Addison Blakely: Confessions of A PK (39 page)

I stepped back, knowing better than to eavesdrop, and waited while leaning against the wall. I hadn’t told Dad I was coming, and since his secretary was off this week, he had no way of knowing I was in the foyer. I contemplated just going home and waiting to talk to Dad when he came home for dinner later. Or even waiting until after dinner. Or maybe right before bedtime.

Technically, I had until 12:01 a.m. before I broke my promise to Marta, and with nerves clenching my stomach and Mrs. Vanderford’s voice bruising my mind, waiting sounded better and better.

I made it exactly four steps outside the carpeted foyer when Dad’s door swung open and the source of voice #2 emerged.

Mr. Keegan.

Oh man. What if he thought I’d been listening in? As he exited, letting the door shut behind him, he kept his eyes trained on the ground. I had about four seconds before he saw me. I looked around. Maybe I could hide.
Three
. Umbrella stand or coatrack?
Two
. My heart stammered.

One
.

Mr. Keegan looked up, catching my gaze. “Addison.” He didn’t sound very surprised to see me, just tired—and stressed. Wrinkles lined his eyebrows, and I swear his hair seemed grayer than it had in weeks past.

I offered a shaky smile. “Hi. I was just, you know—coming to see my dad.”

He nodded, making no move to walk past me. Just stood, arms limp, shoulders low. He held a legal pad under one arm, like he’d been taking notes.

I have no clue why I felt the urge to keep talking. “Not for counseling or anything, you know. Just regular church business. I mean, not church, but personal. Like, father-daughter stuff.” I snapped my mouth shut, wishing I could dive inside the umbrella stand after all.

“Addison, I owe you an apology.” Mr. Keegan ignored my waterfall of words and gestured to the two armchairs in front of the secretary’s vacant desk. He sat down heavily, as if the world weighted upon his shoulders. “Do you mind?”

I perched on the edge of the farthest chair, my mouth dry.

Suddenly I wished I’d heeded my instincts to go home. What in the world did Mr. Keegan have to say to me? And what in the world would I say back? His life was none of my business, especially now that Wes and I were over before we’d even truly begun.

Still, the haunted look in his eyes reminded me of the one in Wes’s, and my anxiety lessened. I took a deep breath. “What’s up?”

“Wes told me you overheard us that day in the hardware store.” Mr. Keegan placed his notepad in his lap, and I glimpsed several Bible verse references scrawled across the pages. “I’ve lived a lie for so long, being one person inside the church and another at home. One parent inside the church, and another at home.” He shook his head. “I can’t keep it up any longer.”

I shifted in my chair, unsure what to say. The heater clicked on, and a rush of air warmed the room, filling the uncomfortable quiet.

“I have a drinking problem. Wes knows that, and I’ve denied it. But it’s true.” Mr. Keegan looked at his lap then at me. “It started when his mother left, at first just a way to ease the pain of the divorce. But then I ran out of excuses and kept drinking anyway.”

Whoa, awkward. I straightened in my chair. “Mr. Keegan, you really don’t have to—”

He held up both hands. “What I’m trying to say, Addison, is that I’ve always admired you—the way you carry yourself and represent your father and this church.” Mr. Keegan shrugged. “When you made the announcement you did last Sunday about your faith, something clicked. I knew I couldn’t keep this up. If you could make such a difficult choice to go down front and announce a change in your life, why couldn’t I do the same? So I’m getting help.” He pointed to Dad’s shut door behind us. “I’m not ready for an official program yet, but I thought counseling could be a first step toward that step, if that makes sense.”

I nodded, though I wasn’t sure. “That’s good.” Man, I sucked at this empathy thing. I hadn’t done a better job with Claire, though that conversation had to be ten times less weird than this one. I’d never had a grown man confess his multiple failures to me before.

“When I asked you to make friends with my son, it was because I knew you could be a good influence on him, maybe urge him toward a path I knew I couldn’t.” Mr. Keegan rubbed one hand over his jaw, looking so much like Wes in that moment my heart hurt. “That boy deserves better than what I can give him. Unfortunately, his mom isn’t doing him any favors, either. I thought when he came to live with me things would be different this time. But they’re not.”

