Heart Bones(3)

“Do you need to call your father?” he asks.

I stare at him a moment, knowing that’s what I’ll end up doing, but wondering how long I can put it off.

“Beyah,” he says, pronouncing my name with a long e.

“It’s pronounced Bay-uh.” I don’t know why I correct him. He’s said it wrong since I’ve known him, and I’ve never cared enough to correct him before this moment.

“Beyah,” he corrects. “I know this isn’t my place, but…you need out of this town. You know what happens to people like—” He stops talking, as if what he was about to say would insult me.

I finish the sentence for him. “To people like me?”

He looks even more ashamed now, even though I know he just means people like me in a broad sense. People with mothers like mine. Poor people with no way out of this town. People who end up working fast food until they’re numb inside, and the fry cook offers them a hit of something that makes the rest of the shift feel like they’re at a disco, and before they know it, they can’t survive a single second of their miserable day without hit after hit, chasing that feeling faster than they chase the safety of their own child, until they’re shooting it straight into their veins and staring at Mother Teresa while they accidentally die, when all they ever really wanted was an escape from the ugliness.

Buzz looks uncomfortable standing inside this house. I wish he’d just leave. I feel sorrier for him than I do myself, and I’m the one who just found my mother dead on the couch.

“I don’t know your father at all, but I know he’s been paying the rent on this trailer since you were born. That right there tells me he’s a better option than staying in this town. If you have an out, you need to take it. This life you’ve been living here—it’s not good enough for you.”

That might be the nicest thing anyone has ever said to me. And it’s coming from Dakota’s dad, of all people.

He stares at me a moment, like he wants to say something else. Or maybe he wants me to respond. Either way, the room stays silent until he nods and then leaves. Finally.

After he shuts the front door, I turn and stare at the couch. I stare so long, I feel like I’m in a daze. It’s weird how your whole life can completely change in the hours between waking up and going to bed.

As much as I hate to admit it, Buzz is right. I can’t stay here. I never planned to, but I at least thought I had the summer left to prepare for my exit.

I’ve been working my ass off to get out of this town, and as soon as August hits, I’ll be on a bus to Pennsylvania.

I received a volleyball scholarship to Penn State. In August, I’ll be out of this life, and it won’t be because of anything my mother did for me, or because my father bailed me out of here. It’ll be because of me.

I want that victory.

I want to be the reason I turn out the way I’m going to turn out.

I refuse to allow Janean to receive any credit for any good things that might happen in my future. I never told her about the volleyball scholarship I received. I didn’t tell anyone. I swore my coach to secrecy and wouldn’t even allow a write-up in the paper, or a photo-op for the yearbook.

I never told my father about the scholarship, either. I’m not even sure he knows I play volleyball. My coaches made sure I had everything I needed as far as supplies, equipment, and a uniform. I was good enough that they weren’t going to allow my financial situation to prevent me from being part of the team.

I haven’t had to ask my parents for a single thing related to volleyball.

It feels strange even referring to them as parents. They gave me life, but that’s about the only thing I’ve ever received from them.

I am the product of a one-night stand. My father lived in Washington and was in Kentucky on business when he met Janean. I was three months old before he even knew he’d gotten Janean pregnant. He found out he was a dad when she served him with child support papers.

He came to see me once a year until I was four; then he started flying me to Washington to visit him, instead.

He knows nothing about my life in Kentucky. He knows nothing about my mother’s addictions. He knows nothing about me, other than what I present to him, and that’s very little.

I’m extremely secretive about every aspect of my life. Secrets are my only form of currency.

I haven’t told my father about my scholarship for the same reason I never told my mother. I don’t want him to take pride in having a daughter who accomplished something. He doesn’t deserve to feel prideful of a child he puts a fraction of his effort into. He thinks a monthly check and intermittent phone calls to my work are enough to cover up the fact that he barely knows me.

He’s a two weeks out of the year Dad.

Because we’re so far apart on the map, it’s convenient for him to excuse his absence in my life. I’ve stayed with him fourteen days out of every summer since I was four, but in the last three years, I haven’t seen him at all.

Once I turned sixteen and joined the varsity team, volleyball became an even bigger part of my daily routine, so I stopped flying out to see him. I’ve been making excuses for three years now as to why I can’t make our visits.

He pretends to be bummed.

I pretend to be apologetic and busy.

Sorry, Brian, but a monthly child support check makes you responsible; it doesn’t make you a father.