Shooting Matt Ch. 04

He does a drum roll on the back of the seat. "Fucking awesome, we got us a threesome."

Liam jerks the wheel so hard he nearly hits a parked car.

"Not like that," Matt howls with laughter. "I meant like the three amigos or something."

"Maybe I'll head back to mom's early," Liam growls.

"No way dude. I saw you've got some baller video games. I hope you're good. I hate easy wins."

"Oh, really," Liam drawls.

I contemplated opening the door and jumping. It looks easy enough in the movies.

***

Gauntlet dropped, the two knights disappear in Liam's room. Soon enough I hear the kinds of sounds only young men lost in a video game seem to be capable of making. It's almost worse than listening to a couple in a motel that wants the whole floor to know that they're fucking their brains out.

This does give me time to think. What it doesn't give me is the ability to do so. I've never been the analytical sort. I've never found making a list of the pros and cons of a topic to be much help. I've always managed to make the result come out the way I want. I spent hours on Edmund's and other car sites researching the Ford Ranger. It was a total waste of time, a façade. I'd always wanted a Ford Ranger, don't ask me why. I don't really need a pickup, not even a small one. I got a Ford Ranger.

The problem I'm having is what do I want? Do I want Matt? Want him as a friend with benefits? Can I enjoy our time together and then smile when he walks away? He'll have to walk away. That much is obvious. I'm not good with hook ups. Like most cynics, I'm a broken-hearted romantic. No one will ever understand how much I loved, still love, Mary Beth. I can't be her husband. I know that. Thus, the broken heart.

I think, maybe, in a different reality, I, we, could have found someone we wanted as a permanent partner. What I do know, for a fact, is that I couldn't have continued the random meet, fuck, say good-bye routine. There are times when I crave the feel of flesh on flesh. I'll hit one of the bars, straight or gay, depending on my mood, and get that itch scratched and go home. That happens maybe once or twice a year. It's always been fun. I'm not about to pretend I don't enjoy it but it's not what I really want.

That's why, I realize now that my head is bit clearer, Matt's rejection of that lifestyle resonated so strongly with me. I shake my head in frustration. So? We may share similar goals but it doesn't matter. I'm forty-two. He's twenty; I think. When he's my age I'll be sixty-four. Does he like the Beatles I wonder? They had a little ditty, not a particularly good one, with regard to love lasting until one is sixty-four. When he's sixty-four, I'll be dead or in a nursing home drooling on my bib. It's impossible.

When he's forty-two, will I be able to cut him lose? Let him find his own twenty-something? Why am I even wondering about it? It isn't going to happen. I need to get it out of my head.

"Hey, Mr. B, I'm going to head home to get a few things. Want me to pick up some soda or will you let Liam and I have a beer?"

"Don't bother. You call me Mr. B again and you aren't coming back anyway."

"Harsh." He looks at Liam. "Randy always been this harsh?"

"At times."

Matt looks at me. "I'll try but I've spent most of my life calling you Mr. B. It's not easy to shift gears."

"No. That's true." I admit. "Sorry. Grab my wallet. Get some pop if you want. You can have a beer as well. I suppose drawing the line at that is bit hard to justify at this point."

"Cool, Randy. Way cool."

Liam follows Matt into the kitchen. I hear soft voices, then the door slams.

***

"Seriously, dude. You're seriously into my dad?" Liam asks during a pause, while a new level loads. Matt is a beast but so is Liam. Neither of them has had an easy win.

Matt shrugs.

"But, dude, he's old. I mean I know he's not ancient but still."

"What do you think of most of the guys our age at State?"

"They're D-bags but so? There's a lot of room between college sophomore and forty-two. Scope out a grad student, or an assistant prof, I mean, you got options."

"I know," Matt says looking at his friend, a guy who really is becoming a friend. "I'm not stupid. I like your dad. I've always liked your dad. Part of it is the way he's always kept it together." Liam starts to say something. Matt cuts him off. "Don't go getting all Sigmund Freud on me. I have a great dad. I do not need a father figure. I already got one."

