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Chapter Thirteen - Otis


Ethan seemed to be practicing nearly non-stop over the next couple of days. He had the guitar with him constantly, asking me tips and questions and making sure he had his fingers spaced perfectly on the neck of the guitar, preparing for playing for his father, Otis, at Cumberland Heights. When he wasn’t practicing, he was talking about his father, telling us stories about Otis Paulson that sounded as though they were designed to make us think his dad was the coolest thing since - like, ever. But there were several that made Lauren and I exchange awkward glances.

Otis, it turned out, had worked as an auto-mechanic most of his life at a garage in Brentwood. I actually knew the garage - it was a shack, painted bright French’s Mustard yellow with piles of used tires contained by high picket fences. It had an old ad board outside that, minus a few letters, bragged they did oil changes for $29.99 plus tax, which blinked at night as the fluorescent bulb contained inside flickered and threatened to go out. The legend, Ethan said, was that his mother’s car broke down and she walked almost ten miles in the dark and rain before she found Otis, who was working late at the garage and just about to close up, but still went and towed her car in and fixed it, free of charge as long as she’d agreed to go on a dinner date with him. They’d been married and had Ethan within a year after that. Ethan told us about family trips during which his mother and father argued in the car and the way Otis smelled like cigarettes and Jack Daniels. He reminisced about watching football games, perched on the arm of his father’s chair, and this one time that Otis had knocked him off the chair because he’d cheered for the wrong team.

I’d frowned when he’d told that story, disapproving.

“He’s really passionate about football,” Ethan explained. “Kinda like you. He didn’t hurt me or nothin’, it was like I was one of the guys.”

I’d never hit Chris or Jordan or Shadrick off a chair for not rooting for the Buccaneers.

But Ethan was just so damn excited to go see his father that I didn’t really dare to say anything negative about the stuff he was telling us. I just kind of felt like maybe I needed to keep my mouth shut, the same way people say divorced couples need to keep their mouths shut about their exes when the kids are around.

“I don’t like this asshole,” I said to Lauren as I smeared gel into my hair, making it do it’s thing. She was putting make-up on beside me, drawing the dark smeary lines under her eyes with her mouth open in a big O that made me think of her sex face. It kind of pissed me off that she was dressing up all nice for this trip to go see Otis. “Do I have to go?”

“Yes,” she replied, then back to the O face.

“I really don’t wanna go,” I said, “I don’t wanna go back to Cumberland Heights. Just thinkin’ of that place gives me the heebie-jeebies.”

Lauren dropped the eye pencil into her big make-up trunk thing and dug around, “I know, but Ethan wants us both to go. It means a lot to him, you’ve heard him all week.” She pulled out a lip gloss and opened it, dipping it several times into the thick solution inside the little plastic container. “Besides, I want more than one of us to witness this guy so I can’t blow it out of proportion in my head.” She smeared stuff on her mouth, making it all glittery and pink.

“He’s a dick, I don’t need to witness him to know that,” I said with a grumble.

Lauren threw the lip gloss back in her case. “You don’t know him.”

“I know him enough.”

She turned to me and put her hands on my chest. “You’re projecting your father on him.”

I stared at her. I’d been thinking that Otis sounded a lot like my father, but that wasn’t why I hated him. Was it?

I sighed. I had a feeling that, once again, Lauren knew me better than I knew myself.

“C’mon,” she said, “Let’s go.”

Ethan was literally standing by the door with his guitar, ready to go, antsy with excitement.

I kind of felt like maybe he had tapped all the energy I normally had, he was twice as excited about going as I was not excited to be going.

We piled into the Jeep and drove out to the freeway and went up to Nashville via the 65. It was rainy and kind of blah outside, which matched my mood, but we had The River playing and they had some good upbeat music going on the station. Lauren hummed along, and Ethan fidgeted in the backseat, rubbing his arm and looking from me to Lauren to his guitar.

I parked at Cumberland Heights with about as much excitement as a poor gunsman about to head out into the streets at high noon for a showdown. I stared out at the building, flooding with old sense of shame and regret, feelings that I’d long since packed away neatly in a box filling me up from head to toe. I took a deep breath. Ethan was excitedly grabbing his guitar, seatbelt already unbuckled, and Lauren was undoing hers. I found my limbs to be awkward, like they were too big for me or something, and I undid the belt with some difficulty, then climbed out of the Jeep, my stomach heavy. We walked up, through the automatic doors, and Ethan paused to wait for Lauren and I by a display of pamphlets, detailing the services Cumberland Heights offered.

I’d stood there once, staring at the pamphlets, trying to get the courage up to face the woman at the counter.

“Can I help you?”

Lauren took the reigns as Ethan excitedly ran his hands across his hips, drying sweat in his palms, and I tried not to throw up. “We’re here to visit Mr. Otis Paulson,” she said. “This is his son and we’re… Ethan’s… current, uh, guardians.”

