This is Part 12 of What Happened to Trunkin. If you missed the beginning, start here:
Emrys Jenkins regarded his son with consternation. “Stuart, I know the technology is coming along, but people still need doctors. Medicine is a human endeavor. What sort of bedside manner do you think a software program is going to have? It isn’t going to care. If you let this…this Whitehead fellow frighten you into—”
“It wasn’t just that. That bad day, Zesh Afridi, Doctor Whitehead, they aren’t why I left. Not really. They were just the wakeup call—the creaking stairs, the branches scraping at my window that woke me from my dream. That roused me enough to see I was living someone else’s life. That I was in the wrong place.”
“How can you say that? Medicine is your calling! You can’t just put it aside when the road gets a little rough. Think of all of the years you spent learning the craft. Think of the people you were helping. The people you could still help!”
“Medicine is your calling, dad,” Stuart said as gently as he could. “And yes, for a long time I was convinced that it was mine.”
A whole host of emotions passed over his father’s face. With an effort of will, he suppressed them. “But?”
“But I’m not convinced anymore.”
“What then? Are you going to sit there and tell me you’ve found something as impactful, as important to do with your life as caring for your fellow man?”
Stuart sighed. “You aren’t going to like the answer.”
“Well I’m certainly not moving until I hear it.”
“Emrys, maybe we should pause,” Stuart’s mother entreated. “Give everyone a little time to cool down.”
Mr. Jenkins’ expression darkened. He would not soon forget her complicity. Her silent betrayal. That wound would take a long time to heal. “You, I’ll deal with later. We’re going to have a very long talk about keeping secrets, you and I. Right now, I’m going to hear what Stuart has to say.”
Stuart’s mother turned her head away, while his father’s fierce brown eyes shifted back to him. A silent command to speak.
A younger Stuart would have withered beneath that glare, but what stopped him from speaking now was not fear of his father, only a desire to say how he really felt.
“The answer…” He searched for the words, surprised at how hard the right ones were to find. “The answer is, I’m not certain I have a purpose at all, and I’m not all that eager to find one. I know it sounds selfish, but I believe there are other ways to live a life. Ones that aren’t defined by what we accomplish, or what we leave behind.”
“I can’t believe what I’m hearing. What does that mean? You just plan to lay about? Don’t think for one second I’m going to pay for it.” Emrys Jenkins’ cheeks were colored with anger. He was out of his chair and pacing. “I’ll be damned if I’m going to let you move home, thirty-six years old and unemployed.”
“Dad, please. Calm down. I have plenty of money, and I’m perfectly happy where I am.”
“Where you are. And where is that, exactly?”
“Stuart, perhaps—” His mother held up a hand, but now that the truth was coming out, Stuart was intent on revealing all of it.
“I’m living out of the bus,” Stuart replied matter-of-factly. His mother winced. “Seeing the country—”
“Oh my god,” Emrys Jenkins’ head was in his hand. “Where did I go wrong? How has it come to this?”
“—which is something I never could have done if I’d stuck with my career.”
“Haven’t you heard of a bloody vacation?” His father’s arms swung above his head. “A leave of absence? A sabbatical? Anything but quitting your bloody job! If you were feeling burnt out—”
“It had nothing to do with—”
“Do you know how hard I worked? How many sacrifices I made to get you to where you are? To get you this life?”
“And I’m grateful! But I never asked—”
“Asked! Asked!” his father thundered. “Do you think I was asked? Do you think I—”
“Emrys, please!”
“No! I will hear no please!” Face purple, eyes bulging, he roared, inarticulate with rage. For a second time, he stormed from the room, but this time he made for the front door. The house shook and the windows rattled as he slammed it shut behind him.
Out in the wintry air, Emrys Jenkins fumed. Hot breath streamed from his nostrils like the smoke from a dragon’s belly, and though he should have been cold, he felt none of it for the fire burning in his chest. Ordinarily he’d have gone for a walk to clear his head, but he wasn’t dressed for snow. His house shoes would be soaked through in minutes. He’d taken no coat. So he stood on his porch, radiating fury.
He was so angry. So angry he could hardly think. With Stuart. With his wife. But also with himself, for the bitter truth he could not deny was that somewhere along the line, he had failed.
How many times had he shaken his head after spotting some misbehaving child in public? “Those parents ought to be ashamed.” It was a parent’s duty to control their child when they were there to do it, and teach them how to behave when they weren’t. How many times, upon spying some vagabond in the street, some dosser with his hand out, had he curled his lip and judged? How many have failed you? he’d wonder. And how terribly? Only now it was his son. Jobless. Aimless. Living out of a bus…
His eyes flicked to the bright yellow behemoth parked in his driveway, and embarrassment washed over him. Every neighbor on the street would see it, and he could all too well imagine the fool thoughts that would run through their heads. He had to get it out of sight.
His first instinct was to break in and roll it down the street. He could see it in his mind’s eye. The door was locked, so his fist went through the window. Though he knew such a thing was probably impossible, in his fantasy he wrestled the gearstick into neutral and let it roll backwards down the drive, hand on the wheel, guiding it, before, with a running shove, he sent it rolling off…
But of course he would never do something so irresponsible. Aside from the fact that the plan would never work, the bus would only become someone else’s problem, until it was traced back to him and returned, accompanied by questions he had no interest in answering.
He was stuck with it, for now. But he wouldn’t be forced to look at it.
He stormed back into the house, eyes averted. If he looked at them, he would only end up shouting. He could feel their attention, back at the dinner table. They’d been whispering. They were silent now, eyes on him. He ground his teeth and ignored them. Made a beeline for the garage door. He slammed it.
His garage, like the rest of his house, was tidy. He could not abide by disarray. He knew exactly where to find what he was after. The sandy brown tarpaulin was neatly folded in a plastic box on a stretch of steel shelving, where he’d stored it after they’d repaired the leak over the master bedroom. It ought to be big enough. He stalked back inside with it tucked under his arm.
“Emrys, what are you doing?”
Flies buzzing in his ear.
Out, into the night. Slushy snow sloshed over the tops of his shoes, soaking his socks and pant legs. He shook out the cloth and threw it over the bus. Went around tugging here and there till it hung mostly even. When his work was done, he stepped back and regarded it, grimacing. The bus was too big. Its bottom stuck out like a child’s legs behind a curtain. Still, it was better than nothing. Why had the boy gone and bought something so bloody…yellow?
He looked up and down the street. The hour was late enough and the weather sufficiently foul that he was the only one fool enough to be outdoors. Half of the neighbors had already put out their lights. Mr. Jenkins shivered. His rage had diminished to a throbbing at his temples. His body bid him get inside, but his brain would not allow it. He settled for the porch. Stood there with his arms crossed, staring out resentfully at this or that, sifting through a catalog of memories in search of a reason why his life had turned out so terribly wrong.
He found no satisfactory answer. As far as he could tell, he’d done everything right. And a damn sight more than his father ever had. It made no sense. The boy had everything. He’d been taught the right lessons. He’d been shown the path as clearly as a person could be shown and still he’d failed to walk down it. Or rather, he’d begun to walk and strayed, which was somehow worse.
“You can lead a horse to water,” Mr. Jenkins muttered. “You can lead a horse…”
He stewed. His thoughts ran in circles, carving angry ruts that all ran back to the same unanswerable question: Why?
He was half-frozen when at last he came in. He left his sodden shoes and socks by the door and sat down barefoot at the table across from his son and his wife. When he spoke, his words were measured. A single, clipped command.
“Tell me what happened next.”
Thanks for reading.
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