Poor Man's Son - 9. Chapter 8

July 12, 2000

Dallas, TX

Will

As soon as we were in the limo, I pulled out my cell phone to call John.

“Who are you calling?” Dad asked.

“John.”

“I’d like to spend a couple of hours with you when we get to Escorial,” he said firmly. “If you want to hang out with John after that, that’s fine.”

This was the conversation I’d described to Robbie, the one I’d have to have with him. There was nothing to be gained by being a dick about it. “No problem.” He smiled at that, at not having me argue with him. It seemed like that’s all we’d been doing lately: arguing.

I dialed John anyway and told him I was in Paly. It was so cool to hear how excited he was about that, and he promised to come up and spend the night at Escorial with me. My sex life was definitely looking up. I’d gotten to fuck around with Gathan yesterday, and now I’d get to mess around with John until they decided to drag me back to Malibu.

We drove up to the familiar house, although ‘familiar’ was a bad way to describe Escorial. Escorial was massively huge, a relic from the past, having been built almost a century ago. It had been renovated, expanded, and modified over the years, but it retained it’s same basic structure. This veritable palace was on 20 acres of land, boasted stables and an indoor pool, and it belonged to my grandfather, JP Crampton.

We got out of the car and headed inside, where JP (my brothers and I called him ‘Grand’) was waiting with Grandmaman to welcome us. Frank, Robbie’s dad, was there too, since he was my Grandmaman’s partner.

Stef was first through the door. He went up and gave JP a very passionate kiss. “Did you miss me?”

“I always miss you when you’re gone,” JP said. They had one of those amazing relationships, built on a love that had weathered time and constant challenges and had ended up stronger as a result. “We have a surprise for you.”

“Indeed?” Stef asked.

“We have a new houseguest. Tiffany has opted to come stay with us.”

“Tiffany is staying with you?” Dad asked.

“She is,” JP said. “Matt and Wade asked if she could stay here, and of course we said yes.”

I guess that made sense, that since she was having their baby they’d want to make sure she was taken care of. “Where is she?” I asked.

“In her room, the room next to Wade’s,” JP said.

“Meet me here in half an hour,” my dad called after me as I strode off deliberately to see her.

I glanced at my watch to acknowledge him, and then waited until I was out of sight of Grandmaman before I ran to Tiffany’s room. Running in Escorial was strictly prohibited. I knocked and heard her say “Come in” in her bitchy voice.

“Hey,” I said as I walked into her room. “I heard you were here. It’s good to see you.”

It was so cool to see her smile when she saw me. “Well hello, Will. It’s good to see you too. You come up here just to cheer me up?”

“Like I’d waste my time,” I joked.

“Probably would be,” she said sadly.

“You OK?”

“I’m trying to be. It’s tough to realize the person you love doesn’t love you back.”

“I’m learning that sometimes it’s a good idea to give out second chances,” I told her. I was happy to see that she actually listened to me.

“I’m surprised to see you here.”

“You mean because we’re all supposed to be on lockdown?” I asked, unable to hide my bitterness. “I rebelled.”

“There’s a surprise,” she said, laughing.

“Does Mom know you’re here?” I asked.

“I called her to let her know,” Tiffany said defensively.

“That was nice of you,” I said honestly. “It pisses me off though. That’s why she wouldn’t let me come up here.”

“Well it all worked out better this way, didn’t it? Otherwise you wouldn’t have been there to go to Dallas.”

“That’s not the point,” I said.

“No, it’s not. The reason she wants you around is because she feels very lonely and needs support. When you decided to leave, she was rejected all over again.”

“That’s bullshit. I’m not the reason she’s feeling rejected, and you know what? If she’d asked me to stay there, told me why, I’d have done it in a heartbeat, especially if she’d have let John stay too. Instead, she’s a total bitch about it. So I don’t feel bad about leaving her there, and if she’s feeling rejected, it’s because she is, and she has no one to blame but herself. If you’re nice to people, they’re more likely to spend time with you.”

Tiffany eyed me as my anger, which had been considerable when I’d rambled out that statement, began to fade. She changed the subject. “How’s Gathan?”

“He seems fine. He’s a hero now,” I said with raised eyebrows.

“So your boyfriend is a hero,” she mused.

“He’s not my boyfriend. I just like to have sex with him,” I said to freak her out. She knew me too well, though, so it didn’t work.

“That’s right. There’s another guy who’s claiming to be your man.”

