A Knight in Central Park(101)

As if enraptured by every word, his father sat tall and rigid. The Academy was indeed his father’s life’s blood, providing him constant nourishment, for his body as well as his soul.

Twice, Joe had tried to pull his father aside, tell him he had amazing news. During his first attempt his father had been called away before Joe could get two words out. The second time Joe cornered him his father suggested they wait until after the ceremony to talk. Without waiting for a reply his father had walked away. Always walking away.

Just like Joe had walked away from Alexandra.

His stomach knotted. One week ago he’d returned to Central Park. He hadn’t slept since.

He hadn’t wanted to return, dammit!

He had changed his mind, tried to throw the damn stone as far away as he could, but it had been too late. A moment too late.

A day late, a dollar short.

Who the hell said “better late than never?” Never was much better than later. Why hadn’t he seen it all along? Why did he have to be so damn blind? How many times had Alexandra tried to tell him that people had become stilted in his world, blind to that which mattered most? Nothing would blind Alexandra. She knew what was important: Family, love, honor, loyalty. She knew.

And now he knew.

And it was too late. “...too bad, too late, the ship had sailed...”

“And with each new finding,” Mr. Katz rambled on, “we serve the public interest, seeking the widest possible engagement with governments, educators, and indigenous peoples, in advancing knowledge and enhancing awareness of the past.”

The members applauded.

Joe realized he was clapping, too. Like a robot, programmed to react without any thought. His father, though, applauded with great vigor. He pushed his chair back and came to his feet, his eyes bright with excitement.

Joe had already accepted membership. Less than two hours ago he had accomplished his supposed life’s dream. But the saddest part of it was that it wasn’t his dream after all.

It was his father’s dream.

All this time he’d wanted his father’s approval and acceptance. And for what? Joe had a piece of paper, nicely framed, ready to be hung on his well-textured wall back home. What now? The Academy’s elite lined up to shake his father’s hand, and his. Before arriving at the luncheon, Joe had decided not to share the sword he’d brought back with the Academy, deciding it would raise too many questions. Questions he was not willing to answer.

The King of England bestowed it as a gift to me for saving his life, using its sharp blade to dub me The Black Knight.

What would they say to that?

The Black Knight had always been Joe’s enemy, an invisible nemesis, which in retrospect, was exactly what he was. Had he not, in the end, proven to be his own worst enemy?

All the questions going round and round within his mind were making his head ache.

His father walked toward Joe now. His face well-lined from the years spent in the sun, searching, digging. It was as if Joe were looking at an enigma instead of directly into the eyes of his own father. Standing before the King of England had been less awkward.

“So what is it you wished to talk to me about?” his father asked.

No hug, no pat on the back. Joe peered into the deep blue of his father’s eyes, endless in their enormity and mystery...cold and vast, and never still.

His father might not be the man Joe wanted him to be, but he was a man with a calling, perhaps a man with dreams and goals not unlike himself. The man before him reached his same height. Joe guessed his father to be in his sixties, but he had no idea when or where his father was born. His father’s hair was still thick and fairly dark, his temples silver. His posture no longer held the vitality of moments before when his eyes had been filled with life.

Joe snapped out of his trance. “Nothing,” he said. “It was nothing.”

His father looked at him then, curious perhaps. Maybe, maybe not. It was hard to tell.

For as long as Joe could remember his father had been searching for the Black Knight. That thought kept coming back to the forefront of his mind. I am the Black Knight. He almost said the words, almost told his father the truth. Inwardly, Joe became amused at the irony of it.

I am the one you have been searching for your entire life. I am he, he is I. Your son. I am the Black Knight.

Who would have guessed that the one thing his father had spent a lifetime searching for was right before his eyes, waiting desperately for him to find him.

Alexandra was right when she’d said people were blind.