Chapter 9 - A Father’s Love Is Maybe All It Takes

Once again, it was late May. Mike pulled away from the airport with a strange feeling of detachment, but also knowing that he was headed in the right direction.

Soon, familiar buildings were passing by the car windows, buildings that Mike hadn’t seen in a year. He drove down the main street slowly, taking in his surroundings and trying not to admit to himself that he was delaying the inevitable.

He reached an intersection and took a right, continuing his slow pace. Eventually he pulled off to the side at a small garage and gas station with the words “Gas and Repairs” displayed in large letters on the front of the building.

“Can I help y - oh, hey Mike!” Nolan exclaimed, coming out of the garage and wiping his grease-covered hands on a rag that wasn’t much cleaner, “How you been?”

“I’ve been better,” Mike replied, getting out of the car and opening the gas cap, “What about you?”

Nolan spread his arms, indicating the shop. “See for yourself. Practically everyone in town comes here now.”

“Since your dad left, you mean,” Mike said. It was a statement, not a question, but Nolan didn’t take it that way.

“Yeah,” he sighed a bit, “But hey, I’ve got a great setup here. Run the shop during the day, stay in the upstairs room at night, eat out…it’s a living, right?” Nolan’s father had left town six months ago when he found out that Nolan was opening his own garage. Apparently he’d seen it as vengeful competition instead of a break for freedom and hadn’t been able to handle it. The way he saw it, he wasn’t going to let his son move in on his territory. So he moved on to find another place to make his own. It was a backward sort of logic, and Mike didn’t pretend to understand it.

“You could call it that,” he agreed, watching the counter on the pump and stopping when it read three dollars, “That ought to get me back to the airport. Here,” he held three dollar bills out to Nolan.

“Thanks,” Nolan took them and rolled them up in his palm before leaning against the pump, “So…you seen her yet?”

It was Mike’s turn to sigh. “No, but that’s where I’m goin’.”

“She don’t hate you, you know,” Nolan told him, “She was shaken is all.”

Mike opened the driver’s door and gave Nolan a sour look over the roof of the car. “I don’t want to talk about it, all right? I’m only here because I feel like I’m supposed to be. This isn’t love, it’s duty, dig?”

Nolan held up his hands. “Okay, man, okay, I get it. Duty. Right.”

“Right,” Mike repeated, getting into the car and starting the engine.

“Hey Mike,” Nolan called over the noise.

“What?” Mike called back.

“I’ll see you.” With that, Nolan turned and went back into the garage. Mike sighed and revved the engine before pulling out. Even when things changed in the town, nothing really changed at all. It was, again, as if he’d never left. But this time there was something claustrophobic or forced about it. Nolan could probably tell why Mike was back, and Mike felt it just by looking at the younger man. Nolan may not be the brightest kid on the block, but he wasn’t stupid, either. News got around to him, even the things that nobody else seemed to find out.

Mike sighed again and turned back onto the town’s main road. Georgia’s house came up quickly and he slowed in front of it but didn’t stop. Instead, he continued on to the general store.

“Hi Mike!” Finn greeted Mike when he entered. Finn was standing near the counter talking to Arthur about the weather and sharing other small talk.

“Hey there, Finn,” Mike shook Finn’s hand, noting that Finn made no move to hug him. Then he headed over to the corner to get himself a cup of coffee. He didn’t have to look to know that both men were watching him. They knew - for God’s sake, the whole town knew - but they weren’t going to say anything. Mike would bet money that they also knew what his reaction back home had been seven months earlier. However, he was able to prepare the coffee calmly, pay for it, and hang around chatting for the next hour. Finn and Arthur caught him up on everything that had been happening in the town, which wasn’t much, but Finn had a knack for making a fishing trip sound like a luxury cruise, and Arthur kept up-to-date on every local baseball game. In return, Mike told them about some of the things the Monkees had been up to and what they were planning to do over the next couple of weeks. Through all of it, though, he could feel the same strange tension, the same forced quality he had felt with Nolan. The other men were trying hard not to talk about, or even obscurely reference, what they knew Mike was in town to do. After a while it began to make Mike feel nervous and boxed in, so he said his goodbyes and got back in the car.

There was no delaying it this time. He’d been everywhere he could possibly go to procrastinate, and now it was time to do what he’d come to do. He was catching a plane back home that night, so he didn’t really have a lot of time.

He pulled up to Georgia’s house, his heart pounding with anxiety. How would she react? Nobody in the town had known he was going to show up, but had word gotten out during the last hour that he’d come back? Or would she be caught totally off-guard? Either way, Mike knew he had to go for it. He knocked and held his breath.

Jacob answered the door. “Hello? Oh, Mike. Hi.” He didn’t sound the least bit enthused.

