Page 92 of Thirsty

If someone can be flawed, and be saved by love, they can also become a hollowed-out shell of a person when that love is gone. Right?

He went downstairs without brushing his teeth and poured some cereal into a bowl, then sat next to his dad, who was reading the paper. He glanced at Charlie’s bowl as he started eating. “Don’t you want milk?”

Charlie shook his head.

Sounding testy, his dad asked, “What are your plans for the day?”

He didn’t answer. His dad sighed and put his paper down. “Charles,” he said. “Do I need to be concerned?”

“Why?”

“Are you...”

Charlie looked at him when he trailed off. To his surprise, his dad actually seemed concerned. “Do you want to talk about...anything?”

He scoffed. “No.”

“Well, you can’t stay here forever.”

“Why?” he shot back. “You’re gonna kick me out for my own good? I have money. I’m just here because...”

His dad raised a bushy eyebrow. “Because...?”

He said nothing. His dad didn’t push, and for a while he thought that was the end of it.

After a moment, though, his dad said quietly, “Are you sorry?”

Charlie scraped his spoon against his bowl, taking small, precise bites, keeping his mouth full.

“Did you tell him that?” his dad added.

“Dad,” he snapped, pushing away from the table, “I don’t want to—”

“Fine, okay!” he said, holding his hands up in surrender.

They ate in silence for another moment. “It was a beautiful column,” he said. “The one about—the one about him.”

Charlie shook his head roughly, willing himself to be okay. “I don’t care.”

“You should.”

“I hurt him,” Charlie said. “I betrayed him.”

“Yes, you did,” his dad said, nodding slowly. “But your work was excellent.”

Charlie’s chair scraped as he stood up. “I don’t care,” he spat. “Do you understand? It wasn’t worth it.”

“I understand more than you,” his dad said, looking up at him with cold sincerity, “because I know that you do care. That’s why you did it. And I understand that.” He shook his head, his lips thinning. “I know what it’s like to...to not let anything stop you. To be...consumed by it.”

Across the kitchen, almost entirely in shadow, Charlie spotted a painting his mom had made. They’d done one of those guided art classes together years ago, before she got sick. They’d all been supposed to paint the same sunset scene, but Mom had ignored the directions and tried to paint Patrick fromSponge-Bob, because Charlie had loved him as a kid and she never let him forget it. It was more an impressionistic red smear than a recognizable starfish, but he loved the painting. He was surprised his dad still had it.

He sat back down slowly. “I know you do, Dad,” he said. “I know.”

His dad reached over and took his hand, and they sat like that for a while, in the quiet, empty house.

Eventually, his dad said, “You should say you’re sorry. Just tell him again. It’ll get through.”

Charlie swallowed back everything bleak and wrong he wanted to say back, and just said, “Thanks.”