“Everybody wants me,” I joked.

“You talk to John yet?”

I almost frowned at her, but didn’t, since that’s what she was looking for. Instead, I pretended to be all nonchalant. “Yep. He’s coming up here to stay while I’m in town.”

I heard footsteps and turned to see Matt and Wade walk in. “Hey!” Matt said enthusiastically, and gave me a big hug. “Great to see you!” Matt was a lot like my dad, only more volatile. He was a blast to be around.

“Hey little brother,” Wade said, and gave me a much more reserved hug, but that didn’t matter, because anything I got from Wade was amplified. If I had a guy I worshipped besides my dad, it would be Wade. He was like a younger version of Grand. He was handsome but refined, and intense but still easy to be around. He always called me ‘little brother’, and to me it was one major compliment.

“Hey Wade,” I said.

“You gonna hang out with us?”

“I have to have a conversation with my dad,” I said, rolling my eyes as I looked at my watch. “He has to explain to me how it’s alright for him to pry into every aspect of my life, and I have to tell him to mind his own fucking business.” That made all three of them laugh.

“Good luck with that,” Tiffany said. I went back up to the entry hall to find my dad waiting for me.

“I thought we’d go for a drive,” he said.

“Fine with me,” I replied in a friendly but distant manner.

We hopped in the Ferrari Robbie had bought him last fall to try and suck up to him, and headed toward Highway 280. “I don’t get to drive this car enough.”

“Pop has one just like it at home. You can borrow his,” I said logically, irritating him. We got to I-280 and he headed north. “Where are we going?”

“The City,” he said simply. The top was down and the weather was beautiful as we screamed up the freeway. It was easy to just be in a good mood and forget this big conversation we had to have, except it just sat there like a big elephant in the room, or the car, in this case. “Robbie and I drove this same way when we were fleeing from his mother,” he told me as he reminisced.

“I didn’t know this freeway was that old,” I said, flashing him a big smile to show I was joking.

“Asshole,” he said playfully, and then he got real serious. “I’m sorry.”

“For what?”

“For digging so hard into your personal life. I think I have the right to do that if I’m worried about you, though.”

“But you weren’t worried about me this time?” I asked, stunned that he got it.

“Well, I was worried about you, but that wasn’t it. It just really bothered me that you wouldn’t tell me about John. Here’s the deal Will. You want to have a relationship with John, I have no problem with that. He’s a great kid, and I love him. But what you can’t do is let that get in the way of family relationships.”

“How is this getting in the way of family relationships?” I asked curiously, if not just a little irritated.

“Claire and I are really close, we always have been. When my son and her son have a spat, it creates tension between us, even though we try to make sure it doesn’t. I’m asking you to take that into consideration.”

“I didn’t think about that,” I told him. “I’m sorry.”

He reached over and held my hand and squeezed it, and I squeezed back. I suddenly realized I’d been fighting and arguing with this man who I loved more than anything, and who always was and always would be 100% in my corner. I had to open my eyes wide to let the wind dry the tears before they fell from my eyes. “Did you know we were together before this?”

“No, I just figured you guys were friends,” he said. “Can’t blame you though. You have excellent taste in men.”

“Even with Gathan?” I teased.

“I will tell you what I told him. I think you have good judgment, and you can make the right decisions about your boundaries with him. It’s pretty obvious, though, that he has some issues. I’m just asking you to be careful.”

“I know he has issues. He’s gone out of his way to treat me well, and to treat me with respect. And he told me what his issues were, so I’m walking into things with my eyes open.”

“Did you sleep with him?” he asked, then seemed to realize that he’d moved beyond the boundary he’d just set for himself. “Sorry.”

I laughed. “You can ask, you just can’t get pissed if I don’t answer.” He chuckled with me. “We messed around, that’s it. I haven’t had, uh, actual sex with anyone yet.”

“I didn’t have sex with someone until I was 17,” he said.

“Was Robbie the first guy you were with?”

“No, it was this guy named Jake,” he said bitterly. “It started off so good, and then he turned into this total slut and it ruined everything.” I could see how much this bothered him even now. We got to the City, stopped at a coffee shop in Ghirardelli Square and got a kick ass table where we could stare at the idiotic tourists. Then he told me all about how he met Robbie, and how Jake had fucked Sam, who was basically his step-dad. “You know, when I look back on it, and I think about having sex with Jake, it bothers me because if I’d have just waited a little longer, I could have done that with Robbie. He could have been the one.”

