You were the best thing your mother and I ever made.
Buy yourself a house, son. Put those boots on first.
And I hope to God you turn out to be a warmer man than I knew how to be.
— Dad.”
Chapter 4: Frank’s Side
I couldn’t speak for a long time after I finished the letter.
Frank sat with me at the kitchen table, in the quiet, and slowly he gave me back the father I thought I’d never had.
“The beer and the fishing gear,” Frank said. “You want to know about that? The beer was the cheapest brand the store carried. That ‘new’ fishing rod he came home with? He bought it secondhand off me, twelve dollars, so he’d have a reason to sit by the water and think. He wore the same two coats for fifteen years.”
Frank shook his head.
“Everything he had went into that account, son. Everything. He ate like a man who owed money to the world. I used to tell him, ‘Ray, buy yourself something, the boy thinks you’re spending it on yourself.’ And you know what he said?”
