oz-smith:
Oz couldn’t shake the feeling that there was more going on below the surface. Of course, time and experience had taught him that there was always something going one below the surface, but he’d also developed a talent for sensing when someone was holding back. Only now he didn’t know if this was just Kennedy, how she had always been around him, or if something had happened in the time since he’d left. Eleven years was a long time to give someone room to grow and change and face all kinds of disasters in life. Time had also taught him that people would share when they were ready though, so he bit back the questions that rose to mind and made a choice to enjoy the moment instead.
Enjoy the moment. Honestly, it was no surprise that he felt something was off; he felt it himself. It was the disorientation of meeting someone who had known a different version of himself. He had a feeling he had known a different version of Kennedy. Everyone change through their twenties, be it for the better or the worse, and he didn’t think anyone would look back on their teen years and think they were the same. Or want to be the same, for that matter. If he was feeling caught off guard and distracted by it, how much worse must it be for her; someone ever concerned with details and order? He felt a little more at ease with that in mind, feeling as though he had discovered the source of the discomfort, if that was the right word for it. In time, the feeling would settle and they would get comfortable again. Really, he had to think about the fact that they had only known each other for a year. A year that was probably a little clearer in her mind than it was in his, to be fair. The memories now were fuzzy at best, only as clear as they were because it had been such an important turning point in his life.
Again, Oz ducked his head. He had grown used to talking about his old vices, but that was always with people who knew only this version of him. Not people who had been witness to it. “Thank God I’ve been able to put all that behind me.” He said, looking back up again, lopsided smile much softer now. “I’d be dead right now if I hadn’t.” He stated it as a fact, with a one-sided shrug. He had been nearly there before stumbling into her church. That was a memory that he didn’t think would ever fade. Be it waking up on a pew to her father standing over him, to waking up on their couch, to Kennedy glaring at him. It almost made him chuckle to think about, comparing the two meetings in his mind.
Oz came into focus suddenly. Something in her tone, in the lay of her words, he thought he had found the source of that something off. He looked hard at her, trying to decide if it was something to poke at in order to learn more, or leave be. He leaned back, hands on the counter as he rolled words over in his mind, doing his best to take care with what he said. “You know I was…well, a little distracted back then. I didn’t really pay attention to the world moving around me. Since getting out on my own though, I’ve learned that people can be in ministry and do a lot of good while neglecting other important things. I don’t really know how your dad did with that, but you know, if you ever need to talk…” He let it trail off there, feeling it made his point well enough. He’d had moments of looking back and realizing he disagreed with some of the things he had been taught, but he’d never thought to examine the man’s personal relationships. He’d always been attentive and supportive with Oz, but that hardly meant that he was perfect.
Instantly, Oz was smiling again, a laugh escaping. A younger him might have been embarrassed by that, something he was long past. He’d gone without, sure, but more often than not he had been fed by eager families who were offended by people who didn’t finish the food they were offered. Working in groups, he was always the person that his teammates passed their food to while other people weren’t looking, when they couldn’t finish it or just didn’t like it. He had been accused of not having taste buds, in the past. “I’m a growing boy.” He defended himself, without much heart behind it. He hadn’t been a growing boy in a very long time. “And I wasn’t really used to having food readily available at that point.”
“Psh,” Oz shook his head, pulling open the fridge. “I happen to be a great cook, thank you very much. I’ve learned a lot in the past decade. Now,” He scanned through the contents, trying to decide on something that would be simple and fast. “How do you feel about cold pasta? Or, I could probably throw together some chaufa, if there’s rice in the pantry. It’s basically fried rice, I’ve been in South America for the past couple years so that’s the food I’m in the habit of making.” He straightened back up and turned to look at her. “I will always be the first person to admit that I’m immature. Jesus himself said that we should make ourselves like children and I do my best every single day.”
