What Happened to Wyatt

07 ｐｒｏｇｒｅｓｓｉｏｎ

I touch Gabriel's shoulder gently. He whirls around to look at me with wild eyes.

"Is everything okay, Gabe?" I say softly, peering into his bloodshot eyes.

"This b-broad...She's....She's trying to kick me out!" Gabe slurs, pointing a finger at the cashier accusingly. The cashier is a woman who looks like she could be in her forties, with graying hair, a sagging face, and lips that are pursed in annoyance.

"Well, I wouldn't have to kick you out if you had some manners. All I did was try to start up a conversation with this man and he stood here and blatantly disrespected me. I don't have any interest in serving this drunken asshole. The last thing he needs is more alcohol!" The woman huffs.

"Don't you tell me what I need, woman! All you've done is sit here and talk my ear off. Maybe if you could do your fucking job instead of running your mouth you wouldn't be 'disrespected'." Gabriel hisses.

"Do you know this man?" The woman demands, turning to me.

"Yes, yes I do. Is there a problem here?" I ask, looking over towards the cashier.

"Your friend here," The cashier says disdainfully, jutting her chin towards Gabe. "Is clearly drunk off his ass and I don't need him causing a disturbance. He needs to leave. Now." The woman orders, gesturing to the door.

"Alright, I understand," I say with a nod. "Come on, Gabe. We can't stay here."

I guide Gabe out of the gas station and over towards a bench outside as he cusses profusely. I hand him what's left of my now lukewarm coffee.

"Down the rest of that, okay? We need to get you sobered up." I mumble. Gabe slowly begins to take small sips of coffee. We sit in silence as Gabriel finishes up the drink. A silence has engulfed the two of us and I feel the need to break it. "I think it all started when I was about seven," I say after quite some time. Gabriel looks up at me abruptly and I know he's listening so I continue. "I had just turned seven and my dad had forgotten about my birthday. He was working, he had been working a lot lately and my mom and I could tell.

"He had begun to change. He became a completely different person and he prioritized his practice before anything else. He was almost never home, and when he was he would take his pent-up anger out on me. My mom started to drink, she became a heavy drinker. Soon things got worse with my dad, but not once did my mother say anything. Neither did I. I have a sister but not once did he lay a hand on her, and I had made sure of that. He had a decent relationship with my sister, but he only saw me as a disappointment, and maybe he thought that was something he could beat out of me. He began to try to mold me into someone he could be able to love. Things never got any better, but they didn't get much worse. I never stood up to him, at times I wouldn't even go home at night.

"Things were horrible...Until I met Delilah," I tell Gabriel all about Delilah, from the moment I met her to the moment she left. "When I left with Delilah, I was reluctant to leave my sister and my mother, but my dad never did mistreat them the way he mistreated me. I knew they would be okay.

"My sister could never fully grasp why I left, she doesn't know the extent of what my dad did. She went to a boarding school for the longest time so she wasn't home as much when we were growing up. When she came home to visit sometimes she would see my bruises and I would make up lame excuses as to why they were there. She still thinks I left because I didn't want to go to law school, that that was what caused the rift in my relationship with my dad, a difference of opinion. She never did understand my feelings for Delilah either. She came to visit me for a few days, and she told me she wants me to move home. She told me my mother is sober, and that my mother left my father. She wants us to be a family again, but I don't know if I can ever go back there..." I explain. A blank expression overtakes Gabe's face and it becomes completely and utterly silent. He's the first person I've ever told about my childhood, but I don't regret telling him. Now he knows my darkest secrets, just as he shared his with me.