. I didn’t know what to say to my father. I never did. It had been easier to spend time with him when I was little, because I’d gone to him with a long list of toy that I wanted. I no longer needed toys. I’d long stopped craving his attention. If I’d ever sought his approval, I didn’t remember it now. It was strange to glance to my left and see my jaw and nose. His face was an older, Caucasian version of my own. My mom was right, I had his looks.

He broke the speed limit as soon as we hit the highway. I asked him if I could turn the radio on and he’d said to crank it. I leaned back in the Mustang, the pavement unrolling in front of me. Classic rock songs faded in and faded out. He cracked his window to smoke. I took mine down to keep the fumes out of my nose. He didn’t smoke the same generic, cheap cigarettes that Garren did. His came in a cheerful, red and white pack. They smelled just as bad.

“Does the smoke bother you?”

“It’s all right.”

I wondered what Garren’s graduation would be like? Would his parents show up to watch him? Would he even bother to go? Knowing him, he’d be one of those kids who had the diploma mailed home.

“Big day for you, junior.”

“Yeah,” I said.

“The future starts rights now.”

I hoped it included several drinks in the coming hours. We made small talk. I knew he wanted time with me; and that it was of massive importance to him. I didn’t need him the way he needed me. My agenda was to get him on my side about college because, for some baffling, mysterious and unfathomable reason, my mom still discussed me with him. I didn’t bring it up, though. We talked about the Broncos and he told me why John Elway was the greatest QB in the NFL. He rattled on about some guys he used to run with when he was a kid in Manitou. The era he referred to himself as a kid was the same period I was wearing a diaper and sleeping with a binky. I half-listened to the story, laughing in all the right places.

We joined I-70 and he pulled off at a rest stop. I caught the keys when he tossed them to me, then stood near the ticking engine while he smoked a cigarette. You can learn a lot about a person by the way he smokes. Garren didn’t so much hold his cigarette as fidget with it. When it wasn’t in his lips, he was moving it in his fingers, rolling it against his thumb, waving it in the air. He smoked fast, too, burning them to the filters in greedy inhalations. It meant he was always anxious or maybe that he was always trying to fill himself up. My father smoked while gazing into the distance, the cigarette smoldering in his steady hand. He inhaled, held it, then blew out the smoke in slow and careful streams. It meant he’d learned to take his time and enjoy the nicotine that was no doubt murdering him.

“You ready, junior?”

“Let’s go.”

His new Mustang roared and I liked the way it accelerated, like it was wanted to go faster and faster.

“No speeding,” my father said. “If you get a ticket your insurance will skyrocket.”

I eased off the gas pedal.

“Besides,” he added, “your mom would kill me.”

Another rock song, one I didn’t know, poured out of the speakers. The crunchy guitar style reminded me of Aerosmith. I liked it right away.

“Between you and me, I’m still afraid of your mom.”

I laughed at that because I knew she could be a terror when she wanted to.

“So am I,” I told him.

“That’s probably how God intended it.”

Then the radio station faded out and another tried to fade in. I heard the garbled voice of a Mexican weather report mixed with a fire and brimstone preacher. We continued down the highway and neither of the stations came in any stronger. The preacher said, “Lucifer was a being of perfect beauty.” That one sentence cut through the static and came out loud and clear.

“It’s like we’re caught between two worlds,” my father said, “and both of them are shit.”

He poked the scan button. The static cut out. Half a second later a doo-wop song filled the car.

“I’d rather have the static.”

He hated doo wop and started playing with the buttons. I thought of my own junk car and the stereo that had broken, then mysteriously started working again. I’d barely thought about it. A wire had been jiggled loose and the next pothole I’d hit had put it back where it was supposed to be. But as the sun went down on Interstate 70, the random words of a radio sermon about the devil in my mind, I started to wonder about it.

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