Ace of Spades Sneak Peek(84)

For a year, my subconscious has tormented me with a traumatic night that wasn’t real. I haven’t been able to sleep properly, and none of it was real. People I knew, people I trusted, made me believe I was losing my mind. I feel angry and lost. How do you undo a fake memory?

My brain still can’t let go, see it as anything but real.

At night when the world goes black, despite everything I’ve learned, the hazy dream/memory sequence of that night at Jamie’s house, the party he threw in junior year, begins again.





33


DEVON

Tuesday


My first time in a prison was when I was ten.

I remember the exact date too: September 9.

Even though the place was bleak, dark, and gray, I was excited to be there. I don’t think anyone in the history of life has been excited by a prison. But I was. I missed my pa, and after two years, he finally wanted to speak to me. Before then, he’d denied Ma’s requests to let us see him. Then this time it was Ma, denying his request for her to visit him. She’d followed me all the way to the prison but refused to come inside and see him.

He looked different from when I last saw him. For one, he was wearing a uniform. It was bright white against his dark skin. He had grown out his beard and hair. His chin was resting on his crossed-over hands, and behind the glass screen, he seemed so distant. I remember staring at him for a while, frozen, not sure why, but scared.

I eventually gathered the strength to shuffle forward, sneakers way too big for me—Ma always bought them a few sizes up so they’d fit in the years to come. I took a seat in front of him and he finally looked up, like he hadn’t sensed that I had arrived until that moment. His head jolted to the side, and I followed the direction to the gray pay phone, noticing that there was one on my side too.

He picks his up.

I pick mine up too.

“Hello, son.” His raspy voice sends a shiver down my spine. I haven’t heard him speak in two years.

“Hi, Dad,” I say.

He smiles, eyes crinkling in the corners the way old people’s do. Dad isn’t even that old, only thirty-two, and he looked his age before. He sure does look old now, though, gray hairs in his cornrows and lines on his forehead.

“How’s your ma?”

“She’s good. Working as a lunch woman at school, so I get to see her all the time and she gives me extra servings,” I tell him. When the men took Dad away, I couldn’t eat for days without feeling sick, but my appetite is back, and I’m so happy Ma gives me more pasta than anyone else.

He rubs his hand across his face and yawns a little.

“You tired, Dad?” I ask. His eyes are a little red, like Ma’s get when she’s tired too.

“Yeah, but I’m gonna get some good sleep tonight,” he tells me. He stares at me through the glass. “How are you?”

I shrug; he’s never asked me that before in my life. “I dunno.”

Dad smiles. “Yes you do. Tell me what you want to tell me.”

I’m not sure how to tell him exactly. It’s not something I understand fully.

“Guys in my class keep talking about all the girls they like. Keep asking them out, keep talking about it,” I start, pausing to see if he’s still with me. Dad nods, and so I continue. “But I don’t think about girls like that. I don’t want to ask them out, or kiss them.”

Dad nods again, then looks up at the ceiling a little, before returning his gaze to me.

“I was eleven when I started asking girls out. Takes time, don’t worry; you’ll be a heartbreaker like I was in no time. Did I tell you how your ma and I got together?”

I shake my head, even though Ma’s already given me her side of the story. I want to hear it from him. Stories are cooler when you hear how everybody else experienced it.

He ahhs, then says, “We met in high school, senior year. Took me two years to notice her. I was busy working on my music, but when I finally put my sax down, I spotted her, and I knew she was the one for me. We kissed, had you, and got married. So, you see, it wasn’t until I was much older that I settled down with a girl. You don’t worry about that, son. Your perfect girl is waiting for you to spot her too.”

I nod, feeling a little better. It’s just a matter of time.

“Dad, when are you coming out of this place? You need to come home. Ma is sad without you.”

Dad looks down now, silent. I almost think something is wrong with the line, but then I hear him breathing.

“I uh—” He wipes his face again. “I did something the state didn’t like—something I don’t regret—a real man never regrets, you hear?”

I nod.

“Feds don’t agree with that sort of thing, so I’m here. Taking control over what matters is important. But you don’t worry about that, or me being here, okay?”

I nod slowly, not really sure what he means. Ma refuses to explain it to me. Dad looks at me with this expression that makes me feel like nothing is right and he’s hiding it. I want to tell him about my dreams of him coming home, us being a family again, but I don’t think he’d want to hear that. Besides, we weren’t really much of a family to start with. Dad was never home.

“Listen, Von, I’m happy you came,” he says. That fills me up like one of those cartoon helium balloons they sell in the mall, all full and bright. I want to say that I’m happy he invited me, but he doesn’t seem to have finished, and I don’t want to be rude or anything.