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xp_logsAs he picks up the mask, Kyle is tempted with what he truly wants.
As Kyle plunked the mask from the flames, a voice resonated in his head; insidious and penetrating. "A new future can be yours."
"Can it though? I mean." Kyle thought, snorting out loud. "Look, creepy voice, or Olivier, or whatever, it kinda can't, because to do that we'd have to erase, you know, my entire past."
"The past is just a tale already told. What if we simply tell it again, differently." The heavy black basalt walls disappeared around Kyle, replaced by a green lawn. Around him appeared a neighborhood which could have been anywhere. A street full of similar houses and lawns, driveways with sensible minivans and SVUs, and a gnawing sense that he belonged here. Kyle stumbled as he took a step, toes catching on the slightly uneven sidewalk. He stopped dead still, and reached down to touch the concrete. It was warm and rough, a little damp from the sprinklers. Tiny pieces of grass clung to his fingers as he stood back up. "It doesn't work like that." He said under his breath, shaking his head. "It doesn't."
His arm shot out to deflect a kicked soccer ball, and it bounced to a stop a few feet away. It was followed by a dark-haired kid in t-shirt and shorts, calling. "Sorry Mister G!" as he chased past the ball. "It's not practice, I don't get laps if it's not practice!" and then the kid was gone, through a fence into one of the back yards.
"Kyle, can you please get in here? The twins are... being the twins. Your wife going to jail for a double homicide is in the cards!" A voice called from his front door, both new and also familiar. "I know you're smoking... something for later, but they are being terrors right now."
Brisket. It was brisket. Kyle's attention snapped to the door, and he knew, he was smoking brisket and he had eight pounds of it and he'd been up since six with a brisket in the smoker that he and his dad had built. He shook the grass off his fingers, and headed for the door. It swung open at his touch onto a little tiled entryway littered with soccer cleats and sandals and sneakers, two little backpacks on low hooks and his own messenger bag a span higher. "Gimme a sec, I got muddy feet!" Of course he did, he'd been mowing the lawn, and messing with the smoker, and having deep contemplative thoughts about getting one of those power washers to get the grime off the driveway.
He kicked muddy sandals off onto the front stoop. "Hey, you two are risking losing screen time!" He called, listening to the sounds of high pitched giggling and shrieking as two sets of feet ran over head. "Don't make me change the wifi password!"
"I love you and the children. But I might have to kill all of them. Just warning you." His wife said, coming around the kitchen island. "I don't know what their problem is today."
"Don't bury them in the back yard. I just got the HOA to get off my..." A pause. "Body part ima not name because of little ears." He brushed a quick kiss over his wife's hair, coppery in the light streaming through the kitchen windows.
"I got 'em. Go make sangria or something, I'll chase them around the yard. It's spring break, they're gonna have a case of the zoomies." He glanced at the ceiling, and considered the sudden quiet suspiciously and moved quickly towards the stairs. "You shoulda seen my Junior Lit classes yesterday. Oh my god."
"Savages. I told you, we could have moved to Amsterdam, opened up a sex shop, and spent the next twenty years high on good hash and coffee. But no... you wanted kids." She said, crossing her arms over her breasts. "I'm doing the PTA meeting with those terrible Karens tomorrow, so you need to figure out dinner that involves a vegetable for them."
"Hash doesn't do anything for... me?" Kyle started, and then shook himself. Of course it did, he'd been spectacularly high in college dozens of times. "Hey, you were right there when we made those kids, and I didn't hear any complaints." He went up the stairs, two at a time, and peeked his head around the corner at two giggling faces. "Hey, we talked about this, guys. I do yard work, you guys don't give your mom hell. No annoying sounds." Kyle's 'Gru" voice was spectacularly on point, probably from having watched those movies four hundred times over the summer. "No painting the cat, no asking her the same question fifteen times, no screaming."
"We didn't paint the cat!" One little voice called out. "We just want snacks."
"Yeah, snacks! We have the metabolisms!"