Kennedy often found herself saying one thing but wanting another. She could come across as uptight and snippy if she wasn’t aware of how she was feeling. She was the kind of woman that propelled the stereotype of “I’m fine” into real life. Very little was laid out on her sleeve for others to see. She had grown up being told to keep her feelings to herself, even when her mother was alive. Her father simply didn’t want to deal with a child with even simple emotions, let alone actual feelings, and acted as such. When her mother had died, it had been a whirlwind and she knew she needed professional help in healing. Her father’s only offer was to guide her in bible study. Needless to say, it had not been enough.
Everything was documented, down to the single words her father would use to answer her questions or statements after he hit his wall, in her journals. Meticulous her entire life, she had journals of all sizes - pocket journals, large leather bound tome looking journals, petite, nightstand journals - with entry dates cataloging all the way back to before first grade, when her small little hands wrote single sentences for each day. We learned about fish at school today. Dad was upset at me because I did not want to eat my broccoli. The dog puked on my shoe. Though, most of the older journals had a vast amount of spelling errors that made her smile whenever she pulled them out. That storage container of journals was one of the only sentimental items she had lugged with her from Chicago. She had packed light, otherwise, a single duffle bag and 2 large suitcases on the flight and then 4 cube boxes shipped over with other things she wanted for her room and that was that. She needed a fresh start; that was the whole point.
But now, she was face to face with one person who made her feel more human and fallible than she wanted to feel. That notion was ridiculous, though. Oz knew nothing of her past, nothing of the things she had been through. She was just that girl that yelled at him when he showed up late to church or pitched a fit when he slipped up and got high. She wasn’t broken, in his eyes. At least, she didn’t think she was. She presented such a put together, organized front that she was almost certain if hid the cracks threatening to splinter her at any given second.
Kennedy knew, the moment the words left her lips, that she had spoken out of turn, in a way. Her father would have shot her a look that could kill had he heard what she said. Thankfully, she was miles and miles away from him but the thought of his reaction was enough to make her stomach churn. She nodded at him and smiled, looking down at her damp papers. “My father is an amazing pastor. But he was never much of a dad.” She glanced up to him and forced a smile, knowing that there was much more to it than that. He was her father but not much of a dad. She had always said that to her friends - he was her father; a father was the man who helped create you and bring you into the world. He was not a dad; a dad was someone who took you out for ice cream even if your mom said not to and a dad played house with you and wore the fancy tea party hat when you asked him to.
Her father had never said it out loud, but part of Kennedy knew that he had wanted to have a son. There was something missing in her relationship with her father that he seemed to search for in others. He had found it when Oz came into their lives and in plenty of young men who needed guidance in their lives. For so long, she had pushed it off as her father wanting to serve the community like he often preached, but perhaps it was more than that.
She was thankful for Oz’s ability to completely shift a conversation from something serious to something so lighthearted was a welcome memory. He had always been good at that, to the point where as a young adult, Kennedy had called him out on it, somewhere along the lines of “no, Oz, you cannot distract me from yelling at you for stupid thing a, b, and c from today, regardless of how wrong you are about x, y, and z.” Now, though, the states were much less serious. She wasn’t railing him about using or his faith this time around. “Man, it’s all coming back to me now...I was sitting here thinking, how could I have ever been so mean to someone so nice...and now I remember. You make it so easy sometimes, you growing boy.” She patted him on the upper arm in a slightly condescending manner as he peeled away to look in the fridge.
As he started rattling off his claim of being a great cook, she quirked an eyebrow, not believing him just yet. Then, at the offer of chaufa, her eyes grew larger. “You’re not kidding. You could make me chaufa?” She had no idea what it was, until he said he could make it and explained what it was. But it was certainly more complicated than a bowl of cereal or mac and cheese. At that, she was impressed, nodding. “I’d love to see you actually make something edible.” The things she had seen young men make in the parish and in college were colossal nightmares; perhaps Oz had some sort of redemption arc coming for mankind as a whole.
