Guardians And Angels | Chapter Four (Part 16)

The first time my best friend met my father, he had a gun pointed at my heart; the next, it was aimed at his own head. Two silent moments, nestled on the ledge of violence. Two chance meetings, bookends to a weekend that would change my young life and the lives of everyone around me forever.

“Dad! It’s me!” I exclaimed, caught off guard. “Fuck!”

My father sat on his recliner, shirtless, abs taut, pecs glistening, hair frazzled, eyes wide and glossy. Tattoos of eagle wings covered both shoulders, wrapping around as if draping him from behind—mineral blue feathers with crisp edges etched deep on his rippling deltoids. A joint hung from his lips, its bittersweet smoke spiraling upward, a cobra-shaped plume. His arm extended as if he were reaching to shake our hands, but instead of an open palm offering peace, he presented his best friend: a 1911 Colt .45 caliber handgun from World War One. Its charcoal barrel, thick and ominous, found the beat of my heart. The darkness at its end gaped wide open, a silent scream at the bottom of a well—an obsidian hole ready to spew fire, sucking in all light from the room.

One… one thousand.

The handgun’s finish, once a flat wartime black, was now streaked a subtle silver where decades of racking and memory had rubbed the steel bare. The cold grey showed through like bones under prosthetic plates peeking through old skin. Like my father, his gun was worn down—but in the wearing, in the worrying, it had grown sharper. Quieter. Deadlier. The kind of deadly that doesn’t boast. A silent deadly. The kind that sits in corners and waits.

Two… one thousand.

“There are two types of men in this world, Christopher,” he would always say, cleaning his handgun for hours, eyes on MASH reruns. A half-eaten TV dinner sat beside him, the dessert always saved for me. “There are Hunters and Trappers. Both will kill you. The difference is how they kill you… and how they sleep at night.”

Three… one thousand.

“Hunters? You see them coming. Maybe you get a shot off or two, maybe you don’t. It doesn’t matter. He’s had your scent and locked onto it longer than you know. He’s on a one-way trip with no exit. He’s the type of man who runs into the fire to make sure you’re burning. He’s all momentum. He won’t sleep until he gets you.”

Four… one thousand.

“But the Trapper…” He paused, voice somber, eyes locking on mine. “The Trapper is different, son. He doesn’t chase you. He knows the world is littered with pitfalls, so he decorates the holes with deadly things and waits beside them, luring you in, hoping you’ll fall.”

Five… one thousand… Fuck!

“They make it seem like it’s your choice, Trappers do. Make you feel confident. Hell, you’ll even relax as you head into their trap. And then… you hear the string tug. Or the trigger click. The ground gives way. And you’re done for, a dead man. You don’t die quick, either. Trappers don’t believe in mercy. They let you bleed out slow. They sleep at night knowing you’ll be dead in the morning.”

Pull the reserve, pull the reserve, jumper burning in, jumper burning in!

“Which one are you?” I asked my father once, curiously. “Which way do you kill, Dad?”

(Pop, pop, pop… the sound of the main parachute deploying, rubber bands snapping as the air catches the canopy and pulls it violently outward.)

Without a second’s reflection, my father squinted and said, “I’m all of the above, son. I’m a United States Paratrooper. I kill men in their sleep if I have to. Then I sing about it in the morning,” he said, laughing as he rubbed the silver wing insignia on the walnut-colored barrel of his Colt .45—metal parachutist wings, the kind he wore on his chest when he jumped into the Vietnam jungle with the 173rd Airborne.

When he said these things, tears sometimes filled his eyes, but I never thought they were from sadness, mostly because he was laughing. I knew he wasn’t joking, though, and the tears weren’t from happiness, either. I thought he felt nothing, or was pretending to feel. Little did I know, he was feeling too much, all the time, all at once, and sometimes people laugh when they’re in pain.

Parachute deployed. Check canopy…

“Dad, what the fuck, snap out of it,” I yelled, alarm bells clanging in my chest. The code word took too long—five seconds was an eternity. It never took five seconds. I hadn’t realized Kai’s presence would trigger him, though I should’ve. I’d been foolish to let Kai come in behind me without forewarning. As I spoke, focused on my father’s trigger finger, I saw Kai raise his arm from the corner of my eye, placing it before me, blocking the barrel of my father’s gun, his palm between my father and my heart.

“Pegasus. Evolve Toi!” I said firmly, anger tinging my voice, my command matching his hand raise as if timed. I felt myself flush, a flash of fright and a dash of embarrassment—two chemicals combusting in my cheeks, staining me red.

Embarrassed. Turning burgundy.

My father’s eyes—green and grey, the color of glacial melt under stormy skies—cleared and grew vibrant as an on/off switch clicked in his mind, like a grenade pin pulled. He shook his head, blinked, and transformed entirely. The glossy coat of his corneas sharpened into matte eagle eyes, focused and piercing. He pulled his hair back, shifting from wild man to drill sergeant, shapeshifting from sloth to Spartan.

His slumped form, soft but muscular in the chair, grew tight and firm. Rigidity set into his bones, his jaw locked, shoulder blades held back, chest puffed out, eagle wing tattoos draped over his shoulders, caressing him in a hug. He stood and reached out to Kai, handshake drawn—a weapon in disguise.

“Fuck yeah, nice to meet you, buddy! What happened to your eye? Damn!” my father said, grasping Kai’s palm, pumping it furiously, squeezing too hard. His eagle eyes measured Kai’s black eye, his size, shape, density, strength… his weaknesses.

You judge a man by his grip, Son.

