Letters to Daddy

Letters to Daddy __

11/10/14

Daddy,

I was wondering. What if the things we’re afraid of saying out loud are the things that need to be said most? Like “stop drinking”. “I hate it when you drink”. “Bud Light isn’t your friend; I am.” “Put the can down.” You were never you when the cans touched your lips. I watched endlessly as you swallowed your poison; then listened as you reflected the venom back at us. I witnessed a suicide and I did nothing. We did nothing. Boy, did you show us that.

If we had known what you were doing before all of this happened, this never would have happened. Never. Why do you have to be such a martyr? I know you probably didn’t want to worry us, but can you imagine how we all feel now? I feel helpless. You’re lying in a hospital bed, comatose. Doctors have no hope for you. The nurses are all telling us something different, filling us with joyful news. You’re opening your eyes they say. You’re responding to commands they say. Then one asshole of a doctor comes in and everything has changed.

“The children just have to accept that he’s going to die. He is a patient with liver cirrhosis and no transplant. That is the reality and they have to accept it.”

You’re going to die…point blank. Funny words.

How can you be in a coma if the nurses say you’re responding? Who’s lying in this situation? Remember that doctor I mentioned earlier? I know I shouldn’t be using these words, but you don’t understand my emotions right now. He said the children need to face reality. He said you have cirrhosis of the liver, that you don’t even have a liver anymore. Without one, you are going to die. I can imagine your face at that. If you didn’t have a liver, shouldn’t you be dead already? Sarcasm kills, remember that.

I can imagine your face at that. It probably mirrors mine right now. And I know we’re thinking the exact same thing. You are not going to die. I don’t care what anyone says. You won’t die. God has you. Your family has you. We have you. I have you. Not only that, we need you.

You’ve been in my life for sixteen years now. You’ve been by my side since I was born. Day 1, A1. Diapers, boogers, snot, and tears. I refuse to let you give up now. And if you do, I don’t think I’ll ever recover from that. I started to say I’ll never forgive you. But that’s a lie. I’m going to forgive you. I forgive you now. I just want you to come back home. Laughing, talking, yelling, dancing, and all the other lame things you do. I want my dad back. I NEED my dad back.

I’ve never really understood your pain until now. I realize now why you always wanted company. You were lonely. You needed us and we weren’t there. Then RJ died and we still weren’t there. And I’m sorry. I understand that pain now, and I hope it’s not too late. Please don’t let it be too late. You can fight this. It is only another struggle. I know it’s hard, but I know you can pull through. If not for you, do it for me. I love you dude…

Brielle

“Run that ball, boy!”

Zion takes off across the football field, dodging kids his age in cleats and pads. My dad is on the sidelines, running with him and screaming at him to go faster. The further he gets, the better his reward will be.

“You almost there! Get it! Get it! Get it! That’s my boy; that’s my kid out there!

I shake my head at my father’s antics. He always gets worked up at the games-right now, he’s turning red and huffing from his exercise down the field. These were the things that excited him. He always told stories about when he played at Carter High School. He always said he was the star running back, nobody could catch him. He wanted my brother to be his prodigy. Zion was becoming exactly what he wanted him to be.

I, however, got bored. Sports don’t excite me. I walk around the school for a minute and take in the sights. The school’s blue and yellow walls are cracked and dirty. I never liked the color combination. The colors reminded me of a discombobulated bee. The bricks have the names of alumni back to the year 1932. I walk to where I know his is.

Ronald Burns. Class of 1979. Football emblem. My hand runs across the faded letters, the rough cement barely scratching the tips of my fingers. I picture the man I’ve only known to change diapers, read stories, and wipe away tears. I imagine him under the stadium lights, running. Maybe he’s flying. No one can catch him. Maybe his coach is running down the sidelines, telling him to run the ball. Now he’s on the sidelines, his team smacking him and hugging him. They’re all loud and screaming. My dad’s best friend, Byron, is crying. The tears fall down his face, but he’s smiling. My dad eats up the attention. They’ve just won their last game of the season and my dad scored the winning touchdown.

