Chasing Lies
"DaVille's Hilltop Settlement", read a sign that hung by the side of the road. I looked down at the name scribbled on the note in my hand then back up at the sign. There didn't seem to be any other settlements around so it had to be the place. After searching for so long, I'd finally tracked my deadbeat father down. I should have been excited, but all I felt was anxiety.
A little winding path led me up to a flat clearing littered with teepee tents and farm animals. A big guy wearing what looked like a burlap sack attended to me. He just stood in my way and didn't say anything. I pulled out the picture and showed him who I was looking for. He blinked at the picture, probably deciding whether to help me or not, then shrugged and pointed at one of the tents.
I knocked on the tent's door and a voice inside told me to enter. A strong smell of incense greeted me as I walked in and sitting on the far end was a man that I knew that but barely recognized. He was much thinner than he was the last time I saw him. His hair was longer too but there was no mistaking those beady eyes and self-assured posture.
He recognized me too. Let out a long sigh and got to his feet, opened up his arms and gave me a wary smile.
"Jerry," he said. "It's good to see you again."
The smug look on his face was too much for me to handle. 8 months I'd been looking for this asshole and the whole time he'd been sitting in a tent, meditating and growing a beard. I felt the rage that had been building inside me for the better part of a year reach its boiling point in my fists and I rushed my father. In three quick steps I closed the distance between us with my fist flying. It smashed into his right temple and I felt all of the despair and anguish from the last few months feed into that single punch. A cut appeared above his face and he went down hard.
"That's for mum, you asshole!" I shouted at him.
My father picked himself up slowly and smiled at me.
"I kinda deserved that," he said.
"Hell yeah, you did!" I screamed. "8 months! 8 months you've been gone and this whole time you've been sitting up here living like a hippie?"
My father half-smiled and shook his head. Looked at me with pity.
"I see that you've been talking to your mother," said my father. "I just wish that she'd given you the full story."
"The full story? The full story is that you walked out on us. You just got up and left."
In spite of myself I could feel tears welling up in my eyes. Seeing my father now took me back to that fateful night when my mother sat my younger brother and me down at the dining room table and explained to us that my father wouldn't be around anymore. Five-year-old Liam kept asking where he'd gone but Mum didn't know how to answer. She just broke down in tears. That was the moment when I realized that I would have to be the strong one. For both my mum and my little brother.
Over the next two months I found out that not only had my father left, but he'd left with everything in the bank accounts. We were flat broke which meant I wouldn't be able to go to college the next year and Liam wouldn't be getting anything more expensive than a coloring book for his birthday. Hell, we barely had enough money to feed ourselves. That was when I decided to track down my absentee father. I'd found him thanks to a private investigator and there he was, smiling like a fool in front of me.
"Where's the money?" I asked him. "I know that you took all of our money so give it back now before I break your nose."
Once upon a time I'd have had no chance in a fight with my father but he was looking kind of thin so I fancied my chances. I'd always known him to be quick to anger so I was a little surprised when he just turned away and chuckled.
"Son," he said. "Your mother is lying to you."
"Don't you dare say anything bad about her. She's still around. You left."
"And did she tell you why I left? Did she tell you that she was sleeping with Mr. Roberts next door and the gardener and anybody else who'd have her?" For the first time since I'd arrived his facade of cool and collected cracked and I saw a flash of anger in his eyes. Then it was gone, just as quickly as it had appeared. "Your mother and I haven't been happy in years."
"Whatever is going on with you and mum is for you two to sort out. It doesn't change the fact that you have a family to take care of."
My father nodded and hung his head. He was showing more shame than I had expected him to.
"You're right," he said. "Which is why I would never leave it up to your mother to make sure that you have a bright future."
He turned away from me and opened a zipper on the side of a backpack on the ground. Pulled out a thick flash disk and stretched it out towards me.
"What's that?" I asked him.
"It's what you came for," he said. "Out here there's almost no need for money. We just live off the land and take care of ourselves. I don't expect you to understand my decision right now but I hope that someday you will."
"Then why did you raid our bank accounts before you left?"
My father chuckled.
"To keep the money away from your mother. Knowing her, she'd probably take her boyfriends on cruises and leave nothing for you and Liam. Take this." he jabbed the flash disk in my direction. "It's an offline bitcoin vault. Should be enough in there to get you through college and take care of your little brother. The password is your birthday. I have one for Liam as well but I'll give it to him when he's old enough."
I took the flash disk in my hands and rolled it in my fingers. I didn't even know how to react. I'd gone up to that freezing hilltop expecting to drag my dead-beat dad back down to face the consequences of his actions. But now that I'd spoken to him, I wasn't too sure. I just shook my head and walked out of the tent. Went back to the car and drove home in silence.
At the dinner table that night I held the flash disk in my hand while my mum served us macaroni and cheese from a box. After what my father had told me that afternoon, I couldn't even look her in the eye. She noticed that something was off and asked me what I had in my hand.
"Just a reminder that nothing is ever as it seems," I said.
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