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"I JUST DON'T FEEL LIKE YOU CARE," Ward Cameron scolds his oldest child, outside in the burning heat, a better place to yell than inside.
"I said I do!" Rafe yells back, not angry enough to get up and challenge his father though.
"You said," Ward argues back, disappointment wafting around him like the smell of cigarettes.
"What do you want me to say?" Rafe questions, disbelief, and entitlement can do that to you.
"I don't want you to say anything! I want you to take care of business!" Ward shouts. His voice attracts his middle child Sarah Cameron to creep into the shadows.
"Okay!"
"Where are the generators? I gave you money for the generators." His father states, an angry calm washing over him. "You said that you would take care of it. Did you take care of it? Where are they?"
Rafe looks down at his hands picking at the chair, before coming up with a straight face lie. "They're on backorder."
Power machines and tools can be heard in the distance, building tension with every rev.
"Yeah, of course, they are." Ward sets down his glass, sitting down on the chair in front of his son.
"There was a hurricane," Rafe starts to complain but his father doesn't let him.
"I'll tell you what. Do you know that Pogue I just fired? Way more reliable than you."
"Really?"
"Yeah, really! You need to get it together, Rafe, or you can go live on the cut."
Rafe scoffs, shaking his head because he's heard that one, countless times before.
"You think that's funny to you?"
"Yeah, wow." He replies, ignoring his father completely and looking off into the distance. "Wow."
"You can go live on the damn cut, Rafe, as far as I'm concerned."
Rafe doesn't answer, just stares out into the backyard, his eyes tearing up as he twists his family ring with his other hand.
"Now get out of here. I'm sick of lookin' at you," he points to the door. Rafe immediately gets up, ignoring anything his father has to say to him after that. "Make yourself useful somewhere, somehow."
Before Rafe walks back into his house, Ward remembers something.
"One last thing, stay away from Martha Holland."
"Wha"— he turns back around, fears finally flood his eyes, his brain, his everything. What did that bitch do now? She'll pay.
"Nuh-uh, I don't want to hear it. I'm giving you the benefit of the doubt because you are my son. Stay away for your own good."