"A grail?"

"Good one. No, a father." He gives Liam a startled glance. "Dude, you aren't worried I'm horning in on the dadster are you?"

"Huh? No." Liam shakes his head. He smiles at Matt. "I'll give you fifty bucks if you call him 'the dadster' to his face, though."

Matt smiles. "Fuck, you don't have to pay me for that." His face grows serious again. "It's not that I think he wasn't a good dad to you. I don't know. He seems solid, seems like if he decides that you're part of the team ain't nothing he'd stop at to protect you." He shakes his head in frustration, unknowingly aping the movement of the man in the living room. "That's not right either. I don't need protection." He shrugs. "I can't explain it, dude. I dig your pop, really dig him. And it's freaking him out."

Matt shoots a glance at Liam. "I sort of glossed over that a bit. I was feeling bad for Mr. B." Matt's face brightens. "Dude, you would not believe the blow..."

"Dude, are you crazy? I don't want to hear that!" Liam snaps.

"Oh, sure. My bad. Right on. Weird. He started getting all tied into knots about what if someone found out. I worry about it, too, but he was really worried. I told him to, you know, chill. That I wasn't planning on walking hand-in-hand down the street. He totally did that clam thing you mentioned. He was decent about it but basically told me to blow. I should have just gone like he asked but I was sorta pissed, you know? So, I left a message for mom that I was crashing after a party and laid down on your bed."

Liam nods. It makes sense to him now. "He thought you were rejecting him," he says.

"What do you mean?"

"When you said you didn't want to hold his hand. My dad can be pretty insecure. He holds back and holds back and then, BAM, he's all in. He doesn't want to admit it but you got under his skin. He knows he's too old, you're too young, but he can't help it. Some place, deep inside his head, he was imagining more, than somehow everything would work out, the sun would shine, all the rain would be warm and gentle, la la the fucking la." Liam punches Matt on the shoulder. "You rained on the dream, dude." He sees the look on Matt's face. "I know you didn't mean it that way. Shit, my dad probably knows it, too. It's his out, dude. He doesn't have to worry about whether it makes sense or not, whether it will work or not, what people will say. No, you 'told' him you were in it for a quickie. He's totally depressed at the thought but totally relieved as well, cause now he doesn't have to deal with it."

Matt looks skeptical. "What the fuck, brah? You really are trying to channel Freud."

"Fuck Freud," Liam snaps. "Try growing up with a junkie manipulative mom and a father who wants the whole world to be perfect and blames himself when it isn't. You learn to figure out shit or you don't survive. My dad has the world's biggest martyr complex."

"I don't see that. I don't see that at all. I have to tell you."

"Trust me, he does. You're right he's not a passive-aggressive bitch about it like some people but he blames himself for everything."

"I don't think that's a martyr complex, dude."

"Whatever. We going to play or not?"

"What time is it?" Matt asks.

Liam stretches across the bed and picks up his phone. Matt tries to ignore the way his shirt pulls up and exposes the top part of his ass.

"Quarter till five."

"Shit, I need to run home for my stuff."

Matt hops off the bed and Liam follows. Randy, Mr. B, dad, is sitting in the recliner staring out the window. He jumps when Liam speaks.

After the repartee regarding forms of address and the beer, Liam follows Matt into the kitchen. He can tell Matt feels uncomfortable picking up his dad's wallet, so he does it. He opens it and pulls out a ten-dollar bill. Matt puts a hand on his forearm and nods with his head.

"Is that your mom?"

"Yeah," Liam whispers back.

"Damn, she's pretty."

"She was," Liam whispers as he closes the wallet.

"Coke or Pepsi."

"Coke."

"Right on."

***

I hear the side door to the carport slam.

"What are you going to do?" Liam asks as he returns to the living room.

"Beats me, kid," I tell him truthfully enough.

"Dude," he begins and I shoot him a look. He knows I hate him calling me 'dude'. "Dad," he corrects himself. "You got it bad."

"What are you talking about?"