Before Kai could answer, my father yanked his arm, pulling him close with a rattlesnake’s strike. Kai’s head flung back with whiplash as my father wrapped his arms around him, thick trunks, veiny and rippling, squeezing him into a bear hug. Kai groaned under the pressure as my father clamped down on his ribcage, tightening the noose. My friend was a tiny rabbit in the grasp of an anaconda—an anaconda I lived with every night. In five seconds, my father had shown three ways he could kill Kai, subliminally, smiling the entire time.

Somewhere in the background, maybe from my room, a faint Guns N’ Roses hum drifted in.

Welcome to the jungle, we got fun and games.

“Nice… to… meet… you… Mr… Dubbs,” Kai groaned, his arms crushed by his sides, fingers hanging loosely, completely trapped. My father held him tight for five seconds, lifting him so the toes of his Vans barely touched the linoleum. Over Kai’s shoulder, my father looked at me, smiling with his mouth, not his eyes. I’d broken two rules: no strangers, no surprises.

Welcome to the jungle, it’s worse here every day.

“Call me George,” my father said, directly—always directly. He wasn’t shy. He released Kai, letting him drop freely. Kai stumbled back, pulled his sweatshirt straight, and stood ready to show respect.

“Nice to meet you… Mr. George,” Kai said shyly, his face a subtle red from the bear hug’s pressure and embarrassment. He shifted, unsure, caught off guard. The blue and white glare of the television flickered as MASH reruns played silently—Hot Lips Houlihan on screen, helicopters and mountainsides.

“What’s up with that eye, kid?” my father barked, reaching out with his left, non-handshake hand, hovering over the puffy purple and blue bruise around Kai’s right eye, then pressing gently. Kai winced but held his ground, a soldier under inspection.

“I got punched, sir.”

“I said call me fucking George, kid,” my father mumbled, emotionless, staring at the damage, tracing his finger over the cheekbone’s upper edge, pressing down. “This hurt?” he asked, sterile, collecting data.

“I can take it.”

“I didn’t ask that, kid,” my father growled, pulling back, locking eyes even deeper, a smirk on his lips.

“I asked if it… hurts?” “Yes, sir—I mean, yes, Mr. George, I mean… fuck…” Kai stumbled, tongue-tied, swallowing hard, his Adam’s apple bobbing. A vein pulsed on his temple, purple and extended, like lightning marking him for punishment. He was stressed, fumbling.

My father looked at me, smiling wide. “This one’s a fucking mess, Christopher. Where’d you find him, the small yellow bus? Does he lick fucking windows?” He laughed, hitting Kai on the shoulder.

“Relax, kid. Don’t shit yourself,” he said, turning to me. “What the fuck happened to his eye, Christopher?”

I looked at Kai, unsure. It wasn’t my story to tell. I knew what to say, but it wouldn’t come out right, so I deferred—knowing the wrath I’d face for dodging a direct question from my father.

“Kai will tell you, Dad.”

My father looked back and forth between us, faux exasperation on his face.

“Holy shit. He’s infected you,” my father said, wide-eyed, feigning surprise one moment, then anger the next as his drill sergeant emerged from the Pandora’s box he carried in his chest.

“Get down and beat your fucking face, Christopher!” he bellowed. “Do some fucking push-ups! I asked a direct question, holy shit. Over.” His eyes pierced, jabbed, stabbed with each syllable. George the Ripper. A pent-up pugilist punching me with commands instead of fists.

“BEAT YOUR FACE!”

“ONE, TWO, THREE!”

I dropped to my palms and toes, catlike, my body locked prone in a plank, a switchblade of muscle and tendon, head lined up, eyes to the ground, a smirk on my lips.

In the jungle, welcome to the jungle,

Watch it bring you to your kneeeeeeeeeeeees!

My father’s voice, raspy and deep, barked numbers full of authority and aggression. My movements matched his cadence, smooth and fluid. I rose and fell with his inflections, galloping on his commands.

“ONE!” Down.

“TWO!” Up.

“THREE!” Down.

In the jungle, welcome to the jungle,

ooh, I wanna watch you bleed!

“ONE!” Down.

“TWO!” Up.

“THREE!” Down.

We continued our song and dance, father and son, up and down, bark and bite, until we reached twenty. Twenty push-ups for defiance. Twenty push-ups to make me a man. Twenty push-ups to make amends.

“Recover, Son,” he commanded, satisfaction in his voice—not from the punishment, but from showing Kai the boy he raised, the man you had to be in his presence.

“Now will someone open their dick holster and start talking? Why does it look like you mouthed off to Mike Tyson?” my father asked, folding his dense forearms across his chest, facing Kai.

Kai faced my father, eye to eye, one eye swollen shut from his own father’s fist, and told him everything that happened earlier that night in his bedroom. He left out the part where we were slow dancing, thankfully, and took a few liberties with the punches he threw, but he got most details right. He was a strong-willed, kind boy, and his voice shook a few times, but he showed no weakness. He was stoic, a hoplite reporting to his strategos.

My father took in the tale, blinking only a few times, studying the details, searching for missing puzzle pieces. He sensed there was more, that he wasn’t getting the full picture, but he could tell Kai was honest, and he saw his bravery. When Kai’s voice quaked, he knew it wasn’t fear but the weight of unspoken words, a feeling my father knew well.

“I haven’t met your mom yet,” my father said to Kai, brow furrowed. He reached out, pulling him in gently this time, wrapping his arms around him softly. They hugged in the trailer’s living room, my father and my best friend, the television flickering blue and white across their embrace. MASH reruns.

Over Kai’s shoulder, my father’s eyes met mine, fierce and intense, a look I hadn’t seen in ages. He gritted his teeth and whispered, “We gotta do this right, Christopher. I gotta meet his mom.”

#GuardiansAndAngels