I stared at him, completely thunderstruck by what he’d said. This is what happened to John. This is what John was thinking right now, what he was going through. He’d carry this burden with him forever. He’d be just like my dad, years from now, talking about Zach and what a tool he’d been for fucking Zach, for giving Zach his cherry. He’d suffer enough on his own; there was no need for me to pile on any more. If anything, I felt sorry for him. “Wow,” I said almost involuntarily.

“What?” he asked.

“I’ve been upset because John fucked Zach,” I told him. I watched that blow out any number of circuits in the part of his brain where his pre-conceived ideas lived.

“Were you and John a couple?”

“I love him, Dad,” I said honestly. “I really love him.” It was cool to see him smile at me, happy that I’d found someone to love. “We’d made a pledge to be each other’s first,” I told him. “Zach hit on me but I said no, because I’d made that pledge. I even told Zach that I had that commitment with John. So Zach went after John and must have caught him at a weak moment. I walked in to find John drilling him.”

“No wonder you were so upset,” he said. That made me feel so validated, that he seemed to think it was reasonable that I’d freak out about this, and it made me wonder yet again why I didn’t talk to him in the first place. “So you guys worked things out?”

“Yeah. I think I just needed to be mad at him for a while, to let him know how much he hurt me. What really pissed me off the most was that he didn’t even say he was sorry.”

He nodded sagely. “That’s where I was with Robbie last year. It’s hard to forgive someone who hasn’t said they’re sorry.” He took a drink of his coffee. “But he finally did? Say he was sorry?”

I nodded. “When I got back home I went onto our special room on the web and he told me Aunt Claire was coming to LA. I asked him to come spend the day with me, and he did. That’s when he apologized.”

“So you worked things out?”

“We were trying to, until Mom turned into a total bitch from hell,” I snapped. I watched him recoil at that, because he wanted to be loyal to my mom. “We’d just gotten all this worked out, and I wanted to spend some time with him, and she decides all of a sudden that he can’t stay with us and I can’t leave.”

“This is a tough time for her, Will.”

“Dad, I totally understand that, but this has been a tough time for me too. It’s hard to think about helping her out when she just kicks me.”

“You still have to treat her with respect,” he said firmly.

“No, Dad, that’s wrong. Respect is a two way street. She can’t treat me like I’m two, and rain all over my life, then pull out the respect card.” I saw him trying to think of a rebuttal to that one, but there wasn’t one. “When I walked in and figured out that Cody may be my future sister’s father, she jumped in and ordered me not to say anything. Since I figured things out on my own, she had no right to make that demand, so I told her no. Then Robbie turned around and asked me nicely. Did I say anything to you before he talked to you?”

“No.”

“See. He treated me with respect, and I treated him with respect. It’s not like I’m a bad kid. I don’t know why she doesn’t like me.”

“I don’t think she sees it that way.”

“Then she needs to open her eyes. If she’s going to go all drama on me and mess with my relationships and feelings, it’s going to be really hard for me to feel sorry for her.”

“Your mother didn’t know you were in a relationship with John either, did she?” he asked. I almost chuckled at that, because he was making a point while at the same time he was trying to figure out if I’d only kept it from him.

“I didn’t talk to her about him, but she knew we had issues, didn’t she?”

“I guess she did,” he conceded.

“Then don’t you think when I asked to spend time with him it should have meant something to her?”

“You should be having this conversation with her,” he said.

“I’m having this conversation with you, and if you’re going to be her mouthpiece and blindly support what she does, then you have to answer for her,” I said. My temper was starting to get a little out of control. “I’m not talking to her. All she does is hand down these orders like I’m some mindless flunky. I’m not doing that.” Those last few sentences seemed to help me vent enough to get my temper under control.

“Will, she’s your mother, and you have to listen to her.”

“Not if I don’t live there, I don’t,” I said.

“Where are you planning to live then?” he asked in a tone that said he wasn’t taking me seriously at all.

“Here.”

“Here?”

“Here,” I confirmed. “At Escorial.”

“You want to spend the summer up here?”

“No, I want to move up here and go to school up here. Darius is going away to college so he’ll be gone. JJ is a diva, and while I love him, I get pretty sick of putting up with his “I’m a good skater, so that makes me cool” shit. I mean, I’m a good surfer, but I don’t pull that shit on him.” I rambled on, as if now that I started this cavalcade of words, there was no way I could stop it. “Mom is a total bitch. She’s blaming everyone for her problems except herself, and she’s the one who’s responsible for them. When Tiffany’s not pregnant, she can be pretty fun to be with, but now even she’s gone. That leaves Cody, and even though he’s pretty nice to look at, he’s busy too.”

