Evangeline

Dear Evangeline

It’s raining outside–it’s been raining for days. I’d like to think that as you’re off in your dreams over in the other room you hear the incessant pitter-patter somewhere far away and it soothes you, and at the same time the lightning strikes that want to frighten you don’t reach your ears at all. I know that’s impossible, but I can dream, too.

I’m at present set to go on a journey. There is a man with a red eye that has had a bullet chasing his head for many years now. At present this bullet is only inching forward, as he hides somewhere out west in what I imagine to be constant, numbing fear–I intend to expedite its delivery. I hesitate to call it revenge. I might even call it a favor–what he’s been reduced to these days is more unsightly than death. But I won’t. I just know I need to do this, because once that bullet goes through I’ll be free of my past. That’s all there is to it, nothing more.

There’s been many things said about you, even before you were born. They called you a mistake–the greatest gunslinger in the West, throwing his reputation away on a daughter, attempting to make roots of this dusty, bare soil. Back in the day someone might’ve died just from that comment, but now I know I don’t need violence to prove I’m the strongest of them all. 

I grew out of my search for thrill, it’s true. But really, the whole time I was wielding this gun I knew what I wanted–to cultivate something more, something lasting, and beautiful. I didn’t “mellow out” from age. I knew what I wanted the whole time, and they just couldn’t see it past the lead and iron.

They’ll try to tell you otherwise. They’ll speak of me only with a footnote at the end of each breath, a stain on each harrowing tale and legendary “victory” in my life. And I’m sure they’ll still attribute my downfall to you, this time directly to your face. That makes me furious, and even more so knowing it’s all my fault. Out here things stick–reputations to the public eye, drunkards to the saloon, idiots to their stupidity, bullets to bodies. And things keep sticking until something else comes along and unsticks them. I’m not gonna wait for these people to change on their own. I’ve done enough of that.

So that’s why I’m leaving. The great Lancaster is going out in a fiery mess, this man that’s been keeping me chained down for my whole life, and God willing he’s taking his storied rival Redeye out with him. And at the end of the shootout all that’ll be left once the smoke clears is your father or nothing at all.

You’ll hear many stories about me. I look back fondly on very few of them–they’re byproducts of a very confused man with a goal and no plan. And I don’t care what they make you think about me, because I love you no matter what.

The one thing I need you to do is free yourself from my past self. Don’t let what I’ve done define what you’re gonna do when you’re older. You’re already so great–curious, full of energy, funny, and a quick learner. I’m sorry this damned shadow of mine hangs over all of that. I’m doing what I can to ease its grip–over me and you alike.

Don’t let anyone tell you you’ve got big shoes to fill. You don’t. As long as you’re doing something that puts that huge smile of yours on your face, I’m a proud father.

I’m leaving you in the care of a trusted friend in my absence, one of the only men with dignity I’ve ever met. I don’t expect to be terribly long.

Who knows, maybe it’ll still be raining by the time I come back. And you’ll still be fast asleep.

***

The clouds were still. They’d been still for days.

Smoke escaped from her mouth through the holes in her sun hat, subsumed into the fog that drooped from the underbellies of the vessels far above. The mist was teeming with sound, cricket chirps and mating cries and wood pecks being jumbled together, cut free from their sources in the absence of sight.

The shack blended into the forest, nestling into the curves and folds of its neighboring pine trees. There were windows on either end of the door, offering cursory glimpses into the cave of a recluse.

Knock. Knock. Knock.

The peephole tentatively crept open. A single eye slunk into view, darting around her face.

“Come in.” It was gruff and earthy, a throat that hadn’t been cleared of gunk in decades. The door swung open.

She dropped her cigarette on the ground, stamped it out, and kicked off her boots at the foot of the door as she walked in. He had already moved to the kitchen, feverishly chopping at vegetables; the knife came down with an exacting fury each time it went to make an incision.

“Siddown at the table. Dinner’s almost ready.”

She took a seat, her back upright and her hands folded in her lap. The walls were hiding behind newspapers depicting smiling faces from all walks of life–a businessman to her left, a beggar on the far wall. There were no cowboys in sight.

He swung open the cupboard and removed another bowl from the stack, taking the bowl sitting on the cast-iron stove and letting the soup spill into its opposite. He took them over to the table, shoving aside bottles and dirty plates and pots and pans to make space, and set them down at either end. She eyed the concoction as he sat down and took his first sip, attempting to identify the ingredients in the swamp.

“Nobody teach you manners, woman? Drink it.”

She held it up to her mouth and tasted it. It was surprisingly salty, the broth lightly biting at her tongue and creating a diversion for carrots and cabbage leaves to rush past.

“It’s good,” she said as she lowered the bowl down. “Very good.”

“I know.”

She went to take another si–

“He went quick. Didn’t get a shot off ‘fore he dropped.”

The salt flared, turning sour and raging in her mouth. It was so hot.

His crusty lips widened into a toothy smile. “It were pathetic, really. You turned him so sappy, ‘e was babblin’ on ‘n on about how he looooves you ‘n he’s ‘found himself’ now. What a load of shit.”

Her arm jumped on the gun concealed in her bag, but she quickly forced herself to regain composure. 

“...How’d you know me?”

“You got his everything. Eyes, nose, damn entire face.”

