Was That Kindness (short story excerpt)

Was that kindness, he asks me, his voice trembling, eyes imploring, to treat me like that?
I suddenly feel very quiet, and stare at the space between us, trying to set up a wall against his grief and sadness, which I now feel intensely.
I'd tried to reason with him, cruel to be kind I said, your father had a good heart I'd said, all the while feeling irritated by his weakness and sensitivity, and also annoyed that he could speak like that about my uncle, his father, who had died just barely a month before. I'd listened to him in complete denial - this - what he said - just didn't make sense; this was not my uncle Seamus, the man who's quiet, almost giant like strength, and gentle, eazy going carefree manner had been such a contrast to my father's seemingly eternal anxieties and black depressions. No, no I inwardly exclaim, listening in mounting disbelief to my cousin's litany of injustice, until I can no longer contain myself and blurt out no, your father was a good man, stop being such a, such a victim for Christ's sake, I'd give anything to have had him as a Dad, he was kind, I'd swap Dads in a heartbeat.
His face registers a momentary shock, like he can't understand me, but then he becomes animated and what he tells me I'm just not prepared for, no, just not willing to hear or accept it. Maybe it's his cold fury more than any words or facts that shock me, that he could feel so much anger and grief at the same time, and I feel shame, fear, and... pity, maybe more than anything else I feel pity that his father is gone and he's got all this hurt, all this wounding inside him and it's just got nowhere to go. As his voice increases in intensity and pitch I am alarmed that he's going to completely lose it, and I feel myself close down, like I've way overstepped the mark and am in alien emotional territory. And then I realize how close he is to me when he asks me - was that kindness - and repeats it a third time with a strangulated exasperation that frightens me out of my shutdown state. It dawns on me that he's expecting a response, even though there's only one obvious answer I can give and I say hastily "no, no, of course not". I feel as if I've been beaten up, and an image comes to my body of the time his older brother had me pinned on the field and wouldn't let me go until I'd actually said the words "I give up", I'd had the submission physically forced out of me. I felt like that now. A pause, then I say "look I'm really sorry, I didn't know, I had this image of your Dad, my uncle, as, as " all the time I'm staring intently into the space with nothing in it, I can see in the corner of my eyes his quivering blue eyes in his yellow jaundiced face and I mutter an inconclusive ending with "I'm sorry, Ger I really am. I can't imagine how you feel, I'm really sorry." Now I'm staring down at the ground. After what seems like an age I look up, and he's gone. I breathe out and it almost hurts. I feel numb, trying to take in what he's told me. Still in denial, my heart and head at odds, confused.

Background - photo of uncle Denis with dog, character, strong, silent, instinctive, big heart. A hero, almost, in the mythological sense of the word. Experience of being Irish in England, of being lost.

Establish relationship with Ger - summers visiting Ireland, dynamic of domination physically, he was frail, prone to asthma. Interleave this with the dialogue - the exchange - above