Kyle groaned. "Guys. You are eight. You do not have mutant metabolisms. Do you even... " He paused. "You know what, no, don't answer that. We're going to the park before your mom turns you into wine racks or donates you to a city college or something." He sighed. "Come on, shoes and ... pants. You both need pants, jesus christ. Real pants, not pajamas." He leaned against the door and sighed, and then picked up his head, shaking it wildly. "Wait. I don't... this isn't right."
There was a crack, and Kyle looked down at his bleeding fist, watching as the skin healed over. "Kay, not a weird coma dream, so." He went still, and the twins were gone, echoes of giggles from a pop-up tent fading. "Yeah, no, look, not fucking likely."
***
Los Angeles International Airport was not growing on Kyle at all. This was his fourth or fifth time in the airport and it was still too bright and too loud and too hot and too dry and the entire airport felt oddly artificial. He'd learned to pack sunglasses, and a good set of headphones with noise canceling.
He still wanted to wrap his face inside his hoodie and go sit somewhere in the dark until his face stopped hurting, or until he got used to the bright sun of California, and the endless dry air. Two vacations, two interviews and now this trip and he still wasn't used to it.
He dropped his duffle bag at his feet, tapped out a text, and then leaned up against a column to wait for luggage. All his luggage.
"ohmygodKYLE" was the only warning before a small brown blur cannonballed into Kyle's side, one arm wrapping around his waist while the crinkle of plastic came from between their bodies. "I got you flowers!" Doreen Green's head was buried somewhere around Kyle's clavicle, and she showed no signs of letting go any time soon. "I'm so happy you're here," she said brightly, continuing to hug him.
Maybe it was the attack pounce, or the unexpected tail wrapping around one leg, but Kyle blinked in shock several times before wrapping both arms around Dori. "I think flowers maybe are getting squished, Dor." He said, finally. It took another minute of hugging before Dori pulled away just enough to pull the sunflowers out with an awkward grin. "No I totally love them. They're awesome. I was just about to text you that I could get like, Uber if you were running late or something."
Doreen shook her head. "Nope, I was always gonna be here to pick up -my man-," she emphasized the last two words by framing Kyle with her arms in a very 'look at how awesome he is' way. "Set like five alarms for myself, but LAX is super big, so it took a little bit to spot you."
"My man?" Kyle mouthed silently. God, he was tired of traveling already. "LAX is the worst, I am super glad to be done with it." He couldn't even remember how many times he'd been through the airport anymore. Too many. Way too many. He was over it. "I've got like five days before I have to go meet the graduate advisor, so what's on the agenda besides unpacking?"
"You mean we can't just stay in bed for five days?" Dori sighed at the look Kyle gave her. "It was worth a shot." She straightened up while still staying close to Kyle, "Once we get you unpacked, I've got a list of restaurants near campus that we can check out, see what's best for your metabolism and stuff. Then I was thinking maybe we could go to Santa Monica, and you can see where skateboarding got its start. Maybe even give surfing a try."
"You made a list?" Kyle tilted his head slightly. "That's... organized." Maybe grad school had finally gotten Doreen Green to make a to do list. Stranger things had happened. He shrugged to himself, picked up the duffle and dumped it on the luggage cart that Dori had also seemingly gotten. The rest of his luggage - two suitcases, and another duffle bag came around the carousel after a few more minutes, and he loaded them onto the cart too. "I just need to wait for... " He paused. "Shamu... hold on. Dor, did I tell you how I was bringing over my cat?"
Doreen cocked her head. "Bringing? Shamu's already at the apartment, silly. Remember, we decided to give him and Monkey Joe extra time to get used to living together?" Her hand smoothed low over Kyle's abs. "C'mon, what are you waiting for?"
"I did what?" Kyle blinked a few times. "How the hell did he get to your place?" He shook his head. "Man, all this travel must have knocked a few screws loose. Look, once we're in the car I think ima call Doc Grey because Dor, I legit don't remember sending Shamu out early."