Anger began a slow build in my chest then, at the selfishness of these two people. Grief over a divorce or not, how could two parents turn their back on their hurting son? Sure, Wes was responsible for his own actions and choices, but without a stable home, without a safety net or firm foundation, how did he stand a chance?

I leaned forward, my former nerves gone. “It’s not too late, you know.” I wanted to point out that if things weren’t different this time around, it was because Mr. Keegan wasn’t any different. But I bit my lip to keep the words inside. “You can make things right with Wes now.”

Mr. Keegan shook his head. “Even if that were true, he wouldn’t go for it. He’s done with me.” He stared at a spot over my shoulder, his eyes glazing over with regret. “He said so the other night.”

I swallowed, wishing I had the right words, feeling like I finally had a chance to do something good for Wes, and it was slipping right through my fingers. My fists clenched in an effort to catch the opportunity. “Mr. Keegan, with all due respect, Wes doesn’t know what he wants.”

The words sounded too familiar on my lips as Wes’s husky voice rang in my ears.
“This is what I am. This is what you get, if you still want it.”
I’d turned him down.

Just like his parents.

“I know what I want for him.” Mr. Keegan’s voice jerked me back from the memory and the accompanied knife in my gut. He traced a pattern in the carpet with the toe of his loafer. “I want him to be successful. To be happy. To do something productive with his gift for music.” He laughed, the sound hollow and lonely. “I was pretty shocked to hear he played at the school talent show the other night. That was the first time he played in public since his mom left. Wished I’d been there to hear him.”

“What?” My head snapped up, senses on full alert.

“His mom taught him to play, you know.” Mr. Keegan seemed suddenly lost in thought, his head tilted as he continued to stare at the carpet. “She was a natural, just like him. We nicknamed her Songbird.”

My breath hitched. Songbird. Wes’s tattoo?

Facts seeped through sudden bursts of memories, filling the cracks with truth. It seemed so obvious now. Why hadn’t I seen it before? Wes, playing secretly at Got Beans. Wes, refusing to play onstage for Jessica. Wes, begging me in the foyer during the show to understand.
“This isn’t about image, PK.”
I hadn’t let him finish. Just accused him of awful things and left, pouting because I hadn’t gotten my way.

Yet he still played.

For me.

My stomach twisted as grief wrung me inside out like a rag. “I didn’t realize.” I should have. If I cared as much as I thought I did, I should have seen the signs. The clues. Yet all I’d seen was my own agenda—and the one I thought Wes had.

Wrong on both accounts.

“Well, I’d better get going. Your dad gave me homework.” Mr. Keegan stood, slapping his legal pad against the palm of his hand with a smile. “I’m glad I ran into you.”

His words mirrored Claire’s, and I returned his smile even though confusion and regret still had me drugged. Somehow I was more of a mess than ever before, yet God had used me to reach two very different people. Talk about miracles. “Same here.”

Mr. Keegan lifted his hand in a wave and slipped outside into the hallway. I stared at my father’s door, wishing I could curl up on the carpet in the fetal position and just cry. What was I supposed to do with this new information? I’d always known there was good inside Wes, despite his carefully crafted image of the opposite, had known there was a hurting heart beneath the leather and tattoos. But how could I go to him now after rejecting him twice? Even if he wanted me back, how could I help him as a friend, without crossing the line toward more? Because even if that was what I wanted—and even if that was what
he
still wanted, which was probably a long shot after all the blows to his ego—how could I pursue more than friendship knowing Wes didn’t want anything to do with God?

The door to my father’s office opened, and Dad walked outside. “Addison! I was just heading out for lunch. What are you doing here?”

I stood up, swiped the tears off my cheeks, and asked the only thing that felt even remotely right at the moment.

“Would you pray with me?”

“I can’t believe you’re not harping on me about this cheeseburger,” Dad mumbled around a big bite of juicy beef covered in cheese.

