The Crew

Untitled part 30

Chapter Thirty

Driving up Del Norte, I was exhausted beyond description, the day having turned into a long and unexpected saga. Instead of pulling into the driveway as usual, I maneuvered the White Beast over the asphalt curb half a block down. I didn't want my parents to ask any more questions than they were already going to ask.

I hadn't bothered to call Johnny. I figured he wouldn't care too much anyway, seeing as he hardly used the Citation. He never had gas money for the intrepid thing; he didn't even have insurance. Johnny couldn't afford it.

I shuffled over to the concrete walkway, thinking of what I would say, taking a step every second or two. I reached the big blue door with the familiar gold knob. I hated that damn gold knob, like we were some kind of royal family or something. I wanted to kick the whole damn door down and yell at the top of my lungs. What came out instead was my feeble knock.

I heard moving and soft voices. My chest heaved with fear. It was like that first night at the show, Cannon telling me to get up on stage, hurl myself off. This was previously unseen land, new, like Columbus first sighting Hispaniola. What would happen next? Not knowing, I wondered what Mr. Bry would recommend in this instant. Running away? Facing my demons? Letting go? This was a familial system. A dictatorial one, like The Crew. Was I too young to grasp its truth, its meaning? Would I one day understand? Was there a solid rationale for this system?

Face the abyss, Jack. I thought of D.D. that day after school, sitting in his car, telling me to face death.

My father appeared at the door seeming more confused than ever. Light bounced off the top of his bald head from the hanging lamp in the entry way. I looked into his eyes, searching for anything that resonated with a time before I was born, a time in which he'd been different, a teenager, alive with spirit, even rebellion, the promise of his whole life in front of him before marriage and kids and a mortgage drained any idea of what it was like to be young, to be in trouble. I remembered Cannon telling me about his mom, when we sat in the Jeep at the motel, waiting for Bear, how she viewed life as a chore, something to be suffered through, a victim of capitalism.

"Come in, son, we've been expecting you." It came out in a flat monotone. It was a lighter, more detached, passive version of Mr. Watson. My father and I had become strangers years ago.

I walked behind him, shutting the royal blue door. I saw my mother in the living room, sitting quietly on the couch, stone-cold radiating. The television was on, muted, and the French doors were closed.

I walked over to the two brick steps that led into the living room and sat. I could see my mother's profile; she looked like she'd been crying. She kept looking straight ahead at the television, not glancing at me. Her bobbed hair was rigid, molded to her head with no hint of freedom to move. Her body seemed wrapped tight.

"You're a sonofabitch, you know that, Jack." Her voice strained to keep the tears in check.

I hesitated and took a deep, long breath. I didn't speak, I didn't look up, I didn't do anything. I sat there. All of the sudden everything got very quiet, externally and internally. It was like being at the bottom of the ocean, in total darkness. Like my previous underwater sensation, I couldn't reach the surface, I couldn't get air. All those emotions which had been jarred out of me, after the shock of being caught at the beach, returned with a vengeance. The shameful knowledge that my mother had been let down by my rash behavior felt like a bruise on my heart that would never heal.

This was what it had come to. Hurting everyone around you, Jack. Sarah. Your mother. Your father. The Crew. It was confusing. Paralyzing. Was it worth it?