Post by CALEB ANDREW TUCKER on Apr 30, 2012 0:27:16 GMT -5
| [atrb=border,0,true][atrb=style, width: 400px; height: 200px; border: 5px solid #9E7E81; padding: 0 10 0 10px;] Caleb Andrew Tucker [/style] [style=width: 394px; background-color: 9E7E81; padding-top: 4px; padding-bottom: 3px; text-align; right; text-transform: uppercase; font-family: Trebuchet MS; font-size: 10px; letter-spacing: 3px; color: EFEFD5; text-align:center;]23, kenneth nixon, local life starts here... AUGUST 19, 2002 Today I'm 14 years old. You'd never know it. Most kids have birthday parties on their birthdays. Or at least they get a cake. Go to the movies with their friends. Hang out and laugh and have fun. Not me. I woke up this morning to the sound of my father's fist hitting my mother's face. Again. But this time I didn't just hide in the closet. This time I didn't back down. I didn't run away. I confronted him. So where am I on my birthday this year? Stuck in a hospital room, trying to explain to the doctors for the third time how I was riding my bike and fell off, rolled down a hill, broke my arm in three places and then somehow crawled home to make a phone call to 911. My father's in the waiting room looking pissed off that he's here to begin with rather than getting drunk. But at least here, in the hospital, he can't hit me. April 2003 I've finally found something that at least numbs the shit I feel. Those crazy bastards that say they feel nothing and would give anything to feel something have lost their god damned minds. I'd give anything to be in their shoes and I've found a way to see to it that I have a temporary fix for that, for the most part. I was at one of dad's shows tonight. He has no idea I was there. No idea that, regardless of the shit he's put me through, I still look up to him. He must be right. There must be something wrong with me if I can still manage to find some glimmer of hope that he'll actually be proud to call me his son one of these days. That he'd actually look at me one day and see something more than a punching bag or a toy to kick around. But I do... Anyways... it was someone there at the show that introduced me to my temporary cure. A quick line and everything feels better... September 2003 School is hell, as normal. I thought grade school was bad but high school is twice as bad. It's not as if I get picked on frequently. People are too afraid to do that. I'm the son of a well-known musician. A rough guy. I'm the silent son with guitar talent and a bad reputation. Yeah. I get into fights at school a hell of a lot when people start up on me about my father. They think I lead some kind of privileged life because my father has talent and money. But they don't know the half of it. They don't know what it's like going home. So they think, that because my father has money and talent, that I must be some kind of special child who just has it all and they pick on me to make me feel better about themselves. I'd love to see any one of those sons of a bitches live a single day in my shoes. They wouldn't survive it, but they'd finally understand just how perfect my life is. June 2005 I don't get it. Not in the least. There's this new girl at school... Stephanie... She's beautiful. She's smart. She's kind and gentle. She's everything that I'm definitely not and everything that I don't deserve and yet... she's treating me as a friend. She's taken a hell of a lot of crap for it from other people in the school but... she's stuck to her guns. I don't understand her. Her life would be so much easier if she gave up her salvation mission and just pointed and laughed along with the other jerks at school when they riled me into a fight. But not Stephanie. She's the one that's there to calm me down and pull me back from a bad place. She's the one who prevents me from getting riled by them with nothing more than a simple smile. I don't get it. I don't get her. But what I do get is the fact that I don't want to give her up or let her out of my sight. She's the first good thing to happen to me and I'd do anything to make her see that. I'm just... not sure how to. August 2005 I had my first official birthday party today. Steph threw it for me at her place. It was just me and her, but it was the best party I've ever been to. Well... the only party I've been to, really. I'm 17 today. Seventeen years old. Things are finally starting to look up for me a little bit. I have a friend... well... I'd like her to be a little more than a friend but... we'll work up to that spot eventually, I guess... or I hope. I have no right to want her in that way, really but... I do. I don't feel broken when I'm with her. I don't feel like I'm the scum of the earth. Nothing else matters. Just her. January 2006 I've been lying to her. The only person in my life that has ever really mattered to me and I'm lying to her face when she asks me what I'm doing when I disappear for hours on end at a time. She still doesn't know about the drugs. I think she suspects something, and I keep waking up every morning, half expecting to look over beside me and find that she's gone... That all of her stuff is gone and that she's left me behind for bigger and better things. But she's always there, right beside me... just as supportive as ever. I still don't know what I've done to deserve her. She's helped to get me on my feet. Helped me get away from my father. Helped me learn a hell of a lot. I finally understand what unconditional love is. And Gods... I love her so much... March 2006 I'm terrified. Absolutely terrified... You hear about all of those teenagers who go and fuck up their lives by doing something stupid like getting knocked up. You hear about deadbeat teenage fathers and washed out idiots who can't be fucked to be there for their own kids. I lived the life of that poor kid... and now I'm living the life of the adult in that situation. Like father like son, huh? The last few days have been a whirlwind