She looked away from him and at the soup. She’d suddenly lost her appetite.

He kept staring at her, further studying the similarities with his one open eye. The other was covered by an eyepatch. 

“Well, tell you one thing, yer not as jumpy as he was. Else you woulda shot me just then.”

“Don’t test me, old man.”

“Ah, There’s the fire. The spirit.”

He guzzled the last of his dinner, slamming the bowl on the table in satisfaction.

“What happened to the eye?” she asked, broaching the obvious.

“Hah! You want out with it, huh? Yer not the first person to ask, you know. Here, why don’t I show ya.”

He brought his right hand up to his eyepatch and lifted the curtain. What was once an eyeball was reduced to a fleshy, bloody amalgam. She was taken aback, but didn’t show it.

“Back when I were in my prime yer daddy shot it out. But I lived.”

“Why?”

“Why’d I live? ‘Cause I was too stubborn to die. Why’d ‘e shoot me? ‘Cause I was his competition. I don’t blame ‘im for it. We were both chasin’ glory back then. So naturally I tried to get back at ‘im. We were always startin’ shit ‘cause it was fun to us, and ‘specially ‘cause it was fun to everyone else, too.”

“Then what made you run away?”

He let out a hearty sigh. “There comes a point when you can’t be livin’ how we did anymore. When the thrill loses its edge ‘n the pain gets worse with each gunshot. We both realized that near the same time… or so I thought.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“You know damn well. I thought we were done playin’ our game, our game that got people killed. ‘N then he comes ‘n tracks me down to the edge of the earth. ‘N I found out he married, ‘n he has a daughter. So, lemme ask you: if he’s got all that, what in God’s name was ‘e doin’ here?”

“He wanted to kill his past. End your ‘game’ for good.”

He looked at her in astonishment, then laughed.

“Well, look where the hell that got ‘im! Here’s a hint: I just said it!”

He leaned with both hands on the table, bringing his grisly smile closer to her face.

“Here, lemme ask you another question: what’s my name?”

“Redeye.”

“Right. Redeye. That’s my name. There’s no one alive who remembers my real name. ‘N till the day I die it’ll stay that way. There’s no erasin’ this name. Even if I begged and pleaded e’ryone I knew to call me by my real name, it’d never be nothin’ but a precursor to Redeye.”

“And what, you’re fine with that?”

“Of course! It’s my cross to bear. I tore mothers from their sons and fathers from their daughters out in the great, wide West. It’s what I deserve. ‘N it’s what your daddy deserved, too.”

She was beginning to understand what exactly she was dealing with.

“Mmm, but he was smart about it. ‘E made me the villain. ‘N then the people forgot all about the truth, ‘n then he went and got ‘imself a family. But ‘e still wasn’t satisfied, no. He had to have some, I don’t know, symbolic end to the tale of Lancaster. So ‘e left you behind. I have to think he knew what he was doin’. He just wanted to prove to ‘imself he was better than me by turnin’ his life around. ‘N then, after that he stopped carin’ about you–”

“Say another word and I’ll kill you. My dad was reckless, he was stupid, but he never stopped caring about me. He loved me, damn it.”

They went silent.

“...If he loved you, he wouldn’ta left you for dead!”

The gun snapped into her hand, Redeye smiling as he stared into its nose. Her hand was steady.

“Yer just like yer dad all alon–”

“Bark!”

A presence made itself known as it stormed through the open door. It was a dog, a big one with a coat of gray fur. It stopped at Redeye’s feet.

His face softened, the cracks showing in his skin and his eye turning glossy. Begrudgingly, he bent down and let the dog jump into his arms.

She lowered the gun, putting it back in her bag as the dog turned its attention to the new face in the room. 

“How about that. ‘E likes you.”

Redeye pulled his chair out and sat back down, dropping his shoulders.

“Maybe Lancaster was right. Maybe you were worth all the shootin’ and robbin’ ‘e did to ‘find himself’. But I don’t care to know. ‘Cause the old West as I knew it is almost over. We’re lookin’ at the sunset now. Soon enough someone’ll mention ol’ Redeye for the last time. ‘N then yer daddy’ll finally get his wish.”

She let the dog return to its owner.

“Please, take care of it.”

And she left.

***

The sun was out, its licks of sweltering heat washing over the lush swaths of grass and over Evangeline’s face. She was barely four then–not long before she’d see her dad for the last time.

They were sitting on a bench in the midst of a park, far from home, where the throes of the West were no more than a whisper.

He turned to her, the sunlight refracting from his eyes.

“It’s nice to get out once in a while, right?”

She nodded.

“Your mother brought me to this place once. See that pond over there?”

It was massive–hard to miss.

“We watched the ducks over there for hours. It’s fascinating–they swim around in the same pond for their whole life and never get bored.”

There were dozens of ducks, all coexisting in the same place.

“One day maybe you’ll come back here with your family. And I’d bet you a hundred bucks these ducks’ll still be here, swimming…”

As he talked, a duck rammed its head into the bridge.

“...smacking into the same bridge, shaking it off. And I think that’s the most beautiful thing in the world.”

Evangeline stared out at the pond before responding:

“A hundred bucks… you could do a lot with that. Like buy duck food.”

“Heh, sure could.”