Dori's face went still for a second. "Well, I have to call her too, so." She giggled. "Um. I was going to surprise you but, uh." Her hand moved from Kyle's stomach to her own. "I kinda missed my period. The school has really good daycare. I looked already, if you're working as a TA, then you get the on site daycare."
Kyle took a step back, and then another. "Uh. Uh. No. We use condoms. You're on the ... hold the fucking phone." He looked back up, and Terry Cassidy was standing in Dori's place. She took a step forward, and put one hand on his cheek. "We'll make it work, love. I can do my Underground work and event planning from the Keep, and you can teach remotely."
"I just said no. No. No, you were Doreen Green a second ago, this was LAX, not.." He looked around. "Not Dublin fucking International Airport, and Terry and I talked. No kids anytime soon." Terry's face went red, and she opened her mouth to scream - and it was gone in a haze of exhaust and blaring car alarm.
***
The car was bright red, a characteristic spoiler in the rear, wide sport muffler, slightly tinted windows. "That's a 911 GT2, this year's model," one of the group of boys gathered around it said. "483 horsepower, it'll do zero to sixty in under 4 seconds." Everyone leaned in far too close, gazing admiringly at the clean lines of the vehicle. An elbow hit the youngest, scrawniest member of the gaggle of teenage bravos. "Time to put up or shut up, Gibney. Let's see what you got."
"Uh." Kyle looked at the t-shirt wrapped around his fist, and at the car. It was a lot harder close up to remember that his Granddad had shown him how to start the old station wagon without the keys. That safety glass wouldn't cut up his hand. "This isn't like... " He looked around. "This is a lot more..."
This wasn't popping the lock on their PE coach to put eggs in his glove box. This wasn't moving the school's old beat up maintenance trucks around. This wasn't boosting a golf cart.
"What, you telling me you were shitting us when you said you could hotwire a car?" another youth called derisively. "What are you, a -pussy-?" A loud chorus of hoots greeted that verbal jab, blending into shouts of 'come on' and 'I dare ya' and repetitions of the go-to insult of teenage boys.
"I can totally hotwire a car." Kyle muttered. "I hotwired the golf cart." But this was a car. This was a real car, that probably cost so much money.
And it was red
and what if they got pulled over
and what if he got ratted out - he couldn't even drive
"Guys I dunno."
"You 'dunno'?" The word was full of sarcasm and taunting from the ringleader who had first dared Kyle to do it. "What don't you know, Gibney? Huh?" A two-handed shove to the chest sent Kyle stumbling backward. "You don't know shit. Man up."
"You know what? Fuck off." The word squeaked out of Kyle's mouth. "Fuck right off. Fuck you, and fuck... fuck your mom." He stammered out the insult and backed away. "Golf carts are funny, this isn't... this isn't a good idea. This is like. " The car was so expensive. Grand Theft Auto, like the game he wasn't supposed to play at friend's houses said. "I'm outta here. Get your stupid self arrested on your own."
"No, fuck -you-!" The insults and catcalls followed Kyle as he walked away into the early evening. Just as Kyle was starting to wonder how he was going to get home, he rounded the corner to see a pay phone almost spotlit by an overhead street light.
He could walk. He'd blow his curfew and get grounded - but it wouldn't be the same grounded as if he called for a ride home and told his parents what happened. He glanced back, just for a second and caught the flash of red and blue lights out of the corner of his eye. Two police cars coming around the block, and another pulling into the parking lot of the convenience store that hosted the payphone.
He picked up the phone. He dialed - the memorized digits of one of the collect call numbers that would let him leave a message, and the phone rang twice.
"Gibney Residence." That was his dad's voice.
Kyle almost dropped the phone. "Dad? How'd you... Dad, can I get a ride home? Some.. stuff .. happened."
"You wanna talk about it?" came the question after the halting confession. "Your mom's already getting her shoes and the keys to the minivan."
"Mom's coming too?" Kyle didn't understand why his voice broke - why a sense of abrupt and painful grief welled up. "Uh. I just. I almost did something dumb, and I didn't do it but I kinda got stranded."