“What about Pop and me?” he asked. “Don’t we count?”

“Dude, do not give me that emotional blackmail crap,” I said to him firmly. “You and Pop work all the time, and when you’re not working, you’re usually busy on some project. You’re forging an empire, Robbie’s saving Claremont, or you’re trying to keep each other happy so you don’t mess up your relationship like you did in November.” I saw him recoil in shock at how I’d pegged it.

“What about your friends?”

“Most of my friends aren’t going to Malibu anyway. Besides Jason, there aren’t any of them I’m close enough to that I’ll miss. Jason’s going to Harvard-Westlake.”

“You can go to a different school,” he told me. “There’s no reason you can’t go to Harvard-Westlake too if you want to.”

“I want to go to Gunn,” I said firmly. He just stared at me, totally shocked. Gunn was his alma mater.

July 12, 2000

Somewhere over Ohio

Gathan

It was pretty slick to be on Brad’s plane all by myself. It made me feel like a mogul, even if it was a little lonely. I was sitting in Brad’s chair, which was kind of like the captain’s chair on Star Trek. Whoever sat there was in charge. The phone next to me buzzed. I answered it and found myself talking to the pilot. “We’ll be on the ground in ten minutes, Mr. Hayes,” he said.

“Thank you,” I said politely but formally, and then chuckled after I hung up the phone, thinking about how officious I must have sounded. I felt like I wasn’t really myself, like I was someone acting in a role, and it wasn’t just because of the cool pain meds they’d given me. The pilots were treating me really well, probably because I’d saved their boss from getting his brains blown out. Then again, that was pretty arrogant on my part, assuming that the idiot that shot me could have actually hit Brad in the first place.

In the press this morning, they were making a big deal out of it, trying to make me out to be some kind of hero. The whole thing bothered me. I mean, yeah, I was smart enough to read the guy and figure out what he was going to do. And yeah, I wasn’t a pussy; I took the plunge and jumped the guy. Personally, I was kind of disappointed in myself that I couldn’t nail him before he got a shot off. I guess when I saw Homer Stapleton I saw Fred Hayes, and I hadn’t credited Homer with being any smarter than Fred. Fred wouldn’t have gotten the shot off; I’d miscalculated.

And then there’s this whole “hero” thing. They kept talking about how brave I was, like I’d endured some major battle in a war or something. I had a sore arm and I’d have a scar on my left bicep; that was it. It didn’t sound like what heroes do, with the wounds that they end up with. I felt like a fraud, and it was just like I’d been about sex, and so many other things. What you saw on the surface was not what you got when you dug a little deeper.

I was pulled out of my self-deprecating thoughts when the wheels touched down. The pilots said they’d arrange for a car to take me home, so I didn’t even think much about it, I just got my shit together and got ready to leave. I took one last look around the plane, savoring the luxury and the life it represented, when the pilot opened the door. There was a bunch of noise, and the pilot just stood there grinning at me like an idiot. There, on the tarmac, was a pretty good crowd of people and a big banner that said “Welcome Home Gathan!” It was as if I’d been gone for years.

I walked down the stairs and the first people there to greet me were Wally and Clara. “You scare me to death sometimes,” Clara said. “I love you.”

“I love you too, Ma,” I replied.

Wally wasn’t normally all that demonstrative, but he was today. He pulled me into a big hug, or at least as big a hug as he could manage what with my left arm in a sling. “I’m real proud of you,” he said, and coming from him, that was more powerful than saying “I love you”.

“Thanks, Pa,” I said, smiling at him. They had done so much for me, and I loved them as if they were my natural parents, but I had stepped out of their world, and I could tell all of this was beyond their comprehension. Flying in private jets to give speeches to workers, where even the workers were a notch higher on the socio-economic scale than they were, had to just be blowing their minds. And then when I was shot, it wasn’t like in school, when I’d gotten hurt and they could pick me up and take me to the doctor. This time, I was in Dallas, both literally and figuratively out of their reach.

The crowd cheered and I remembered to wave and look happy that they were there. Ella, Darius, and my brothers were here too, all saying the same pabulum things that the others had already said. “We’re proud of you.” “You’re so brave.” Whatever.

