Betrayal
by Mab
Him
For a while, your father isn't just 'him', he's 'Him', God the Father. Then you figure out that He worships some gods of his own. Normality, achievement, control. Ellison men fit in by being better than everybody else. They get, they take, they hold on to what they have. They don't give up anything – goals, status. They grasp tight, and they rule their own damn destinies. That's what Ellison men do. Giving up, giving away, that's for patsies. No compromises, ever. Always win. You tell yourself that you've learned better, but old time religion - it's bred in the bone.
Betrayal
I can be an ungrateful son of a bitch. Never more so than when I'm in this bar, eyeing some long-legged brunette. She wants me – she's going to get me, if only for a few hours.
He's at home with his nose buried in a book on police procedure, secure in this destined cosmic thing he thinks we have. Well, hooray for destiny and the cosmos, but I'm getting tired of marching in karma's army. Drownings, spirit merges, sacrificial press conferences. They're complicated, the way guilt is.
The brunette isn't complicated or destined or cosmic. She's just a guilty pleasure.
Accident
He was supposed to come back tomorrow afternoon! Tomorrow! I call down to him, “Blair. Don't come upstairs. Stay there.” Startled, he casts his eyes around the apartment; probably looking for the psycho. I'm dragging on a pair of jeans in despairing haste. Then he sees her purse and shoes by the couch.
He looks up at me, his face paper white. She's waking; lifts her head enough that he can see her. He whirls and grabs his bag and keys and he's gone. I hurtle after him, nowhere near fast enough. This can't be happening. This can't be happening.
Hurt
I can't see him on the street. Then I hear the miserable sound of retching from an alley two buildings down. I run for it, as he turns the corner and sees me coming. “You stay away from me!” he roars, swinging his bag in a wild arc. “Bastard! Bastard!”
He charges across the road to the parking lot. I follow, half-naked and barefoot in the cold. There isn't sufficient penitence in the world for this. His hands shake as he struggles to unlock his car. His voice shakes, too. “I wanted to surprise you.”
Colour us both surprised, Chief.
Loss
Sure, he's fucked up. I'm fucked up. Figured that we'd be fucked up together. If it was just about women…I can be sexually open and accommodating. Don't give me that look. Yes, he does extremes – black or white, with him or against him, his way or the highway. I can do pliant, I can bend in the wind – and I still get my own way as much as anybody; maybe more than some. I could see the guilt – but how could I see contempt when even he didn't know it was there? No vision – and y'know, that – that's really funny.
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