Total pages in book: 42
Estimated words: 38856 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 194(@200wpm)___ 155(@250wpm)___ 130(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 38856 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 194(@200wpm)___ 155(@250wpm)___ 130(@300wpm)
"Get in," she said.
I got in. The car smelled like her—expensive perfume and leather. She drove us to a lookout point outside town. No one around for miles. Just us and the Montana sky.
"I want to tell you about your father," she said.
I stared straight ahead, heart pounding. "I don't have a father."
She laughed. "Everyone has a father, Legion."
"Not me."
"His name was Matthias," she said, ignoring my denial. "Matthias Kane. He came through Drybone on a motorcycle when I was twenty-three."
I didn't look at her. Didn't want to give her the satisfaction. But I listened. How could I not?
This woman had a piece of my history. Something that didn’t belong to her, but she had it nonetheless.
And she was gonna give it back to me.
"He stayed six months. Long enough to charm half the town. Long enough to make promises to your mama, marry her, and then leave her pregnant." Eleanor's voice softened. "Long enough for me to fall in love with him."
That got my attention. I turned to her, searching her face for lies. "Love with him?"
"I loved him more than anyone," she said. "Except maybe your mother."
I shake my head. Pushing these things away.
"I have proof." She reached into the back seat and found an envelope, then handed it to me.
I pulled the photo out slowly. Revealing a man on a motorcycle. He was tall, lean, with my exact jawline and blue eyes. His hair was longer than mine at the time, but the same dirty blond. He wore a leather jacket with patches I didn't recognize.
"That's not proof of anything," I said, but my voice shook.
"I'll tell you everything I know about him," Eleanor said. "Every detail. Every story. But I need something from you in return."
I scoffed.
Of course, she did. That’s how Eleanor Ashby worked. Quid pro quo.
But the photo was too tempting to say no. That’s why she dangled it in front of me like a carrot. It was bait. "What do you want?"
"Pose for me. Let me photograph you."
I handed the picture back. "No, thanks."
"You don't understand." Her voice hardened. "I'm offering you your history, Legion. The part of yourself you've never known."
I got out of the car then. Walked back to town in the dark. But the damage was done. She planted the seed.
Two days later, I found an envelope on my motorcycle seat outside the trailer. Inside was another photograph of my father. Younger this time. And a note: He loved thunderstorms. Would stand outside in them, face turned up to the rain.
I crumpled the note. Threw it away. But I remembered every word.
The next week, another envelope. Another photo. Another detail: He could play the guitar. Knew every Johnny Cash song by heart.
It went on like that for months. I never agreed to her deal. Never said yes. But whenever I saw her, I... stayed. I didn't run. I let her take her stupid pictures.
And in return, she fed me pieces of a man I never met.
"You were never paid," ghost-Eleanor says now, reading my thoughts. "Not for the photographs."
"No." The word tastes bitter. "Just information. Scraps about a man who left before I was born."
"You wanted to know him."
"I wanted to know where I came from." I look away from her, at the dust motes dancing in the silo light. "If I was like him."
"You are," she says softly. "In all the ways that matter."
I don't ask what she means. I don't want to know.
"I remember the first time I held you," Eleanor says, swayin’ the conversation into a new direction. Her voice goes dreamy, lost in memory. "You were nine months old. Your mother was in the drugstore, and she dropped her purse. Everything spilled out—her wallet, keys, lipstick. She was counting change to pay for medicine.
"You were crying," Eleanor continues. "Red-faced with fever. An ear infection, your mother said. I offered to hold you while she gathered her things. You stopped crying the moment I took you in my arms."
I close my eyes, not wanting to hear more. But she keeps going.
"I gave you back, of course. And I paid for the medicine before I left. But on my way out, I thought—he would be so easy to love. A child that wasn't mine, but that didn't matter."
"So you stalked me," I say, anger rising. "Took pictures of me from a distance."
"At first, yes." She doesn't deny it. "I kept my distance until you were older. But I watched you grow up, Legion. I saw you become the man you are."
"You're sick."
"I'm honest," she corrects. "More honest than you're being with yourself right now."
I shake my head, disgust churning in my stomach. "I never told Savannah about any of this. About you and me."
"No," Eleanor agrees. "You kept our relationship separate. Apart from what you had with my daughter."