Kyle's dad's chuckle was gravelly but kind. "Well 'almost' isn't 'did', and your mom and I will always come get you, no matter where you're stranded."
The rest of the details came out of Kyle, reassuring noises from the other end of the line keeping him going.
"I'm proud of you, son. Standing up for yourself to your friends takes guts, it's even hard for me sometimes," Tyler Gibney said as Kyle wound down from his story. There was no judgment, just quiet acceptance. "Your mom's got her jacket, so sit tight, we're on our way. How about we go get some ribs on the way home?"
"You're..." Kyle asked. "You'll always come get me?" The question was hesitant, disbelieving. "You'd get me from anywhere? New York, maybe?"
"Always. We're your parents, that's our job. Come on home, worrying about you'll be the death of your mom. You don't want that, right?"
And abruptly, Kyle was no longer standing at the payphone, he was in the backyard, his mom calling out from the back porch that lunch was ready.
***
Kyle, somehow both slender and young in jeans and a Montana Magic Hockey jersey, and tall and muscled, in his black X-Men leathers growled out something profane. Had he been twelve, he would have found himself grounded, his mother's voice breaking shrill as she scolded his language.
The scolding never came. His mother's voice never called out all his names. He could still hear her, asking him to come in for lunch, that she'd made BLTs, that his dad wanted his help with the shed door.
The itch in his eyes grew worse, the sting of tears that refused to spill over. "No, just.. .fucking no. It's not real. Mom's dead, Yvette's dead, Laurie's gone. None of that is my fucking fault."
The baseball glove in his hand was cold and hot at the same time, the leather shifting brown to green to brown to green again. Kyle brought it down on his knee, and it did not break. He spat, and pulled at the mask with both hands, clawed fingers through the eyeholes "You know what, choices have fucking conseuquences, but I didn't kill my mom."
And it cracked, long glowing lines down the middle, and then broke into sharp pieces that sliced Kyle's fingers bloody
As Kyle plunked the mask from the flames, a voice resonated in his head; insidious and penetrating. "A new future can be yours."
"Can it though? I mean." Kyle thought, snorting out loud. "Look, creepy voice, or Olivier, or whatever, it kinda can't, because to do that we'd have to erase, you know, my entire past."
"The past is just a tale already told. What if we simply tell it again, differently." The heavy black basalt walls disappeared around Kyle, replaced by a green lawn. Around him appeared a neighborhood which could have been anywhere. A street full of similar houses and lawns, driveways with sensible minivans and SVUs, and a gnawing sense that he belonged here. Kyle stumbled as he took a step, toes catching on the slightly uneven sidewalk. He stopped dead still, and reached down to touch the concrete. It was warm and rough, a little damp from the sprinklers. Tiny pieces of grass clung to his fingers as he stood back up. "It doesn't work like that." He said under his breath, shaking his head. "It doesn't."
His arm shot out to deflect a kicked soccer ball, and it bounced to a stop a few feet away. It was followed by a dark-haired kid in t-shirt and shorts, calling. "Sorry Mister G!" as he chased past the ball. "It's not practice, I don't get laps if it's not practice!" and then the kid was gone, through a fence into one of the back yards.
"Kyle, can you please get in here? The twins are... being the twins. Your wife going to jail for a double homicide is in the cards!" A voice called from his front door, both new and also familiar. "I know you're smoking... something for later, but they are being terrors right now."
Brisket. It was brisket. Kyle's attention snapped to the door, and he knew, he was smoking brisket and he had eight pounds of it and he'd been up since six with a brisket in the smoker that he and his dad had built. He shook the grass off his fingers, and headed for the door. It swung open at his touch onto a little tiled entryway littered with soccer cleats and sandals and sneakers, two little backpacks on low hooks and his own messenger bag a span higher. "Gimme a sec, I got muddy feet!" Of course he did, he'd been mowing the lawn, and messing with the smoker, and having deep contemplative thoughts about getting one of those power washers to get the grime off the driveway.