of crap for me. Steph just found out that she's pregnant. I think I have grounds to be terrified at the moment... but I just don't know what the hell to do. I don't know the first thing about being a father because I haven't exactly had a stellar role model. But I know one thing's for damned sure... This is do or die for me. I either step up to the plate and take charge of my own damned life or I let Steph walk out of it. I want to be a better man for her and for this baby and... so I guess it's time to man up. To hell with the drugs. I flushed them this morning. No more. No child of mine will ever have to grow up the same way I did. Ever. And I'll do anything and everything in my power to make sure that Steph knows that I'm here for the long haul... June 2006 Things are getting crazy. Steph's halfway through the pregnancy now and she keeps laughing at me and telling me to stop being so damned neurotic. I can't help it. It's not exactly like I've done this before or anything. Her parents hate my guts. I've ruined their little girl and I can't really say that I blame them for thinking that way. But I'm trying here. I have two jobs. Two respectable jobs working my ass off, actually, and I still managed to finish high school. No one can tell me that I'm not making an effort here. Honestly, I'm starting to get excited now. By the way... we just found out... It's a boy! October 2006 Happy fucking birthday. Three days before my birthday and, rather than expecting to celebrate it with my fiance... I'm mourning. Mourning my son. Mourning Steph. A week ago, Steph woke up in the dead of the night freaking out because something wasn't right. I rushed her to the hospital immediately. A few hours later and the doctor was telling me that I had a baby boy... A son... And a few minutes after that, I was holding Steph's hand in the delivery room as she died. She's gone. I've been living without her for a week now and it feels like I can't breathe. Every time I walk into this apartment... every time I so much as think of her... I just can't breathe. I've been spending every day in the hospital with my son. Strange... Steph wanted to name him Evan... I hated the name... But now that she's gone... I'm in love with it. My little boy's name is Evan Michael Tucker. Evan. Michael. Tucker. Everything's being ripped away from me. I can't do this on my own and I know, for a fact, that Steph's parents are going to do everything in their power to make sure that I never see my son again. And I know I don't stand a chance in hell of keeping him if the court does a little digging around into my past and stability records. I'm losing everything... and it looks like I was right. I do break everything I touch. It's why I've never actually held my son in my arms. I'm afraid I'm going to ruin his life too... July 2007 I'm on a plane to the USA right now. I'm packing everything up and leaving Wales behind me. The courts settled their verdict last week about who would get custody of Evan and I was right. Steph's parents have full custody of him and they've made it more than clear that I'm not welcome in his life. I get it. I do. I'm not fit to look after a baby. Not by a long shot... But I'd like to know him at least. A phone call to tell me how he is. Photographs. Something. Anything. But I know I'm never going to get that. And I know if I stay here, the temptation will be far too great. And if I do that and wind up in jail... the kid'll be just as bad off as I was in high school. So I'm giving him the best shot he has. His best fighting chance. I want him to grow up happy and healthy, and if that means never knowing me... so be it. But I love him. He's my son. I'd do anything for him. Even walk away from him if it means his happiness. I don't know what I'll do once I wind up in the US. I don't know where it'll take me. Maybe I'll wind up dead in a gutter somewhere. Honestly... at this point, I'm not so sure I care... May 2009 I've been here in the USA for over a year now. I'm surprised at how well I'm doing, actually. I started off working a small factory job as soon as I could. Then I was offered a job at a local music store here in Myrtle Beach when one of the guys at work heard that I had some talent of my own. We wound up starting up a band together, actually, as it would be. So far, it's been a great outlet for me. I'm not as miserable as I was a year ago. I've been keeping myself busy and throwing myself into my work 100%. It's been working for me. But not a day goes by when I don't think of Evan. Not a single day. I wonder what his first words were. When he took his first steps. I wonder how he's doing with his grandparents. I wonder if they've ever even bothered to tell him about me or the fact that I love him. I'm a stranger to him... but it doesn't stop the longing. I thought that maybe an ocean between us would go a long way towards easing some of that but... it hasn't... April 2012 I now successfully own and operate my own music store. Yeah. I opened one up, give lessons. Things like. And I think I owe a lot of the credit of its success to my band and the fact that we're doing as well as we are. We landed a record deal last year. Did our first tour this summer. And now, at 23 years old, I own my own music store right here in Myrtle Beach. I can hardly believe it. I got a call yesterday, actually, from someone I haven't heard in a hell of a long time. The call went through to voicemail and I'm kind of glad it did... It was actually from Steph's brother in Wales... Talk about a rough voice to hear... It sounded pretty urgent but... that's a whole can of worms I'm not sure I want to open up. I still haven't decided whether or not I'm going to return the call but... we'll see... Hello, my name is MEL and I am 23 years old. I have been RPing for 10+ years and this is my 3RD character. If you need to contact me, feel free to do so via AIM and my account name is MELIMUS.PRIME. [/style] |
