Lost in your own head, but then a knock at the door. Put down that drink, your steps creaking the floor. Go and get the gun, distract yourself from death. Back against the door, your hands are starting to sweat. Slowly [bad word] the gun, slowly move to the side, slowly turn the handle, slowly open it wide. You catch a glimpse of his face. Your heart sinks in your chest; your hands start to shake because you know that it’s him. Just the coward and you standing silent, dead air. So you pull him inside into your father’s chair. “Your addict mother is dead, all thanks to you. Her addiction got worse after you left you [bad word] fool. What you did to our father, I promised you’d pay up.

I’m going to take your life, but it don’t feel like enough.” Cold steel to his head, walk him to his death. Walk him down past the white oak doors. Walk him out past the boardwalk and your old shipyard. Your pistol in his side, make him pay. On the outskirts of town, pass the old quarry now. Walk him down to those cold steel tracks. You stumble [bad word] with the gun in his back.

“Now get down on your knees on the tracks where you shamed me. But this time, the dodge ain’t going to end so pretty. Either a bullet or that train steaming just ahead is going to end your days. You coward little kid.” You sit and you stir, while he waits for his death. You’ll never forgive him, and you never did forget. He’ll never see the sun again. Make him pay off his debt. Stand on those tracks, cold steel under your feet, barrel to his temple. “Your addict mother, you will soon re-meet,” you whisper in his ear, feel his whole body shake. In an instant he’s got your arm, he’s got your gun, you’re held down by his weight. You feel the cold steel above and below. You feel your stomach tie in knots as the train whistle blows. You feel the warm of the blood where the barrel digs in. From your cheek to your mouth, you taste the sweat and the tin.

You don’t cry, you don’t beg. You’ve been waiting for this. For the coward, or for death, just to see your wife again. That train is so close, so loud and so clear. Your hands stop shaking and it’s all that you hear. Just like father. “You took him. If this is how it’s going to be then I would rather die at the hands of my own family.”