“What’re you doing here?” Dad asked him.

The tone wasn’t mean or nasty. But it was definitely drunk.

“I wanted to see you.”

His father nodded, looking back at the television for a few minutes. A news show was on.

“Well, you’ve seen me. You can tell Mom all about it.”

Thomas stood there, unsure what to do right now. So much had happened since he was standing here right before they left. So much had happened and yet he was back where he started. The same boy facing the same father in the same light.

“Mom’s not doing so well.”

“Really? What? She got sick or something?”

“She lost her job,” Thomas said, standing up a little straighter, hoping to show that he wasn’t afraid. “She hasn’t found anything. And I’m trying to find a job, but it probably won’t be much.”

“Did she tell you kids that I just saw her? That I asked her when you’d be coming back?”

Thomas nodded but didn’t tell his father anything more.

“Well, then. You can understand. That’s what I get for trying to change. For trying to do something nice.”

“You changed?”

His father shot him a glance that reminded him of the good ol’ days. For a moment he wondered if he needed to get out of here. He was faster than his father, that Thomas knew for sure. Maybe he should haul out of here and take the bike and pedal all the way back home.

“Not a lot of good it did anyone,” Dad said, looking away.

Something in the way he sat, a bit hunched over, looking thin and kinda sick and very sad, made Thomas feel something he’d never felt for his father.

Pity.

“I told her I’m sorry, and I’ll tell you,” Dad said, looking again at him. “I’m sorry. But I can’t undo the past, Tommy.”

“Why were you riding my bike?”

Dad shrugged, drained the last bit in his glass. “That’s what happens when you get too many DUIs.”

Thomas could feel the anger inside of him. He’d gone all this way to ask for his father’s help. But his father was the same man they’d left. The past year had done nothing. Absolutely nothing.

“I gave your mother all the money I could,” he told Thomas. “I’ll get more to you when I can.”

Thomas nodded.

That’s all we’ll need from you, and soon enough we won’t even need that.

He didn’t say anything but just glared at this old man. He could hardly call him a father.

“You want something?”

“Yeah,” Thomas said. Then shook his head. “But I’m not gonna find it here. Not in this house.”

He left without saying anything else.

Of all the grand and epic scenarios that had played out in his mind before coming here, he had never imagined that it would turn out like this. Another rerun of a show he was tired of watching night after night.

At least now I know.