"Don't play dumb, pop. Matt, you got a bad case of Matt, that's what."

"I just can't make sense of it. I mean, hell, I'm flattered at the attention, but come on. I don't want to be a dick about it, but I need to make him understand this is crazy, without hurting his feelings or" my voice tails off.

"Bullshit, father dear. No doubt all you've said is true enough. You scoop up spiders and put them outside. I've no doubt that you're worried about Matt." He leans forward on the sofa. "But, what you're really worried about is how much you want to believe him."

I open my mouth to protest. No sound comes out. I close it.

"What should I do?" I can't believe I'm asking my twenty-year old son for relationship advice.

"Beats me, pop." He sighs and leans back on the sofa. "Have you tried yoga?"

"Yoga?"

Liam nods. "Yup. I thought it would be an easy phys ed credit. It's not that I'm tired of swimming but I wanted to do something different. You knew I took a yoga class."

I nod. I did know that.

"I ended up really getting into. It helps a lot with mom."

"Really?"

"Yup. It's not a miracle. I still want to smack her in the head three or four times a day but it helps."

"You think it would help me decide what to do?"

"Fuck no," he snorts. "But it might help you not have a stroke over it." He's quiet for a time. "Dad, it is what it is. If you go for it, it will end. That much is always going to be true. It might not end until one of you is dead, or it might end in a week. It might end in a total shit storm. Maybe Matt'll go off his nut and blow your head off. Maybe you'll leave him for a ninety-year old chick. I don't know how it'll end anymore that you do. If you don't go for it, you will go over and over and over it in your head, every possible scenario and permutation, convinced you should have done something different. Mom is a heroin addict. You are a regret addict."

"You really think that little of me?" I ask, stunned.

"I told you, don't play dumb. You know I love you. You know I respect you, or you should. You made it possible for me to have an almost normal life. I'm not stupid. I don't know why, I suppose it was what happened with mom, but it's clear to me you can't imagine that you deserve to be happy. Everything is your fault. If I'm in a bad mood, it must be your fault. It never occurs to you I might have discovered Courtney was blowing the football team. Fucking let it go, dude. You aren't responsible for my happiness, or mom's, or your mom's, or Matt's. I'm not saying you should learn to be a dick but a little self-interest, a little self-righteousness wouldn't do you any harm."

I stare at my son.

"Who the fuck is the father here?" I ask.

"Now ain't that a great fucking question," Liam says and stands up.

***

We polish off two large pepperoni pizzas and most of the Rolling Rock. Liam and Matt insist on watching the Terminator movies. I make it through the first two.

"I'm going to bed, you guys. I'm beat."

"Huh, okay. Sure," Matt says and jumps up from where he's lying on the floor in front of the TV. I just look at him. Surely, he doesn't mean what he seems to.

"Oh for fuck sake," Liam snaps. "'Should I go back to mom's?"

"Huh?"

"If I wasn't here would Matt be sleeping in your bed tonight?"

"I, I.."

"I,I what?" Liam snarls. "Jesus, dude, are you sure you're up to this?" The latter is directed at Matt who pulls a half smile and gives him a weak shrug of the shoulders.

"Jesus Christ, dad, act like you have a pair. Either take Matt back to your bed or send him home. Shit or get off the fucking pot, already. If you suck it up and choose the former, don't fucking keep me awake. One advantage of not having mom around growing up is I never had to pretend I wasn't hearing you two fucking. I'm not interested in learning that skill at this point in my life."

I look helplessly at Matt. I'm so lost in wondering how I became such a fucking pussy, I almost blow it. Matt's shoulders drop and he starts to turn.

"You want the bathroom first?" I manage to whisper.

He turns back smiling. "We can share the sink."

"No you fucking can't" Liam hollers. "His bathroom is barely big enough for one person to wipe their ass in. Fucking brush your teeth in the full bath. Dad, fucking brush your fucking teeth in your own fucking bathroom and get the fuck out of here before I fucking puke. Fuck."

"Harsh. Totally harsh." Matt smiles at me. "He gets that from you."