He kicked muddy sandals off onto the front stoop. "Hey, you two are risking losing screen time!" He called, listening to the sounds of high pitched giggling and shrieking as two sets of feet ran over head. "Don't make me change the wifi password!"
"I love you and the children. But I might have to kill all of them. Just warning you." His wife said, coming around the kitchen island. "I don't know what their problem is today."
"Don't bury them in the back yard. I just got the HOA to get off my..." A pause. "Body part ima not name because of little ears." He brushed a quick kiss over his wife's hair, coppery in the light streaming through the kitchen windows.
"I got 'em. Go make sangria or something, I'll chase them around the yard. It's spring break, they're gonna have a case of the zoomies." He glanced at the ceiling, and considered the sudden quiet suspiciously and moved quickly towards the stairs. "You shoulda seen my Junior Lit classes yesterday. Oh my god."
"Savages. I told you, we could have moved to Amsterdam, opened up a sex shop, and spent the next twenty years high on good hash and coffee. But no... you wanted kids." She said, crossing her arms over her breasts. "I'm doing the PTA meeting with those terrible Karens tomorrow, so you need to figure out dinner that involves a vegetable for them."
"Hash doesn't do anything for... me?" Kyle started, and then shook himself. Of course it did, he'd been spectacularly high in college dozens of times. "Hey, you were right there when we made those kids, and I didn't hear any complaints." He went up the stairs, two at a time, and peeked his head around the corner at two giggling faces. "Hey, we talked about this, guys. I do yard work, you guys don't give your mom hell. No annoying sounds." Kyle's 'Gru" voice was spectacularly on point, probably from having watched those movies four hundred times over the summer. "No painting the cat, no asking her the same question fifteen times, no screaming."
"We didn't paint the cat!" One little voice called out. "We just want snacks."
"Yeah, snacks! We have the metabolisms!"
Kyle groaned. "Guys. You are eight. You do not have mutant metabolisms. Do you even... " He paused. "You know what, no, don't answer that. We're going to the park before your mom turns you into wine racks or donates you to a city college or something." He sighed. "Come on, shoes and ... pants. You both need pants, jesus christ. Real pants, not pajamas." He leaned against the door and sighed, and then picked up his head, shaking it wildly. "Wait. I don't... this isn't right."
There was a crack, and Kyle looked down at his bleeding fist, watching as the skin healed over. "Kay, not a weird coma dream, so." He went still, and the twins were gone, echoes of giggles from a pop-up tent fading. "Yeah, no, look, not fucking likely."
***
Los Angeles International Airport was not growing on Kyle at all. This was his fourth or fifth time in the airport and it was still too bright and too loud and too hot and too dry and the entire airport felt oddly artificial. He'd learned to pack sunglasses, and a good set of headphones with noise canceling.
He still wanted to wrap his face inside his hoodie and go sit somewhere in the dark until his face stopped hurting, or until he got used to the bright sun of California, and the endless dry air. Two vacations, two interviews and now this trip and he still wasn't used to it.
He dropped his duffle bag at his feet, tapped out a text, and then leaned up against a column to wait for luggage. All his luggage.
"ohmygodKYLE" was the only warning before a small brown blur cannonballed into Kyle's side, one arm wrapping around his waist while the crinkle of plastic came from between their bodies. "I got you flowers!" Doreen Green's head was buried somewhere around Kyle's clavicle, and she showed no signs of letting go any time soon. "I'm so happy you're here," she said brightly, continuing to hug him.
Maybe it was the attack pounce, or the unexpected tail wrapping around one leg, but Kyle blinked in shock several times before wrapping both arms around Dori. "I think flowers maybe are getting squished, Dor." He said, finally. It took another minute of hugging before Dori pulled away just enough to pull the sunflowers out with an awkward grin. "No I totally love them. They're awesome. I was just about to text you that I could get like, Uber if you were running late or something."