I wondered what that man would have been like.

“How you found my brick, brat?”

I smile. I know that voice all too well. If he’s here, that means it’s time to go. Another smile.

“I found it a while ago. You know, maybe twenty years ago when you were watching Zion and not me.”

The laugh I receive makes me feel good inside. He’s always nicer in public, and when he hasn’t had his drink for the day. He’s also happier.

“Sarcasm kills, remember that,” he laughed.

The beginning of the end was unexpected. That’s how most things go, I suppose. The sun rises, you live a little, and the sun sets. When I got the phone call, I figured it would be another in and out visit. The doctor would tell him to quit drinking, he’d agree and we’d leave again. When we got home, he’d stop drinking for a week or two. Eventually, we would find beer can stashed in the console of his truck and another in the bathroom. It was the kind of routine you just get used to. It was not supposed to change. You don’t expect it to change.

“I don’t feel like going home today”

Days after practice usually ended that way. Music got me high in so many ways. Playing music and being around people I loved brought a sense of euphoria- the mind you can’t get rid of. I imagine it to be the kind of euphoria that weed heads get from smoking. Music and all its key signatures and rhythm challenges were my metaphoric drugs. Laughter was ever present in the band room and sometimes they even fought. The others-and me, I admit, -often got in trouble for skipping class and staying in the band room all day. We’ve all had a collection of good and bad times there. It’s been that way since I joined. Somewhere between the first day and now, I began to like it here more than at home.

Home was chaotic. Everything and nothing happened at once. When my dad left his wife for my mom, he moved in with her. They never married. Fights resulted because my dad wouldn’t stop drinking. He always assumed she was cheating and she would leave him eventually, taking us with her. As I predicted, this arrangement wouldn’t last long. We all got tired of the constant fighting and traumatizing experiences; Zion had even managed to sneak a beer or two and guzzle them by the age of ten. She figured it wasn’t a conducive environment for us to live in, and my mom threatened my dad, saying we would leave if he wouldn’t.

He left us and we didn’t hear from him for three long years. One day, he called my mom, begging for visitation rights which were set up through a Wellspring program. Those lasted a while.

During all this, Mom worked all the time and my sister, Yorke, snuck out often. My little brother, Zion, stayed with my dad for as long as I could remember. He’d made the decision to leave during the visitation. I have four other sisters and four other brothers, but we don’t speak much. They despise everything to do with us and our mother. Apparently, my mother had ended their fairy tale life when she broke up their family.

“I don’t blame you,” Doodlebug answers.

My house didn’t interest me right now. Pink, Disney princess walls and twin beds that should have been replaced ages ago-even the image disgusted me. Lavender walls and musical notes and a variety of instruments did, however. Mr. Clyde, my band director, usually let me and the other kids stay as long as we possibly could. Today, it was just me and my best friend, Doodlebug. We both played sax and we were practically inseparable.

Today, we played a duet arrangement of Whitney Houston’s “I Look to You”. She played piano and I accompanied her on sax. The song had always been a favorite of my dad’s. His mom, whom I have never met, used to play it throughout the house while they cleaned back in the gap. We were practicing so the entire section could play it for his birthday the following month. It would be the perfect present. We worked through the tricky sharps and flats, going over each piece of the song measure by measure. Within an hour, we had most of it down pact. During that hour, I had missed three calls from my mom. I was in no hurry to call back.

A baby’s laugh fills the room. Doodlebug and I look at each other and burst into laughter upon realizing it was her new ringtone on her cell phone. However, the laughter doesn’t last long.

“It’s your mom,” she says.

“Ignore it.”

“No way,” she rolls her eyes and answers the phone.

I roll my eyes and watch her. At first, her mouth is opened in a wide O. Her eyes are big and she’s shaking slightly. Then her expression turns into one of guilt as she looks at me and confirms my whereabouts.

