Learning Curve

Finn

“You can bring Jeff Hayes back,” Dean Kandinsky tells Officer Walters, completely oblivious to the mess he’s inviting.

My hands shake in my lap as I try to control the dump of fresh adrenaline in my veins. “W-why is my father here?”

“We tried to contact your mom—the emergency contact you have listed on your university forms, but your father is the one who answered her phone and felt strongly that he would come down to discuss this situation further,” Dean Kandinsky updates.

“I’m nineteen,” I say, my voice rising with irritation and panic. “Why would you need to contact either of my parents? In the eyes of the law, I’m an adult, and I’m okay with that. I’m ready to face my consequences.”

Dean Kandinsky’s eyes shed a layer of sternness momentarily. “I appreciate that, Finn. I do. It’s very mature of you. But parent involvement in an incident of this magnitude is protocol in the contract you signed in the student handbook at the beginning of the year.”

“It’s just policy,” Ty says, and he offers a soft smile in my direction. “Nothing more than that, okay?”

He’s trying to calm me down. He thinks he’s helping. But what he doesn’t know is that his world is about to be turned upside fucking down the instant Jeff Hayes steps into this room. I know it’s been nearly half a century since he last saw his father, but the resemblance between the two of them is unmistakable.

“I don’t want him in here,” I say, but it’s too late. Right on cue, my father steps into the room. He’s wearing jeans and a stained white tank top that pop culture calls a wifebeater. Ironic, I know. His cheeks are ruddy, his eyes are red-rimmed, and I already know with just one look at him that he’s had his favorite whiskey for breakfast.

“Hello, Mr. Hayes,” Dean Kandinsky says candidly as my father enters the room. “Appreciate your coming down here. I’m Dean Kandinsky.” He offers his hand, but my dad doesn’t even acknowledge it.

“What did my fuckup son do now?” he questions instead, spittle flying off his loose tongue as he glares right at me. “I told you it didn’t matter what fancy college you ran off to, and here we are. You sitting in a police station.” He laughs. “Man, I fucking told you so, shit brains.”

“Mr. Hayes, I don’t think this—” The dean starts to interject, but dear old Dad is on a roll.

“You sure as shit weren’t thinking when you let this idiot into your university. All he’s going to do is cause you trouble. Just like the rest of my good-for-nothing spawn.”

The dean’s face turns hard and uncomfortable.

“I don’t think you understand the circumstances at all, sir. Finn is in trouble, but it’s not as clear-cut as it seems.”

“Finn’s a good kid and a good student,” Ty hedges, standing from his chair to approach our dad.

I hold my breath as Jeff’s face screws up in a nasty grin. “Oh yeah? And who the hell are you?”

“Professor Ty Winslow,” Ty introduces, and my eyes fall closed. Two years and exactly one month and one day after I found my dad’s journal, the truth has finally been set free.

My dad stumbles back, taking in Ty’s face for the first time since entering the room. His expression isn’t warm or welcoming—it’s downright nasty. He laughs, the sound cutting like a knife as a tear falls down my cheek. “Well, look at that. Two of my fuckup sons in the same damn room. What a party.”

“He changed his last name,” I find myself saying, and Ty’s wild eyes shoot to mine. “He used to be Jeff Winslow, but he changed it to Jeff Hayes.” I nod, confirming all the questions running through Ty’s desperate mind. We’re brothers.

Watching Ty crumple doesn’t feel even remotely like I thought it would. I don’t feel power or satisfaction or vengeance.

Instead, I feel his pain.

“How the fuck do you know that?” my dad asks, rounding the table and pulling me out of my seat by the front of my shirt. I put my hands on his arms to shove him away, but Ty is already there, pulling him away from me by the denim of his jacket.

I don’t even know how he got there so fast, but when my dad steps forward again, Ty puts a hand to his chest and shoves. “Get the fuck back.”

“Professor Winslow,” Dean Kandinsky chastises, utterly shocked that one of his professors has just pushed a student’s parent in a police station.

But Ty ignores it completely and ensures that our father can’t look anywhere but at him. He crowds his personal space until their gazes lock. “I’m a little bigger than I used to be, Dad. So you’d better calm the fuck down before I make you.”

“Oh no,” Dean Kandinsky mutters.

For a split second, I swear I see shock and surprise and something else I can’t translate on my father’s face. But within a blink of an eye, it’s gone and he’s back to the cold, hard, mean-as-hell bastard I’ve known all my life.

He steps closer to Ty, gets right in his face, and I can imagine that the smell of stale whiskey is burning Ty’s nostrils at this point. “You miss me, son? You feeling sad that I left you and your pain-in-the-ass siblings and mom to start a new family?”

Ty doesn’t respond.

“What a great little family reunion we’ve got going on here, huh? Shall we get Wendy on the line? I’d love to know if she’s still as big of a cunt as she was the day I left her.”

Ty shuts his eyes, and his jaw ticks with each rigid breath he inhales through his lungs. He’s tempted to throttle our father. He’s tempted to make the bastard eat his words, but somehow, he manages to keep control. “You keep my mother’s name out of your mouth.”

“Ohhh, what are you going to do?”

“Whatever I’m going to do, I’m not stupid enough to do it here,” Ty says, and his voice is so low I almost don’t hear the words.

But our father takes those words as a challenge and shoves his chest into Ty’s. “You’re all talk, no action. Fucking weak. Just like Finn. Just like his brothers and sister. Just like his good-for-nothing mom.”

I’m on my feet before I can stop myself, stepping right between the two of them to look our father dead in the eyes. “The only one who is weak is you.”

His nostrils flare, and his breath brushes harshly against my face, the smell of whiskey and cigarettes and bad teeth violating my airway. He doesn’t say anything, cocking back and throwing a punch right at my face that Ty somehow deflects.

Between one blink and the next, my father goes from ready to beat the shit out of me to completely restrained by Ty locking both of his arms behind his head.

Dean Kandinsky calls out the door for help, and Officer Walters arrives and takes over in a flash. He pulls cuffs off his belt and fastens them around Jeff’s wrists before escorting him out of the room.

Ty’s voice shakes with the all-too-familiar flight-or-flight adrenaline dump that happens when you’re in Jeff Hayes’s drunk presence as he follows behind, talking to Officer Walters. “He drove here. Make sure your officers are aware that he’s heavily under the influence and should be arrested if he gets behind the wheel again.”

“Finn, wait here for a moment, okay?” Dean Kandinsky requests, his eyes devoid of all their previous anger now. “Ty, a word.”

The two of them step out of the room and shut the door behind them, and I can’t hear shit from where I’m standing.

When they step back inside, Ty’s face is more determined than I’ve ever seen it as Dean Kandinsky starts talking. “Finn, after evaluating the situation in its entirety, we feel strongly that expulsion would be the wrong reaction. Instead, I’m releasing you into Professor Winslow’s custody and recommending a counselor.” He turns to Ty, and my hands shake at my sides with an overwhelming surge of both relief and unspent anger. “Professor Winslow, I’m trusting you to handle this situation with the utmost care and consideration.”

Ty nods.

“What about Dane? What about the assault charges?”

“I’ll discuss the situation with Dane’s father as soon as we leave here, and I assure you, the matter will be taken care of,” Dean Kandinsky asserts.

My wheels are spinning, my heart on fire.

There’s nothing left to do but leave the police station…with my brother.