The Power of a King

The Power of a King

When I was little my mother told me my father lived in a castle. It was an enormous castle, she said, made of big rough stone blocks. It had coned roof towers in every corner and guards along every wall.

We went once a month because it was far away. We took a bus because that’s all my mother could afford. She worked in a diner. "People are stingy," she said.

The last time I went to my father’s castle I gave him a picture I drew during the bus ride to see him. I drew my father with a gold crown. I drew my mother with her orange hair and red lipstick lips. I drew myself with a smaller crown. I colored the sky blue, the grass green, and the castle gray.

My mother and I walked through the arched iron gate. She held my hand until we were inside. A guard walked to my mother and said, "This way, Bev."

My mother knelt down. "Sit here," she said. She sat a basket next to me. "I won’t be gone long. Your father and I have to talk about important things," she said. "Then you can come see him and give him your picture."

The guard walked my mother to a door and opened it for her. I could see my father sitting inside. The door closed and the guard stood outside. "How you doin’, champ?" he said.

I said nothing.

I decided to draw another picture while I waited for my mother and father to get done talking. I drew some flaming arrows and horses and knights. I drew my father on top of a black stallion. My father held a sword and led his knights in battle.

I had finished the picture and half of another when the door opened and my mother walked from the room. She was buttoning her blouse and blowing a stray orange clump out of her face. "You can come see your father now," she said.

I walked into the room and my father was sweaty and red. "How you doin’ bud?" he said. "Haven’t seen you in a while."

"I have some pictures for you," I said. "I have another, but it’s not finished."

"Well sit down, bud," he said. "Finish it for me."

My mother shut the door behind her and sat next to me. She started to uncover the basket.

"You know," my father said to me, " this is the last time I get to see you. I won’t get to see you again. Being a king will be too busy."

"I know," I said. "Mother told me."

"You did?" he said to my mother.

She nodded.

"Mother told me when you become king you’ll have a lot of things to take care of. She told me you’ll have to make sure the people of the castle are safe and that you’ll have to go away and fight other kings."

My father started crying and said, "Being a king will be so hard."

My mother started crying.

I finished my picture and slid it across the table to my father and he picked it up and looked at it. He wiped his eyes. "I love it," he said. "I love it."

Mother’s crying started winding down and she unpacked the food she had brought in the basket and we ate

Mother and Father talked about what they did before I was born, how they met in a diner. "You almost spilled coffee on me," my father said. "Then my food."

"Then," my mother laughed, "we went outside behind the diner and—"

My father was laughing too loud and covering his mouth, trying to keep his food in.

"Remember that time," my father said to me, "up on the lake when you caught that catfish? I still think he could’ve eaten you."

"Catfish don’t eat people," I said.

My father laughed and looked at the clock above the door. He put his hand on my head and rubbed my hair to a mess.

Empty plates and a few dozen paper castles were scattered across the table when two guards opened the door. Another man in a black suit with a white collar followed behind them. He looked at my father.

"I have to go now," my father said. "I’ll miss you both."

My mother started crying again. She hugged and kissed my father. My father bent down and hugged me. He stacked the pictures and folded them into his pocket. "I’ll own castles just like these," he said.

The guards walked him out and down the hallway. The man with the white collar followed, reading from a book about God and a kingdom, how the accused would be gone and give my father the power of a king.