Ella gave me a dirty look. “Gathan, quit beating yourself up. You’re not allowed to make yourself miserable today.” That actually made me laugh.

“Alright El. I’ll do my best to enjoy my 15 minutes of fame.”

“Good,” she said.

“Dude, you saved my dad. That rocks,” Darius said, giving me another big hug.

“Yeah, but I think the dude was too stupid to hit him with the gun anyway,” I joked. He shook his head at my modesty, something that he’d never understand.

All these people, this big show, were a bit overwhelming. I didn’t have it figured out until I ran into the next person there: Mayor Schluter. Then it made sense: this was all political. That would have irritated me except I understood how the game was played, and I also understood that this was, in a way, my payback to him. He’d taken a chance on me and given me a job, given me responsibilities way beyond my years, and let me be involved in the revitalization of the city. Now that I thought about it, he’d probably had to really put up with some shit for that. I thought about Mrs. Finch and how condescending she’d been at the picnic. People like her had probably really come down on him for including the son of a felon and a whore in the inner sanctum of city administration. When I turned into a hero, it made him look good. It validated his good judgment, and shut those assholes up, so next time they questioned him, he’d have this to throw in their faces. Somehow, knowing that, and knowing how much I owed this man, made this whole ceremony much more meaningful. I threw myself into it, pushing my charm up a bunch of notches and really playing it as well as I could.

There was a podium for him to make a brief statement. “Gathan Hayes, Claremont proudly welcomes you home,” he said, sparking off more cheering. “Your selfless bravery saved the lives of two of Claremont’s most illustrious benefactors, Brad and Stefan Schluter, and since both of them are my relatives, I must thank you personally as well.” There was more cheering. “I’d like to present this award to you, a resolution from the city council, signed by me, making July 11, 2000 Gathan Hayes Day.” He handed me this framed certificate and shook my hand. Holy Shit. They named a day after me? How cool was that. There was no way I couldn’t get laid in this town tonight. There was more cheering, and then the mike was passed to me.

Like an idiot, I hadn’t figured out that I’d need to talk, but I thought fast. I talked about how I’d grown up in this town, kind of that whole ‘it takes a village’ theme that Hillary Clinton was trying to foist on people. I gave them credit for my ‘bravery’, along with the mayor, who I glowingly raved on about. I babbled on until I got the slightest of nods from the mayor, and then I wrapped it up. “I’d just like to thank Mayor Schluter for giving someone like me a chance to be involved in this city. I love Claremont. It’s my home.” That got really loud cheers, and then I was hustled off toward a limousine.

“Won’t you join us?” the mayor asked Wally and Clara. He was being polite. They would feel out of place and uncomfortable.

“That’s real nice of you, your honor,” Wally said. “But we drove here, so we’ll just take our car home. That way we can take Gathan’s bags home with us. We’ll see you when you get there, Gathan.”

“We’d like to have him over for dinner, if that’s alright with you,” the mayor asked, treating me like I was ten, but now was not the time to be bitchy.

“That’s fine, your honor,” Clara said, smiling broadly. I could see right through her façade and see how nervous all this was making her. I squeezed her shoulder lovingly, trying to reassure her, but I’m not sure how effective it was.

With that, the mayor led me off and ushered me into the limousine. I was surprised to find that he and I were the only two people there. “I’m sorry to spring all this on you without warning,” he said.

“It’s no problem, sir,” I said respectfully. “Thank you for making me feel so special.”

“You are special. I knew it the first time I met you,” he said forcefully. “You have a great future ahead of you, no matter what career you pick. If it’s politics, then someday you’ll understand why we had this ceremony, but I hope you know that for me, it was more than that.”

“Thank you,” I was barely able to say, I was so choked up. “I got what was going on, and I hope it helps out.”

“Times are tough in the city right now. The citizens voted over four months ago for change, and they’re wondering why I haven’t turned this place into paradise yet.” That made both of us laugh.

“Paradise takes time,” I said profoundly.

“It does. I hope you don’t mind having dinner with us. It’s a nice way to show the people you’re special, and it will get Harry off my back.”

I laughed at that, even though it made me a little nervous. Harry followed me around like a dog in heat. He was cute, and a nice guy, but sometimes it was almost like he was a stalker. “Harry’s a good guy. It’s not a problem.” I found that I meant that, because Harry was a good person. I just wasn’t sure I wanted him all that close to me.