“Where is he?”
“Still in Texas.”
“Do you talk?”
“No.”
“Can I?”
The Biker’s immediate instinct was no.
He swallowed it.
“That’s something we talk through with your therapist.”
The boy rolled his eyes.
“Everything is therapy.”
“Welcome to emotional health.”
The boy laughed.
After careful planning, he wrote one letter.
Not reconciliation.
Questions.
Why did you throw the cake?
Why did you leave?
Did you hate me?
Why did you send Grandpa’s letters back?
The response arrived three weeks later.
The Stepfather admitted some things.
Denied others.
He wrote that grief had made the house unbearable.
That the mother’s death left him angry.
That the child’s resemblance to her made it worse.
He claimed he threw the cake because he could not handle celebrating.
He admitted leaving the boy to scare him.
He wrote:
I was wrong.
Then a paragraph the boy hated:
But you were difficult then.
The boy crumpled the letter.
The Biker waited.
“He blamed me.”
“Yes.”
“He said sorry, then blamed me.”
“Yes.”
“Does that count?”
“As what?”
“An apology.”
The Biker thought.
“Part of one.”
The boy looked at him.
“What’s missing?”
“Responsibility without a door out.”
The boy flattened the letter.
He did not reply.
At fourteen, he did.
One sentence.
I was seven.
The Stepfather never wrote again.
That was enough.
The Biker aged faster than the boy wanted.
Gray became white.
The beard remained.
Knees worsened.
One shoulder needed surgery.
The boy, now a teenager, began carrying heavy grocery bags.
The Biker complained.
“You think I’m old?”
“Yes.”
“Disrespectful.”
“You use reading glasses.”
“Those are tactical lenses.”
“No.”
Their relationship had changed.
The child no longer needed to check the driveway constantly.
Sometimes he forgot to text where he was.
The Biker hated that and loved what it meant.
Safety had become boring.
The best possible outcome.
On the tenth anniversary of the gas station, the boy turned seventeen.
He chose to celebrate at the motorcycle clubhouse.
Not a giant event.
Family.
Friends.
Teachers from years past.
The retired social worker.
Foster parents.
Police officer from the gas station, now promoted.
The gas station witness, whom the Biker had kept in touch with because she mattered more than she ever knew.
The Nurse Biker.
The Vice President.
The club.
A cake sat on the center table.
Simple.
Blue frosting.
The seventeen-year-old stood beside it.
The Biker handed him a box.
“What?”
“Open.”
Inside was the number-seven candle.
Preserved in a small wooden case.