Page 5 of String Boys

He’d smiled in all of Seth’s baby pictures.

But once Kesha Arnold passed away in a car wreck, all smiles stopped.

“Where were you?”

“There was a school assembly. I went with the neighbors. They walked me home.”

Craig nodded. “Get ready for bed,” he said gruffly, and Seth gave a sigh of relief. Not tonight, maybe.

He was pulling on his pajamas—they were tight, showing his wrists and ankles, but that was the only size he had—when he heard his father’s heavy tread down the hall.

“What kind of school assembly?”

“Christmas,” Seth said and then wished he’d lied. Their apartment was painfully bare. None of his projects on the wall. He kept them all in a folder under his bed. No family pictures—no pictures, period.

And no tree, no lights, no decorations.

“Christmas?” Craig scowled. “Since fuckingwhen?”

“It’s next week. There were people singing and a band and….” He swallowed. “Violins.”

“Aw, man.”

Seth’s heart dropped for a moment.

“Pretty? Was it pretty?”

“Yeah.”

“Sorry about Christmas,” Craig slurred. He must have had another swallow or two while Seth was dressing. “This was a good thing?”

“It was pretty,” Seth told him. “Fun.”

Seth could hear his father’s uneven temper spike. “Like I’m not?”

“I was part of it.” He hadn’t wanted to tell him, but… but Craig was hisfather.Once upon a time, he’d smiled at Seth. He’d held him gently. This—this hadn’t happened overnight. They’d moved to Sacramento, and they’d been all alone.

“You didn’t think I’d want to go?”

“I didn’t want to bother you,” Seth said, hating where this seemed to be going. It had only happened once before, but it was enough to make him walk on eggshells.

“You fucking embarrassed of me?”

A spark of anger shot up Seth’s spine. “I thought you’d be too busy at the bar,” he replied baldly, retreating to the corner of his room.

He made it two steps before his father’s heavy hand caught him across the face. Then another blow hit across his chest, and he went flying into the coffee table, catching it painfully across the thighs.

It hurt, but he tuned out the pain. He was good at that. It was like tuning out the lack of a Christmas tree or the way his once smiling father had become this terrible alien, a thing to be afraid of. In his head, he heard the lone, pure note of the violin.

He finally dragged himself to bed, where he pulled the covers over his head to hide from his father’s broken sobbing.

“I’m sorry… I’m sorry… I’m sorry….”

Now Seth cried. He’d been sorry the last time. Sorry enough to quit drinking for a week, to be home on time, to try to make up for the bruise on Seth’s face.

But was there a way to be sorry enough to make that stick?

Daddies