Doreen shook her head. "Nope, I was always gonna be here to pick up -my man-," she emphasized the last two words by framing Kyle with her arms in a very 'look at how awesome he is' way. "Set like five alarms for myself, but LAX is super big, so it took a little bit to spot you."
"My man?" Kyle mouthed silently. God, he was tired of traveling already. "LAX is the worst, I am super glad to be done with it." He couldn't even remember how many times he'd been through the airport anymore. Too many. Way too many. He was over it. "I've got like five days before I have to go meet the graduate advisor, so what's on the agenda besides unpacking?"
"You mean we can't just stay in bed for five days?" Dori sighed at the look Kyle gave her. "It was worth a shot." She straightened up while still staying close to Kyle, "Once we get you unpacked, I've got a list of restaurants near campus that we can check out, see what's best for your metabolism and stuff. Then I was thinking maybe we could go to Santa Monica, and you can see where skateboarding got its start. Maybe even give surfing a try."
"You made a list?" Kyle tilted his head slightly. "That's... organized." Maybe grad school had finally gotten Doreen Green to make a to do list. Stranger things had happened. He shrugged to himself, picked up the duffle and dumped it on the luggage cart that Dori had also seemingly gotten. The rest of his luggage - two suitcases, and another duffle bag came around the carousel after a few more minutes, and he loaded them onto the cart too. "I just need to wait for... " He paused. "Shamu... hold on. Dor, did I tell you how I was bringing over my cat?"
Doreen cocked her head. "Bringing? Shamu's already at the apartment, silly. Remember, we decided to give him and Monkey Joe extra time to get used to living together?" Her hand smoothed low over Kyle's abs. "C'mon, what are you waiting for?"
"I did what?" Kyle blinked a few times. "How the hell did he get to your place?" He shook his head. "Man, all this travel must have knocked a few screws loose. Look, once we're in the car I think ima call Doc Grey because Dor, I legit don't remember sending Shamu out early."
Dori's face went still for a second. "Well, I have to call her too, so." She giggled. "Um. I was going to surprise you but, uh." Her hand moved from Kyle's stomach to her own. "I kinda missed my period. The school has really good daycare. I looked already, if you're working as a TA, then you get the on site daycare."
Kyle took a step back, and then another. "Uh. Uh. No. We use condoms. You're on the ... hold the fucking phone." He looked back up, and Terry Cassidy was standing in Dori's place. She took a step forward, and put one hand on his cheek. "We'll make it work, love. I can do my Underground work and event planning from the Keep, and you can teach remotely."
"I just said no. No. No, you were Doreen Green a second ago, this was LAX, not.." He looked around. "Not Dublin fucking International Airport, and Terry and I talked. No kids anytime soon." Terry's face went red, and she opened her mouth to scream - and it was gone in a haze of exhaust and blaring car alarm.
***
The car was bright red, a characteristic spoiler in the rear, wide sport muffler, slightly tinted windows. "That's a 911 GT2, this year's model," one of the group of boys gathered around it said. "483 horsepower, it'll do zero to sixty in under 4 seconds." Everyone leaned in far too close, gazing admiringly at the clean lines of the vehicle. An elbow hit the youngest, scrawniest member of the gaggle of teenage bravos. "Time to put up or shut up, Gibney. Let's see what you got."
"Uh." Kyle looked at the t-shirt wrapped around his fist, and at the car. It was a lot harder close up to remember that his Granddad had shown him how to start the old station wagon without the keys. That safety glass wouldn't cut up his hand. "This isn't like... " He looked around. "This is a lot more..."
This wasn't popping the lock on their PE coach to put eggs in his glove box. This wasn't moving the school's old beat up maintenance trucks around. This wasn't boosting a golf cart.
"What, you telling me you were shitting us when you said you could hotwire a car?" another youth called derisively. "What are you, a -pussy-?" A loud chorus of hoots greeted that verbal jab, blending into shouts of 'come on' and 'I dare ya' and repetitions of the go-to insult of teenage boys.