“Fill out this form,” the woman replied, pushing the form across the counter. She tapped into the computer. I turned to the pamphlets.

12 Steps to Recovery: Alcoholic’s Anonymous.

Remembering Who You Were Before Addiction.

Your Family Needs You! Finding Your Reason to Overcome Addiction.

The Effects of Drugs and Alcohol on Your Body.

My throat tightened and I turned away.

“Nick?” Lauren was staring at me expectantly.

“Huh?”

“Your ID.” She was holding her hand out. She’d obviously asked a couple times and I hadn’t heard. I pulled it out and dropped it into her hand. “You okay?” she asked. I nodded.

A few minutes of paperwork and a couple calls “upstairs” later, and a nurse came and checked us and the guitar for anything we might’ve been trying to sneak in. Once that was done, we had to walk through this crazy xray device like at the airports and then they led us to a community room.

People were peeking at us from all over the community room as we were walked through what felt like a big living room to a private den off to one side that wasn’t unlike a waiting area in a regular hospital. I was scratching my arm out of nerves. “Mr. Paulson will be right in,” the nurse smiled and left.

“I’m nervous,” Ethan said, jittery.

Join the club, I thought.

“It’ll be okay, sweetie,” Lauren smiled at him, reaching over and touching his hand like she usually did mine when I was worked up. She glanced at me, and gave me this look like she was mentally doing the same to me.

There was this weird mechanical noise and I looked up to see one of those plastic automatic air freshener spray units overhead. A moment later, the room smelled like linen.

Then the door opened and two guys walked in. One was a fat, beefy man with sausagey-looking fingers, who looked like an Otis to me and I instantly assumed was Ethan’s father. He fit every characteristic you could possibly think of for the traditional, stereotypical abusive father type. The other guy was a tall, narrow guy with barely-there blonde hair and deep set brown eyes and a sort of Turkey-skin texture to his neck.

That one kinda reminded me of my father, actually, a little.

I didn’t like either of them.

“Dad!” Ethan jumped up from the seat he’d landed in and rushed over to the skinny guy, wrapping him in a hug.

I blinked in surprise.

Sausage fingers held out his hand, “I’m Dr. Sonder,” he introduced himself, smiling, “I’m the psychologist treating Mr. Paulson.” He smiled at Otis and Ethan. “You’re the family?”

“We’re taking care of Ethan until Mr. Paulson gets out,” Lauren supplied.

Otis and Ethan broke apart and Ethan grinned at his father with this look of admiration that you see in pictures of kids when they meet their favorite sports heros or Spiderman or something. Otis turned to me - not to Lauren, I noticed, even though she’d been the one who spoke - and held out his hand. “Nice to meet you,” he said, “My son had quite a deal to say about you on the phone the other day.”

I reluctantly shook his hand.

“He’s just the sweetest kid,” Lauren said. She held out her hand to him before he’d even finished shaking mine - which he was doing for quite a long time, by the way - “I’m Lauren, and this is my husband, Nick.”

“Hello, Nick.”

I pulled my hand away, and he turned to Lauren and shook her hand, too, though just as reluctantly as I’d shaken his.

No wonder Ethan’s mother had left, I thought, This guy’s a total misogynist.

Lauren smiled at him none the less.

“I appreciate you all taking care of my boy here,” he said, wrapping his arm around Ethan. He smiled. “I ain’t been the best father in the past couple’r months,” he added, “But I plan to make that right real soon, soon’s I can.” Suddenly he did look like an Otis. Or at least sounded like an Otis.

I mean Otis doesn’t exactly sound like a terribly intelligent name.

And this was definitely not exactly an intelligent sounding man.

They kind of fit together.

Ethan looked about ready to burst with excitement, though. “I missed you,” he said, “But you’re better now and we’re gonna do okay again, right? We’re gonna get a place to live and be okay?”

Otis nodded, “Course we are,” he answered, “Gonna be finer than frog’s fur soon as shootin’.” He smiled and turned to find himself a seat.

Dr. Sonder, Lauren, Ethan and I all sat, too, and Ethan grabbed his guitar excitedly. “Dad… Nick’s been teachin’ me guitar. I’m gettin’ real good. Learnin’ how to play songs and everything. I can play John Denver, dad.”

“Good job,” Otis answered. But instead of asking him to play it, despite the fact that Ethan already had the guitar pulled over, an obvious indication that he wanted his father to ask him, Otis turned to me, “Ain’t you a singer or somethin’? I seen you some place.”

I was gonna say no. I dunno why, but instincts in me had reared up when he asked and I was about to deny it but Ethan cut in, “He’s a Backstreet Boy,” he said, “Mom liked them, remember? Maybe we can find where she went, like - oh maybe Nick could like post on Twitter and maybe she’ll come back if she finds out we’re doin’ okay for ourselves, huh dad? Maybe?”

