You Had Me At Christmas: A Holiday Anthology(141)

“Roy? You okay?”

“I’m fine. Why are you here?” Roy’s hair used to be red, but now it was beige with silver. His jeans hung off his far-too-thin frame. Guilt gnawed at Dean. He knew the old man had no one looking in on him. He’d chased off anyone who might care. I should have stopped by earlier. Made sure the guy was eating at least.

“Everything all right?” Roy asked.

“That’s what I’m here to ask you.”

“The herd—”

“It’s fine.”

“This storm, we might have some wander—”

“The boys are on it.”

“Then what are you doing here?”

Why am I here? Excellent question.

“I haven’t seen you in about a week.”

“Chest cold. Knocked me out.”

“You can come up with something better than that.”

“And you can get the hell out of my house if you’re gonna call me a liar.”

Roy shuffled out into the hallway. Milton came from the kitchen to meet him, and Roy gave the old dog a scratch on the head. “Anyone feed you yet today?” he asked the old dog. “No? Let’s take care of that.”

Roy was better to that damn dog than he was to any person in his life. Including and especially his daughter.

“It’s Christmas Eve,” Dean said.

“Well, then you must be Santa Claus.”

“That…that doesn’t mean anything to you?” Lowest damn point in your daughter’s life and you’re cracking jokes?

Roy rubbed a hand over his face, his eyes sharpening as they glanced over at Dean.

Yeah, he thought, you know I’m talking about Trina.

“Shouldn’t you be at your parents’ party?” Roy asked.

“I wanted to check on you first.”

“Check on me?” Roy blinked up at him, laughed in his throat. “I don’t need checking up on. Unless you got a case of beer in your truck.”

“No beer.”

“Then go on to your party. Say hi to your father for me. Tell him he can go screw himself, that the land is mine. Will always be mine. And he can sic as many of his lawyers on me as he wants, but I ain’t selling. Not one rock. Not one mineral right. Merry Christmas to him from me.”

Roy shuffled off toward the kitchen.

“What about Trina?” Dean asked.

Her name spoken out loud in this house changed the air. The hair on his arms stood up. And he wondered how long it had been since Trina had been talked about inside these walls. Inside any of Roy’s walls for that matter. Since her mom left? Twelve years. Did people even say her name to him? Ask him about his daughter?

Dean hadn’t in the last year, because he had too much pride. Because he knew Roy wouldn’t know anything about her.

It was as if she’d been erased, and he felt sick that he’d been a part of it to some degree.

Roy stopped. He didn’t turn around, he just stopped. Like right there his battery died.

“What about her?” Roy’s voice was a wheeze. A gasp. The sound something made when it was dying.

“Did you know she was in town?”

The old man turned and had the grace to look guilty. “I talked to her some a while back.”

“You hung up on her.”

“She’s working for your old man. What have I got to say to her?” Ah, yes, that was truly enough justification.

“So what? She’s trying her damnedest to stop that pipeline. And she’s your daughter.”

Roy’s pale skin was paler. His shaking hands shakier.

“Is she going to that party?” he asked. “She always did like it. She was a fool for that yule log. And you…playing music with you. She liked that too. She never said that, but you could tell. She just kind of glowed at that piano.”

Something about this old dirty drunk talking about his daughter like that—like he knew her, like her feelings about the yule log and their playing music together was enough to fulfil the requirements of fatherhood—made him furious. Like… beyond furious. Like something actually broke inside of him.

“You know, Roy.” He walked into the den and smacked the light switch. Oh, man, the den was worse in the light. He grabbed the first empty beer case and started to shove empty cans into it. “I stayed out of it with you and your daughter. I watched her kill herself trying to make you notice. To make you care.”

“What are you doing?” Roy asked, coming back into the room.

“I’m cleaning up.”

“Why?”

Dean stared at him incredulously. “Are you kidding? Because you are one step away from being a show on TLC. Because I am running your ranch and I could be robbing you blind. I could be stealing your herd and you wouldn’t even notice.”

“You wouldn’t do that.”

“No. I wouldn’t. But you are going to die if you keep this up.”

Roy rubbed a hand over his face, the sound of his whiskers against his calloused hand audible in the hushed and closed room.

“Your daughter is here. Your daughter has been in town for a year and she’s called you three times—”

“She called once.”

“Three times, Roy. Three. You don’t remember because you’ve been too drunk.”