23. What You Want

23

WHAT YOU WANT

" A re you more frustrated than anything else?" Kelsey asked on Saturday.

She'd just listened to what Van had told her about the conversation with her father.

There was this teeny tiny part that was annoyed he didn't tell her last night when she'd asked him three times what was wrong.

No. It was more than teeny tiny.

It was humongous, but she also knew she couldn't push Van.

She wasn't sure what caused him to even bring it up today.

"Yes," he said.

They were sitting out on his deck. She was going to spend the night here since they'd stayed at her place last night.

It was morning and they hadn't made plans for the day yet.

Frankie was snoozing in the sun and she had her second cup of coffee in her hand.

"What are you going to do?" she asked. "I mean I understand you've got to have a ton of questions. Do you think you'll ask your father?"

"No," he said. "Not right now at least."

Which meant there might be a time he'd do it.

"Does your father even know you're here? On this island? Didn't you say he didn't know you even moved?"

"He doesn't know where I am the last I knew," he said. "It's not like I've changed my cell number. He could reach out and hasn't."

She frowned. "What an asshole."

"He is that," he said. "But one could argue that I haven't reached out to him either. I'm starting to understand why my mother was able to write her father off for so long."

"Barry doesn't sound anything like your father," she argued.

"I have no idea. I just know my mother was able to do it and now I am too. The world saw my father one way. Who is to say that you guys didn't see Barry one way on the outside and then he was someone else different at home?"

She didn't like that he pointed that out.

"You could be right, but I don't think so," she said. "My father is a good judge of character. You can't hide that much from someone you are partners with."

"I want to say you're right, but there are plenty of married couples out there that will say that they were blindsided by their spouses. There are serial killers living normal lives and going home to their wives and kids and no one suspects. Not everyone knows everything about another person."

"You sure know how to be a Debbie Downer," she said.

She never thought like that and couldn't understand why anyone would.

Even if it was the truth.

"Sorry," he said.

"Do you think you're like your grandfather?" she asked. "Is that what is bothering you?"

"Maybe," he said.

She was going to go with it since he was opening up.

"Barry wasn't a horrible person. I don't think you are either."

"Gee," he said. "Thanks for that. I'll take not a horrible person. It's better than being an asshole or a dick."

"Very funny," she said.

"I wasn't trying to be."

"Neither was I. Why don't you open up envelope number three? It might give you a better idea of things. You know where the pictures came from. To me that showed he was trying. That he thought of your mother often."

"I think that is what my grandfather wants. He wants me to know he'd done his part for years. But then I have to ask myself if his part was enough. I would have loved for my mother to have a different life."

"You can't control those things," she said. "Do you think your mother would have left your father? You were an adult in law enforcement. If your mother wanted to leave, she had a way out. Not even back to her father, but just with you."

He let out a big sigh. "You think I haven't thought of that? I just don't know why she stayed."

"Maybe she wasn't as unhappy as you thought?"

"That is only going to piss me off," he said.

"I'm not trying to get in a fight with you," she said. "I just commented."

"I think my mother and my grandfather shared a lot of genetics. One of them was being stubborn."

"Like the one big gene that is overtaking your body?" she asked.

"Most likely," he said, turning to look at her. There was silence for a minute. "Do you want me to open another envelope?"

"Of course I do," she said. "But it's not what I want. It's what you want. If it were me I wouldn't have waited as long as you to do anything. I can't. It's like putting Christmas gifts in front of me and telling me I have to wait six months to open them. Nope. I'm lucky if I can wait six minutes."

He stood up and walked back into the house and she jumped up to follow, Frankie doing the same.

He went to his office, opened a drawer and pulled out an envelope.

"Here," he said. "You open it."

"Why me?" she asked. "You should do it."

"Maybe I need the emotional support."

It was the smirk on his face that told her now he was being a wise guy.

But deep down she did wonder if he truly needed it and could only ask it in that context.

She took it out of his hand. "You've got three seconds to change your mind; otherwise the contents will be out."

She counted to three and he said nothing so she opened it. It was newspaper articles. Some old, some more recent and printed out as if they'd been read online.

The first one was a picture of Van playing basketball. "You've got some moves."

He took it out of her hand and looked at it. "Jesus," he said. "I was sixteen in that picture. It got me laid that weekend for the first time."

"Hey," she said. "No talk about your exes."

"Not exes," he said. "That was a party. We'd won the championship. I wasn't even the winning score but just a picture they'd taken. We had a few beers at my friend's house and I ended up in the back room with Sheila Commons."

"No more," she said, putting her fingers in her ears and making noises.

"Fine," he said. "Are you jealous?"

"I think we've established that I'm a jealous girlfriend. This article is your name listed for high school graduation. Here is your name for the academy. A few more with arrests you'd made. Oh man," she said when she got to the last one.

"What?" he asked, pulling it out of her hand.

"It's when you were stabbed. Poor Barry. I wonder when he got that. I remember when my father told us about it, but I can't put the dates together of when he found out."

"This article was released a week after it happened," he said. "They kept it as quiet as they could to get the arrest. Or bring in everyone involved. The guy who stabbed me was killed on the spot by my partner, but they still had to investigate more. The case we were working on too."

"I want to say he found out a few weeks after this date. I just know he was really upset but then found out you'd been released and were okay. I mean you would be fine. So yeah."

"I was in the hospital for a few weeks and home for a few months recovering," he said.

"Then he found out much later," she said.

"How was he?" he asked.

"Devastated, as I said," she said. "I remember my father coming home upset. My father said it was damn close to how Barry was when he found out your mother passed. I think Barry got in a dark place for a while there."

"I know what that is like," he said. "I felt I lived in that cave for years after my mother died."

"I can't even imagine what you've gone through in your life," she said. "I'm sorry I pushed you to open this."

"But not sorry enough you wouldn't wish I'd open another?" he asked.

She shrugged. "You have to make that decision and you have to be the one to open it. Not me."

He picked up another envelope and tore it open.

"I'm glad you're here for this one," he said and handed it over.

She looked and saw it was the obituary for his mother.

"There is something on the back," she said and flipped it over. It was a piece of paper taped to it marking the day Barry found out.

"Did you see this?" she asked, handing it back.

He looked at it. "This is supposed to be his proof that he didn't know?"

"I don't know what to tell you, Van. Other than he knew you wouldn't believe him and it seems to me Barry has gone to a lot of work to try to get you to see otherwise."

Van put the article back in the drawer with the others and shut it. "I need to get out of here. Where can we go with Frankie to get some air?"

"We could go back on the deck, but I think you mean you want to get out of the house."

"I do," he said.

She found it sweet that he wanted to bring Frankie with them when they could have easily brought the dog back to her house a mile away and done anything else.

"There is a dog park in Plymouth," she said.

"You want to take a ferry ride to go to the dog park?" he asked.

"You said you wanted air and a place to bring Frankie. Got a better idea?"

"Not at the moment."

"Then let's get cracking so we can catch the ferry."

"Do you have a backpack for Frankie's stuff again?" he asked. "I've got one here somewhere I'm sure."

"I don't have that purse with me," she said.

"Give me a minute. I'll grab mine and carry it so he's taken care of."

When Van was in his room, she cupped her hands over her mouth. "I'm in the mood for lemon Jell-O. Can we get some of that while we're out too?"

"Sure," he said.

She rolled her eyes. She knew he got the joke, but he was just ignoring her.

That was fine. She was happier with the fact that Van opened up more to her today and seemed to be taking some baby steps.