Page 41 of The Writer
CHAPTER FORTY-ONE
DECLAN REMOVES THE BATTERY and SIM card from his phone. Satisfied it can no longer be traced, he slips the various pieces into his pocket.
He spent the day on a bench in Central Park with a clear view of the Beresford building across Central Park West. He watched the joggers and the mothers, fathers, and various nannies pushing strollers. He watched the groundskeepers come and go like little elves, trimming trees and flowers, mowing, edging, making bits of litter disappear. He wondered how many times Ruben “Lucky” Lucero had walked by this very bench. That fucker—he wasn’t so lucky anymore. And he wondered how many times Maggie Marshall had walked past here, how many times she had safely crossed the park until that one day she didn’t.
Daniels has been holding back information.
No shit.
Daniels.
And Roy Harrison.
And Cordova too, for that matter.
They’re all holding pieces of the truth, but not one of them is willing to step up. Nope. They’d rather throw him under the bus.
Ain’t that how it’s always been, boy? You and me, we’re nothing but garbage to them. Something to be left on the curb and forgotten.
“Fuck you, Pop,” Declan mutters softly. “Don’t you ever compare me to you.”
You think we’re different? We ain’t no different. Work hard. Do what’s right. Get shit on. Work harder. Get shit on again. It’s all good if you keep your mouth shut and do what you’re told, but the second you try to get up, a thousand boots are on your back putting you in your place. That Lucero fella was a twisted fuck; he got what he had coming. You saw him about to get off, you felt those boots on your back, you didn’t let them hold you down. Nope. Not my boy. You shook them off. You put that dog down. You ask me, he got off easy. In my day we woulda tied him behind a car and dragged his ass around the neighborhood until all his nastiness was nothing but a stain on the pavement. But you got him your way—ain’t nothing wrong with that. Maybe a little weak in execution, but you still got him. Good for you.
Declan looks down at his hands. His fists are clenched so tight, his nails are digging into his palms. Rather than release them, he squeezes tighter, hoping the pain will shut down his father’s voice. It does not.
You ask me, the way you took me out showed more balls. Hell, to pull that off? At seven? Goddamn, boy. That’s when I knew I raised you right. I raised you strong.
“You beat the hell out of me.”
I made you a man! I was thirteen before I stood up to my old man. You were seven! Fifty pounds soaking wet. Maybe that’s why I wasn’t ready for it. Didn’t see you coming. Another four or five years, hell yeah, I’d be watching, but not when you were seven. No way. I didn’t figure it out until the moment I slipped off that girder. I was in the air, on my way to the pavement, and that’s when it hit me. What was it you put in my coffee? Rat poison? Strychnine? No, that’s not right. They would have caught that. What was it again?
“Benadryl.”
Yeah, the same shit your mama slipped you when she couldn’t get you to sleep. Benadryl. I felt nothing. Not a damn thing. Not at first. Up on that building. Walking around. Doing what needed doing. I was maybe an hour into my shift, two-thirds through that thermos of coffee, when the Benadryl kicked in. Not in a bad way; more a warm-blanket kinda way, like slipping-into-a-nice-tub-of-water kinda way. I shoulda known something was wrong, but that’s the beauty of a drug like that. It dulls all the senses, numbs you. There’s no anxiety, worry, or fear—all the things that’d kept me alive on those girders day after god-awful day slowly dimmed. Dimmed so slow, I didn’t notice them go. And with them went my coordination, my balance… when I took that last step, when I realized my foot had missed the edge of the girder and I tumbled, even then, there was no fear. I suppose that ain’t what you want to hear, is it, boy? I’m guessing you want to believe I went out in a bad way, but it just wasn’t like that. You know what my last thought was? What went through my head when I realized what you’d done? It was pride. It was pride in my boy. I knew in those last few seconds you’d get through the shit of this world just fine. I knew I’d put that in you. My boy, who don’t let nobody push him around. Not even me.
Declan unclenches his fists, studies the red marks on his palms, then squeezes them again. Tighter. As tight as he can. He wants the pain. He needs it. All those broken bones. The cuts. The bruises. He needs to remember every ounce of pain his father inflicted on him.
Without me, think you could do the things you do? Think you’d have it in you? Not a chance. I made you.
“Yeah, well, Pop, you’re gonna love what comes next.”
Declan stands, stretches, feels the blood course through every inch of his body. He exits the park and crosses the street, heading for the Beresford building, the night thick all around him. He’s never felt so alive.