Reaper's Lullaby

Lucas: The Scarecrow Man

"We must all make do with the rags of love we find flapping on the scarecrow of humanity."
Angela Carter

On that same day on the other side of the country, in a suburb of Williamsburg, Virginia, Lucas Killian was watching his father's car pull up in front of the sizable brick house he shared with his mother and stepfather.

Lucas stood when he saw the small Honda turning into the driveway, as if he was going to get into it, backpack in hand, like he had so many other times since the divorce three years ago. Then he remembered.

One of his mother's flower pots, overflowing with a bunch of withered purple flowers all in different stages of wilting, was blocking his view. Lucas stooped down at a different angle, trying to catch a glimpse of the man he loved more than anyone and hadn't seen in months.

The car door opened. The shrunken figure that emerged from the driver's seat sent his stomach plummeting and his heart pounding. This wasn't his dad. It couldn't be. This was a walking scarecrow straight out of his nightmares.

"Dad?" Lucas whispered. The word was a wisp of breath he exhaled, too in shock to draw another.

"Hey, dude!" his father said happily.

Once a hulking figure with a booming laugh, the man that appeared before Lucas now looked like a Halloween decoration in comparison. His clothes hung off his scary-thin frame like they were still on hangers, flat and unwrinkled by the regular form of a normal-sized human being. He was bad off, really bad, much worse than he'd let on when they'd talked on the phone last week. Lucas didn't know how to respond. His whole body was locked in the same stooping position he'd been in when he tried to catch a glimpse of his father through the windshield.

"Come on, gimme a hug," the man said.

Lucas, finding his muscles again, numbly stepped forward and wrapped his arms around the disappearing stranger. His father's smell was familiar. It smacked him. Smells never changed. With the smell came a deluge of happy memories leading up to this shocking meeting, and Lucas's eyes flooded with tears.

His father, his hero, was going to die a junkie. It was both of their biggest fears, and it was happening before both of their eyes.

"Dad!" he choked out.

His father pulled away and put both of his hands on Lucas's shoulders.

"Hey," he said. "You don't get to cry for me. I'm gonna beat this motherfucker. The rehab I'm going to, it's in California and it's one of the best-"

"California! Why? Mom told me you found a place in Richmond! Why are you going all the way there?" Lucas exclaimed hysterically.

"It's better to be far away. Far away from all my old contacts and dealers. You understand?" he said.

"Dad, what the fuck? Why? Why are you using so much now? What changed?" Lucas cried, and he started to sob.

His father pulled him into his arms, and Lucas felt the man kiss his hair.

"Son," he said softly. "It's gonna be okay. I swear. I swear on everything I love. I swear on you that I'm gonna be fine."

He pulled back once more and lifted Lucas's chin and smudged the tears off his cheeks even as more trickled down to take their places.

"Look, it's my last night here. My flight leaves at eight a.m. tomorrow. How about we go somewhere and chat? You know, hang out for a bit. I still owe you that beer. I know I can never make up for what happened that weekend, but when I'm better I swear we'll go on the trip of a lifetime and celebrate. I owe you that and so much more, Lucas."

The weekend he was referring to, which had been at the heart of the biggest fight they'd ever had, and Lucas's bitterest disappointment, was no longer a touchy subject. They'd fought and moved on. At least, Lucas let his father think he'd moved on. The wound still throbbed sometimes when he least expected it.

Lucas's father had promised he would visit him on his sixteenth birthday four months ago and take him to the coast so they could go to a Five Finger Death Punch concert. They had even booked a hotel for the weekend. After the concert, they were going to grab a beer, Lucas's first, and spend time together on the beach like grown ups. Lucas had been hyped up about it for months, waving the tickets in his girlfriend, Nora's, face and laughing at her jealousy.

Then the day came. And the hours passed. And the concert started and ended while Lucas sat in his bedroom fuming with his bags packed. He rode the anger until dark, when he broke down and sobbed. And his father didn't even call for a week afterwards. He had gone on a bender.

Lucas nodded, wiping his eyes on the sleeves of the black hoodie he wore everywhere. He had seen the sincerity in his father's eyes and believed him. And because he believed him he also forced himself to believe, once again, that his father just had a disease, like cancer, and now he was going to a rehab, like a hospital, where they would make him get better.

"Let me tell Mom," he said.

"Wait," his father said, putting a hand on his shoulder.

"Why?" Lucas asked.

"Give this to Sarah. I mean, your mom. Okay? Promise?" He was holding out an envelope.

"What's this?" Lucas asked, taking it.

"Just some... um... papers about the rehab. Boring stuff. Information," he said.

The way he stumbled over the words made it obvious he was hiding something, but Lucas decided not to push it. He knew how much his father still loved his mother, and his secret hope was that they would re-marry again after he got better and all three of them would carry Brian, his stepfather, out of the house and throw him into the street. Then when Brian was on the ground begging to come back into the house, Lucas would spit on him and kick him in the face and it would be the best day of his life.

"I'll give it to her," he said.

Lucas put the envelope in his pocket. Then he opened the front door behind him and called out, "Mom!"

"What!" came the muffled reply from somewhere deep inside the house.

"I'm going out with Dad!"

"Huh? What? I can't hear you!"

Lucas stepped further into the house. "I'M GOING OUT WITH DAD!"

"What are you saying! I can't-"

He rolled his eyes and went all the way inside and shut the door behind him.

"I SAID I'M-"

At that moment Brian appeared, coming out of the living room to his right and looking annoyed.

"Shut the hell up! I'm trying to watch the game!" he barked.

Lucas rolled his eyes. He hated Brian with a passion that ran deep.

"Tell Mom I went out with Dad," he said.

Brian's eyes narrowed as he smirked. Lucas knew that look. He knew what was coming.

"That piece of shit is here? At my fucking house? He dares to come to my house and-"

"It's NOT your house!" Lucas snapped. "My father bought this house! And he's not a piece of shit! You are!"

Brian laughed. "He bought this house and now he's homeless while I fuck his wife. Sounds like a loser to me."

Lucas wanted to punch him, but his dad was waiting outside and it just wasn't worth it.

Brian laughed at him, but even he knew better than to try anything else while Lucas's father was around. The two men had gotten into fistfights on the front lawn before, fights that Brian always lost.

Lucas walked back through the front door and slammed it shut behind him.