“Hi Mr. Mitchell,” Mike tried his best to keep his voice steady, “Is…is Georgia home?”

“I don’t think she needs to see you,” Jacob replied coldly, keeping the screen door shut as a barrier between himself and Mike.

“Well, I think I need to see her,” Mike returned stubbornly.

“You are not allowed in this house,” Jacob snapped, “As far as I’m concerned, you and my daughter never met.”

“Daddy? Daddy please,” Georgia’s voice came from somewhere inside, “Is that Michael?”

Jacob glared at Mike before turning his attention inside the house. “Yes, Georgia. He was just leaving.”

“Daddy,” Georgia’s voice took on a tone of warning.

Jacob sighed heavily. “All right,” he consented as Georgia appeared from somewhere to his right, “But he stays outside.”

“Fine,” Georgia agreed shortly, opening the screen door and stepping out onto the porch, “And don’t you dare spy on us, Daddy.”

Jacob gave Mike one last look of distaste before going back into the house and shutting the main door tightly behind him.

“Don’t think I got rid of him for your sake,” were Georgia’s first words to Mike.

Mike was taken aback. “I…well for a second there I…but then…” he closed his eyes and took a deep breath, trying to sort out what he wanted to say, “Georgia, to tell you the honest truth, I don’t even know what I’m doin’ here.”

“You feel guilty,” Georgia suggested blandly, twisting her hair around her finger and refusing to meet Mike’s gaze.

Mike thought about this. “No,” he said after a minute, “No. For once, you’re wrong. I wouldn’t come here if I felt guilty. I’d do something stupid like send money.”

“You certainly have plenty of that,” Georgia shot back, folding her arms across her chest and turning away.

Mike walked around her so he could look at her face. “Look, why’re you actin’ like this? I know you don’t love me anymore but for God’s sake, I didn’t think you hated me.”

Georgia’s testy façade suddenly failed her and she turned away again with a half-sob that shook her.

“I don’t,” she said quietly, looking back at Mike over her shoulder, “How could I?”

“I don’t know, but you were doing a pretty damn good job of it a minute ago,” Mike tried to keep himself from yelling, “Geez, Georgia, I didn’t know what to expect from you when I met you, but now…this is just crazy! How am I supposed to tell what you’re thinkin’ if you turn on me one second then look at me like I’m you’re biggest desire the next?”

Georgia regained her composure and glared at him. “If I looked at you like that, it was a mistake,” she snapped, sweeping away from Mike and turning on him when she got to the other end of the porch. “My life has been hell these last few months, Michael!” she screamed, pointing a shaking finger at him, “And it’s all because of you!”

“Me?” Mike exclaimed in surprise, “What did I do?”

Georgia shook with anger, color creeping into her cheeks. “What did you do?” she whispered menacingly, “What did you do?” Her voice rose and cracked. “You gave me something that nobody has ever been able to give me, then left me with something else I didn’t know how to deal with! You ruined my heart, Michael! You set up a place for yourself in my soul and never bothered to move out! I didn’t know what to do with myself when you left! My father thought I was on drugs, for God’s sake! My mother didn’t know what to do for me; I heard her crying to Daddy that she was losing her only daughter.

“And when I told them I was pregnant! They nearly killed me, both of them! Daddy wanted me to have an abortion! I was too afraid to be alone with him in the car, too afraid where he would take me. I had to get Finn to drive me to the doctor! For nine whole months Finn put up with it, never said a word. My mother couldn’t stand the tension. She’s gone now, Michael, did you know that? She moved out. It wouldn’t surprise me if she’s someplace with Nolan’s dad. They always did like each other.

“So now you just show up and expect everything to be like it was last year? Well I have news for you, Michael. This town may never seem to change on the outside, but ever since you left things have been tumbling out of control. It’s still attractive outside, but inside things have gone sour. Sometimes I wish it would just go back to the way it was, when nobody paid much attention to me.”

Mike stared at Georgia, dumbstruck. He’d had no idea what she’d been going through; she hadn’t contacted him since the month before Nolan had called with the fateful information, and he’d been too depressed and afraid after that first phone call to contact her himself. But somehow he felt that he didn’t quite deserve all the blame she was placing on him.

“Don’t try to lay it all on me,” he said a moment later, after Georgia’s temper had cooled down somewhat, “You can’t brand all of it my fault. You were as in love with me as I was with you, and you certainly didn’t do much of anything to stop what happened, did you? Because you know I would have stopped if you said you -”

“Was.” The tone of Georgia’s voice made Mike stop.

“What?” he asked, caught off-guard.

“You said ‘was’, Michael,” Georgia repeated softly.

