Page 6 of Forbidden Dreams
“Are you fucking done?” I say before I can stop it, halting his spew of words. “Like, I haven’t been around for much, and even I’m sick and tired of this shit. And she’s been here less than a week.”
“Then get the fuck off my wife’s property and go to your house,” he snaps, and I look at Harmony.
“I thought I heard you divorced him.” I ignore him, looking over Winston and at Harmony.
“He won’t sign the papers,” she replies, nervously playing with her fingers in front of her.
“His name on the lease?” I ask, and she shakes her head.
“So not only are you disturbing my peace,” I sneer at him, “but it also looks like you are trespassing.”
“Brady, why the fuck do you even care?” He turns to look at me. “Can’t you just fuck off already?”
“I was thinking the same thing,” I finally say. “Like, can you just fuck off already?” He walks toward the steps. “She doesn’t want you here.”
“And what? She wants you here?” He snickers. “A low-class whiskey maker.”
“Jesus.” I shake my head. “What, are we in grade school that you are throwing insults? Be a fucking man and respect the mother of your child and get the fuck out of here.” I try not to roar out the last couple of words.
He walks down the steps, and when he gets closer, I can smell the liquor on him. “I am a fucking man.” He defends his honor, looking over his shoulder at Harmony. “Have her, she’s like a dead fish in bed.” Harmony makes her way down the steps away from the door. Watching him the whole time, wrapping her arms around her waist.
He walks to his car, getting in and pulling out. “You really shouldn’t bother.” I turn from watching his car to looking at her. Seeing she’s right beside me, I can see the tiredness in her eyes. I can see the worry fill them. “It’s all for nothing,” she laments, her voice sounding defeated, nothing like this morning when she showed up at my door with a hot apple pie. “He’s just going to keep showing up here again and again.” The lone tear finally escapes her and my hand moves while my head tells me that it’s a bad fucking idea.
“Harmony.” I say her name as if it’s been on my lips my whole life. The distance between us closing as I step even closer towards her. “It’s going to be okay,” I whisper, my hand cupping her cheek. The both of us just standing here staring at each other. I swear it feels like I’m fighting for air to breathe.
“Momma,” her son calls her name, and the fear in his voice makes me turn to stone, my hand dropping from her face, “are… are you okay?” He sticks his head out of the door she closed to probably keep him from hearing his father.
She walks up the steps toward him and bends to look in his eyes. “I’m fine, baby,” she assures him softly. “Did he wake you?” she asks. He nods, then looks over at me, probably wondering what the fuck I’m doing standing in the dark in front of his house.
“Night,” I say, turning and walking away from them. I hear the door close before I even get to my front porch.
I shut the door and head off to bed, crashing as soon as my head hits the pillow. The alarm wakes me the following morning. I’m showered and headed out of the house when my eyes look over next door and see there is no car in the driveway. I pull out and open the windows as I make my way over to my father’s house. Last year, he was diagnosed with stage 4 liver cancer. The only good thing about that diagnosis is it is hepatocellular carcinoma, which means that it doesn’t spread. He didn’t want to do anything to treat it, but when my sister, Autumn, came back to town, he changed his mind and has now been through chemotherapy and radiation. The radiation has kicked his ass, especially since he’s not been able to leave the house because he’s immunocompromised. We don’t know how much time he has left, but according to him, every day is a blessing.
Getting out of my truck and seeing his front door is open, I jog up the steps, opening the storm door and calling his name, “Daddio.” I stop in the foyer and look up the stairs, listening to see if he’s up there or in the kitchen. I don’t hear him in either place, so I walk into the house. I also see the kitchen empty but then spot him through the back door window, sitting on the back porch. I push open the door and step out onto the porch. He’s sitting there with the plate of apple pie beside him. “Morning,” he mumbles, and I can see he looks more tired today, which is normal for two days after his appointments.
“Morning.” I sit down beside him. “Is that all you ate?” I ask, and he smirks.
“It’s the best apple pie I’ve ever had in my life,” he says of the pie I brought over to him yesterday. I ate a piece yesterday, and it was heaven on my lips. Never tasted anything so good in my life, and my father agreed with me since he’d eaten two pieces by the time I left.
“How’re you feeling?” I ask, and he shrugs.
“Not dead yet,” he jokes. “How’s work?” he asks of the distillery that has been in our family since the twenties when my great-grandfather made his own whiskey and sold it out of the trunk of his car. Once Prohibition ended, he opened up a distillery called, Southern Country Whiskey, with its own bar, known as Thatcher’s. He figured he would make it and sell it at the same time. Cut the middleman out, and it’s been passed down from one son to the other. My father took it over from his father, and then when Dad was ready to hand it over to both of us, he ensured my sister was involved. It was thriving, and then it wasn’t. Autumn facing the wrath of the Cartwrights when she came out and told the truth about their son drinking and driving. The court found out they paid off the medical examiner to forge the documents. They were out for blood, and it was ours they wanted. It didn’t matter that my sister left town for eight years. They just wanted us to suffer, and, boy, did we. We were literally on our last leg until Autumn came back to town and turned everything around. Now we’re busting in the bar every night and have tasting rooms. We even have fucking tours of the distillery that I have to give, and I hate every single second of them. It’s why I am so fucking exhausted. I’m still tending the bar every single night so she doesn’t but it’s getting to a point where I need to take a couple of days off.
“It’s good,” I admit. “I was thinking yesterday after leaving here,” I tell him, leaning to put my hands on my knees, “what if we added apple to one of our blends?” This right here is what I’ve always wanted to do. Create different blends, play around with the blends we have, and add certain things to the house blend that is the staple for us. Last year, I added lemon to a batch, and it turned out amazing. This year, I was trying to think of something else to do, and after eating the apple pie, it was as if a light bulb went off in my head.
He nods. “It would have to be the right amount, not overpowering.”
“Yeah, I think so too. I’m going to test a few things in the next couple of weeks.”
“I wish I could come there.” He looks out into the distance. “Staying home is killing me faster than this cancer inside me.”
“Dad,” I hiss, “can we not be so morbid? It’s a nice day. The sun is shining.”
“How’s your new neighbor?” he asks me of Harmony. When I arrived yesterday, I told him my neighbor baked me a pie but didn’t mention why. I also didn’t say who it was because he would probably worry about that shit.
“She’s good.” The last thing we need is another war with the Cartwrights, and with the way things are going, it’s only a matter of time before Winston sets his sights on me. I know I should tell him and Autumn about what has been happening so we can prepare ourselves, but something stops me from doing it. What? I have no idea.
“Is she pretty?” He grins when he asks me this, and I just smirk and shake my head. “She isn’t pretty?”