I handed him a napkin with an angelic smile. “That’s because I’ve already decided you’re having salad for dinner.”

He grinned, wiping his mouth before reaching for another french fry. “At least I opted out of the mayonnaise. Kathy made me read a nutrition chart the other day comparing calories and fat grams of condiments, and I had to admit I was a little surprised.”

Since he’d already made such obvious progress, I held my tongue as he reached for the saltshaker, glad Ms. Hawthorne was doing her part as promised. We’d work on him together. For once the thought brought more peace than anguish, but maybe that was just because I’d already been through enough emotional drama for the day.

And it wasn’t over yet.

After his fries were severely salted, Dad looked at me. “I appreciate your telling me what Wes’s father said earlier. I know you have a lot to process right now. But it seems like there’s more on your mind.”

This was it, my blinking neon opportunity to share my fears. If I didn’t take this chance, Marta would kill me. I took a fortifying sip of Coke then set my cup on the table between us. “There is.” I hesitated, searching for the right words, before realizing there really weren’t any. “Someone at church said something sort of—mean—Sunday.”

Dad’s eyebrows rose, but he kept chomping, allowing me the chance to continue.

“She implied that you were embarrassed about my decision. You know, about committing my life to God and all after having grown up in the church.” I drew a deep breath. “That you were ashamed of me.”

Dad choked, snorting and coughing into his napkin.

“I knew I should have taken that saltshaker away from you!” I jumped out of our booth and pounded him on the back, drawing the stares of more than a few fellow patrons.

“I’m okay, I’m okay.” Voice raspy, Dad held up one hand to stop me as he sucked down a long sip of pop. “It’s not the food. I’m just really shocked someone in my congregation said such a thing. Are you sure you didn’t misunderstand?”

“I’m sure.” I didn’t want to name names, didn’t want to put Mrs. Vanderford in a negative light in front of my father, even if she did deserve it. It wasn’t my place. Besides, the point wasn’t the who—it was the
what
. And I had to know if she was right.

Dad lowered his voice as he realized we still had an audience from his near-choking episode. “Is that why you stayed home Sunday night? To avoid this person?”

I nodded slowly. “And you.”

Dad’s expression grayed, and he reached across the table toward me, dragging his sleeve through his puddle of ketchup and not even noticing. “Why, Addison?”

Emotion pricked my throat. “Because I don’t know if she’s right.”

His grip on my hand tightened, and grief filled his gaze. “That’s the craziest thing I’ve ever heard. And trust me, I’ve heard some whoppers.”

I couldn’t help but smile, even as tears threatened my eyes.

“I know we’ve had our struggles and that I haven’t been a perfect parent. The Lord knows I’ve tried.” Dad finally pulled his arm out of the ketchup and began dabbing his sleeve with a napkin. “But if for one minute I’ve ever given you reason to think this woman’s words could be true, I apologize.”

“So you’re … happy?” My voice sounded so little-girl small, but I couldn’t help it. I casually handed him another napkin, as if his next response didn’t matter in the least.

“Am I happy that my daughter made a decision about her faith from her heart? Of course I am.” Dad grinned at me across the table. “I couldn’t have been happier Sunday morning. Probably couldn’t have been more surprised, either, but that’s partly because of your altar-call methods.”

“I was boxed in. And the song was almost over.” I couldn’t help but giggle at the memory, wishing I could have seen my pew vault from my father’s point of view. “And I totally didn’t realize your microphone was still on.”

“That was the sound guy’s fault. He usually turns it off during invitations so any altar prayers won’t be broadcasted.” Dad laughed as he wadded up his trash. “I’ll tell him he owes you a mocha.”

“That works.” I helped Dad load the tray with our wrappings, feeling lighter than I had in weeks. Months. Maybe ever. Who cared what Mrs. Vanderford thought if her negativity was hers alone? Maybe I had embarrassed Dad a little with my methods, as he’d put it, but I’d eventually live down the details of that morning, and the important part—the heart part—would live on. And that was what mattered.