"I can totally hotwire a car." Kyle muttered. "I hotwired the golf cart." But this was a car. This was a real car, that probably cost so much money.
And it was red
and what if they got pulled over
and what if he got ratted out - he couldn't even drive
"Guys I dunno."
"You 'dunno'?" The word was full of sarcasm and taunting from the ringleader who had first dared Kyle to do it. "What don't you know, Gibney? Huh?" A two-handed shove to the chest sent Kyle stumbling backward. "You don't know shit. Man up."
"You know what? Fuck off." The word squeaked out of Kyle's mouth. "Fuck right off. Fuck you, and fuck... fuck your mom." He stammered out the insult and backed away. "Golf carts are funny, this isn't... this isn't a good idea. This is like. " The car was so expensive. Grand Theft Auto, like the game he wasn't supposed to play at friend's houses said. "I'm outta here. Get your stupid self arrested on your own."
"No, fuck -you-!" The insults and catcalls followed Kyle as he walked away into the early evening. Just as Kyle was starting to wonder how he was going to get home, he rounded the corner to see a pay phone almost spotlit by an overhead street light.
He could walk. He'd blow his curfew and get grounded - but it wouldn't be the same grounded as if he called for a ride home and told his parents what happened. He glanced back, just for a second and caught the flash of red and blue lights out of the corner of his eye. Two police cars coming around the block, and another pulling into the parking lot of the convenience store that hosted the payphone.
He picked up the phone. He dialed - the memorized digits of one of the collect call numbers that would let him leave a message, and the phone rang twice.
"Gibney Residence." That was his dad's voice.
Kyle almost dropped the phone. "Dad? How'd you... Dad, can I get a ride home? Some.. stuff .. happened."
"You wanna talk about it?" came the question after the halting confession. "Your mom's already getting her shoes and the keys to the minivan."
"Mom's coming too?" Kyle didn't understand why his voice broke - why a sense of abrupt and painful grief welled up. "Uh. I just. I almost did something dumb, and I didn't do it but I kinda got stranded."
Kyle's dad's chuckle was gravelly but kind. "Well 'almost' isn't 'did', and your mom and I will always come get you, no matter where you're stranded."
The rest of the details came out of Kyle, reassuring noises from the other end of the line keeping him going.
"I'm proud of you, son. Standing up for yourself to your friends takes guts, it's even hard for me sometimes," Tyler Gibney said as Kyle wound down from his story. There was no judgment, just quiet acceptance. "Your mom's got her jacket, so sit tight, we're on our way. How about we go get some ribs on the way home?"
"You're..." Kyle asked. "You'll always come get me?" The question was hesitant, disbelieving. "You'd get me from anywhere? New York, maybe?"
"Always. We're your parents, that's our job. Come on home, worrying about you'll be the death of your mom. You don't want that, right?"
And abruptly, Kyle was no longer standing at the payphone, he was in the backyard, his mom calling out from the back porch that lunch was ready.
***
Kyle, somehow both slender and young in jeans and a Montana Magic Hockey jersey, and tall and muscled, in his black X-Men leathers growled out something profane. Had he been twelve, he would have found himself grounded, his mother's voice breaking shrill as she scolded his language.
The scolding never came. His mother's voice never called out all his names. He could still hear her, asking him to come in for lunch, that she'd made BLTs, that his dad wanted his help with the shed door.
The itch in his eyes grew worse, the sting of tears that refused to spill over. "No, just.. .fucking no. It's not real. Mom's dead, Yvette's dead, Laurie's gone. None of that is my fucking fault."
The baseball glove in his hand was cold and hot at the same time, the leather shifting brown to green to brown to green again. Kyle brought it down on his knee, and it did not break. He spat, and pulled at the mask with both hands, clawed fingers through the eyeholes "You know what, choices have fucking conseuquences, but I didn't kill my mom."
And it cracked, long glowing lines down the middle, and then broke into sharp pieces that sliced Kyle's fingers bloody
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Date: 2022-01-22 02:47 am (UTC)