He sounded like a kid.

I mean he is a kid, but he really sounded like one. Desperate to please dad. This strange feeling was crawling over me, slow, like a creeping chill I couldn’t quite find the source of.

“Very impressive,” Otis said, “You’ve been livin’ the luxe life while I been gone, ‘ey boy?” he asked, and he slapped Ethan on the back in what appeared a friendly way, but seemed just a little harder than necessary to me. Nobody else seemed to have noticed. “Nice of’em, these are good people. I can tell. I can see it in their eyes.” He looked at me, then at Lauren and back to me, and he crossed his legs and sat back, “So very glad y’all could help him out like this, watchin’ o’er him ‘til I get on my feet, it’s mighty fine of you.”

“Not a problem,” Lauren answered again, “Like I said, he’s a sweet kid.”

“I love him very much,” Otis replied, and he put his arm around Ethan and pulled him in for a hug, and the look on Ethan’s face was as though Otis had just bestowed him with the crown jewels of England, he was so pleased to hear the words.

”I love you son.” My father’s words had rung in my ears, like fourth of July fireworks, more colorful and brilliant than anything I could ever imagine. And even in the flashback, they were still so solid and bright and crisp. It’d been the first time he’d said them in an extremely long time, possibly even ever. We’d been waist deep in ocean water at the American Power Boating Association Racing World Championship in Florida and Dad had just taken the win after a summer of me pouring millions of dollars into this dream of his. It was worth every penny, I’d told myself, just to hear those words from him. I’d have paid for that whole APBA Championship run a hundred times over if I’d heard it every time we won.

I knew too well about fickle moments and cheap words lighting up the world.

I fucking hated Otis.

I stood up, “I need to take a piss,” I said. I used the most crass word I could muster. It was like I wanted to shock everyone in the room into understanding that this dude was full of shit. Like maybe using a rude word would discolor the memory of those pretty words and reveal them to be as disgusting as the words I’d used. “Where’s the john?”

Lauren looked like she was ready to karate chop me.

“Down the hall to the left,” Dr. Sonder said.

Ethan was still looking at Otis with admiration, no different than it’d been before I said anything.

I pushed my way out into the hallway and went to the bathroom. I didn’t really need to go but since I said that’s where I was going - it was as good as any other place. People stared as I went into the restroom. It was a single unit room, no lock on the door. Probably so psychos couldn’t lock themselves in with drugs or booze or anything. I leaned against the door and closed my eyes, trying to push thoughts out of my head.

I just wanted a blank mind.

A knock on the door stirred me. “Somebody’s in here,” I barked.

“Let me in.” It was Lauren.

I sighed and moved away from the door so she could push it open. She closed it behind her, staring at me. “What the hell?” she asked.

I frowned.

“Nick, could you be more rude? Ethan’s totally excited, and you’re just over there being this grumpy yeti. You’ve been extremely rude to his father and --”

“That guy’s a prick,” I answered dismissively. I paced the length of the bathroom.

“Nick you don’t even know him.”

“He’s a misogynistic assfucker,” I replied. “And he’s a liar. And he’s fake. He’s shallow. I’ll bet you anything he asks us for help getting a place to live once he’s out of here. Anything.” I waved my finger at her.

She sighed.

“I don’t like him.”

“Nick, he’s broken. He’s been through a lot of shit. Don’t you remember how horrible it was being at this stage? The end zone of recovery?” Lauren looked at me with judging eyes, “You weren’t exactly a ball of sunshine.”

“I didn’t tell someone I loved them when I didn’t mean it.”

“You didn’t mean it for like the first year we were together and you know it,” she said. “So yes, actually, you did.”

“But that’s his son,” I said, “And he should mean it. And he doesn’t.”

“How do you know?”

“Because he’s just like my father,” I snapped.

Lauren stared at me for a long moment. “Are you sure that isn’t why you dislike him so strongly?” she asked, raising an eyebrow, “Is it possible that you’re projecting your feelings about your father onto Ethan’s father without really experiencing Otis to make a judgement based on Otis?”

I gritted my teeth. “No.”

Lauren shrugged, “Maybe you should think about your answer a little bit.” She turned to the door. “Come back to the room when you’re done taking your piss,” she said the word with emphasis.

As soon as she left the room I pulled the toilet paper off the little spindle hanger thing and threw it against the wall just to vent some frustration. I paced some more. I didn’t like Otis. I didn’t like Otis. I didn’t want it to be that I didn’t like my father and projection and all that shit. So what if Otis kinda had a similar build and coloration and hair pattern or whatever of my father, so the fuck what? It had nothing to do with it. Otis had avoided shaking Lauren’s hand and fake I love you-ed Ethan. What was there to like?

I didn’t leave the room until a nurse knocked and told me that Ethan and Lauren were waiting for me to go home.