The Father Ethan Had Buried
Chapter 02 - The Father Ethan Had Buried
Ethan laughed once.
It was not amusement.
It was the sound a man made when reality became too offensive to accept.
“My father is dead.”
Laura flinched.
Mason lowered his gaze.
Ethan pointed toward Grant’s photograph.
“That man raised me. That man stayed.”
Mason’s expression hardened, but he kept his voice controlled.
“That man sent me to prison.”
The garage became silent.
Laura stepped toward Ethan.
“Please come inside. I’ll explain everything.”
“No.”
Ethan looked from her to Mason.
“You had thirty-one years to explain.”
Laura’s face crumpled.
“I thought he was never getting out.”
Mason looked at her sharply.
“That’s what Grant told you?”
She nodded.
Ethan backed toward the driveway.
His duffel remained on the concrete.
Mason spoke before he could leave.
“I wrote you two hundred and forty-six letters.”
Ethan stopped.
“I never got one.”
“I know.”
Mason reached into the saddlebag and removed a small bundle tied with faded red cord.
The envelopes were yellowed.
Every one carried Ethan’s name.
The first was addressed to Baby Ethan Cross.
Later envelopes said Ethan Hale.
The most recent had been written five years earlier.
Ethan did not touch them.
“You expect me to believe Grant hid all of this?”
“I expect nothing from you.”
Mason placed the letters on the workbench.
“I came because your mother found something after his funeral. Something he kept hidden inside this garage.”
Laura held up a small brass key.
“It opens a storage compartment under the motorcycle lift.”
Ethan remembered Grant warning him never to touch that compartment.
He claimed it contained old police evidence.
Laura inserted the key.
Inside was a black metal box.
Mason stared at it as if he had spent half his life imagining the moment.
Ethan opened the lid.
There were photographs, court records, and a cassette tape.
On top lay an old newspaper clipping.
LOCAL MECHANIC CONVICTED IN DEADLY GARAGE FIRE.
The photograph showed Mason at twenty-three.
May you like
Beneath it, someone had written in Grant’s handwriting:
He will never see the boy.