Mike suddenly realized what she was telling him. “God, did I? No…no…I didn’t. I mean, I did, but I didn’t mean it, Georgia, I swear I didn’t.”

“I can see you didn’t,” Georgia’s voice dropped to a whisper as she began to cry, “I can see you didn’t mean it and I wish you did, Michael, because…” She trailed off, biting her lip and looking out across the street.

Mike found himself instinctively walking over to her. He put his arms around her waist and looked down at her, seeing in her expression pain and longing and all kinds of emotions that made his heart wrench. “Because what, Georgia?”

“Because…” Georgia took a deep breath and looked up into Mike’s eyes, “I’m still in love with you, Michael. God, I am.” She buried her face in his shirt and sobbed. “I tried not to be,” her words were punctuated by hiccups, “I tried so hard to get back to where I was and I just couldn’t, Michael. I just couldn’t. I thought that maybe if…if you really didn’t care anymore, I’d be able to let go. But you do, and I can’t.”

Mike hugged her to his chest and rested his chin on her head, stroking her hair. He tried hard not to shake as the tears came to him, too. They stood like that for a long time and probably would have stayed there longer if the silence hadn’t been broken by a sharp cry from somewhere inside.

“Oh,” Georgia pulled back and sniffed, wiping her eyes, “The baby…excuse me…”

She hurried into the house, leaving Mike alone with his spiraling thoughts. Had she really been using all that bitterness, all that anger, to cover up the fact that she really still loved him? Had he been smothering his own feelings? The tear stains on his cheeks were evidence enough that he had. But if she did love him…

“What am I thinking, ‘if’?” he muttered to himself, “She don’t lie. She really don’t.” He cast a glance to the backseat of the car. Should he? Yes, Mike decided, now was the time. Now he had the chance, and it would work. It would be right. He was just about to go to the car when Georgia came out of the house, carrying a bassinet in one hand and…

And their son in the other. Mike stared. Somehow, the baby had acquired his dark hair and Georgia’s blue eyes. Though the hair was still only the wisps of a near newborn and the eyes were glassy from crying, it was obvious that this life had a part of both of them contained in it.

Georgia murmured to the baby and placed the bassinet in the corner of the porch, then lowered the tiny child into it. He fussed for a moment, then settled down, the warm sunshine casting gentle rays across him.

Mike walked over to Georgia and slipped his arm around her shoulders. “He’s…beautiful.”

“Yes, he is,” Georgia smiled, a look of absolute love on her face.

Mike knew he couldn’t wait any longer. Soon he’d be gone, and he would regret leaving if he didn’t do what he now knew he’d come to do.

“Georgia, I…I have somethin’ for you,” he said, “Wait here.” He left the porch, went to the car, and opened the back door. Carefully, he pulled out the acoustic guitar he had bought months ago, after smashing his old one. It shone in the sunlight, and Georgia gasped when she saw it.

“Michael…” she began, but Mike shook his head.

“Please. I need to do this, Georgia. I’ve waited too long.” Mike sat down on the porch steps, strumming a few chords to warm up and to steady himself. For some reason he felt nervous, but it was now or never and he was determined to do this right the first time.

And…he played. He just sat there and played everything he could think of, playing it for the girl he loved, playing it for what they had shared and what they still shared, playing it all for Georgia. He was about to stop when he realized there was one song he’d left out. He took a deep breath and tried his best to recreate the song he’d heard in his head the night he and Georgia were together. He poured his heart into it and wasn’t surprised to find, at the end, that he’d been crying. He looked up at Georgia and found her staring at him, tears rimming her eyes but not quite ready to spill over.

“You heard it, too,” she whispered.

Mike stood up, leaning his guitar against the porch railing. “Yes.”

“Oh Michael,” Georgia ran to him and pressed herself against him, as if she wanted to listen to his heartbeat forever. Mike held her again, just held her and breathed in everything he could about the moment, glad that the sound of a heart breaking wasn’t something you could hear.

The baby began to cry again. Georgia sighed and pulled away from the embrace. She went over to the bassinet and picked the boy up, cradling him in her arms as delicately as if he were made of glass. When he had quieted, she looked back at Mike, her once serious and intense eyes now clouded with unbearable emotion.

“I named him after you, Michael,” she whispered, walking over. Mike looked down at the baby, this little life just starting out in a world that he couldn’t understand, born into something he couldn’t control, living each day knowing his mother’s kindness, but only his father’s name. Unable to say anything, Mike reached down and gently stroked his son’s hair, earning a look of such pure love and trust from the boy that the tears started again. So this was what he had to leave behind: this child, this life, this kind of unending love.

And so there they stood, Mike, Georgia, and the baby, looking for all the world like the family they could never truly be.