“Yes ma’am, she’s right here. We stayed in the band room today.”

I struggle to cover a laugh. Doodlebug winces as she looks at me again and I straighten up. Her posture turns rigid; I imagine my mom yelling at her. She could be brutal when she wanted to and I hoped this wasn’t the case.

“I’ll tell her.”

“Why’d you answer? “I ask her, groaning and lying down on the floor

“I think it’s a good thing I did. Your mom is on her way here. Your dad is being rushed to the hospital. He threw up blood in Brookshire’s and his blood pressure is low. They think he could die,” she snapped.

I can tell she wants to take back every word and the way she’s delivered her speech, but she doesn’t. That wouldn’t help either of us right now. The walls don’t look as lavish as they had a few hours before, yet I find myself staring at them again. The color has dulled, and it’s getting a little blurry. The black eight notes move in different directions and then I can’t see them anymore. The first tear falls and I wipe it, silently pulling myself together. I don’t face her when I turn around again.

I bite back the stinging retort sitting on my tongue and begin packing my things. Embarrassment and anger became apparent in my movements, but Doodlebug understood why. She said nothing. I throw the music in my backpack, slamming the binder shut. The clang of the metal snaps is satisfying in my anger.

Daddy had a long history of drinking and hospital visits. He always promised he would do better and stop drinking. Then I would get a call much like this one, requesting our presence at the hospital. Doodlebug had been there for most of those calls. She never has a bad thing to say and she supports me. We are forever, thunder and lightning.

As I get ready to leave, she hugs me.

“It’ll be fine. It always is,” she reassures me.

I shrug her off and give a half-hearted wave. Yeah, whatever.

“See ya, kid.”

My mother shoots me a glare as I slink into the back seat. I give her my best Cheshire cat grin and wait for the explosion. It doesn’t come. Instead she gives a resigned sigh and continues driving. I know I have disappointed her, but I cannot bring myself to empathize with her. I can’t even make myself feel the slightest bit guilty. She’s a working woman; she works to accommodate for our needs. I guess I could pretend to be gracious and answer her phone calls. I also know that she’s waiting for an apology she’ll never receive. What use is there in spouting off words that I don’t mean? Insincerity is not my strong point. I watch her brow furrow with an indescribable emotion. Worry? Anger? Confusion?

“How is he?”

My question receives no answer and the silence remains unbroken the rest of the way.

The streets are black and the sky outside is basically the same-the stars don’t shine in the city. The moon sheds a dull light over the black canvas and it’s a beauty I can appreciate. The night is uncomfortable. I prepare myself for the unnerving feelings I am sure to feel. As usual, I’m always right.

The sky is illuminated, meaning we’ve reached the hospital.

I’d always assumed that hospitals were the light at the end of the tunnel. When we got there, they’d patch my dad up nice and send him right back home. They could fix everything. My dad, on the other hand, hated doctors and hospitals with a passion. He avoided them at all costs. Smart man he was.

In 2012, Ronald was a patient in Stanley hospital for a hernia he needed removed. We woke up promptly at 6 a.m., excited that he’d be basically back to normal again. The hernia had ruined his self-esteem for years.

“How’s it feel to be a new man?” The doctor asks my dad.

“It feels great; I’m not drinking again. Ever.”

I believed him.

The doctors failed to inform him of the complications of the story and the ones that could result after the surgery. One doctor lost a staple in his stomach during the surgery. He didn’t know he couldn’t move around as much. The incision ripped open, leaving him bleeding and where they found the staple. It’s weird how things so small can have such a big impact. After that incident, I changed my mind.

I think of hospitals, precisely Stanley, as the headlights on cars right before they hit the deer. They treat patients as roadkill. Patients are roadkill. Ronald was roadkill.

I was always on edge with hospital visits. The sense of doom had already showed its face before we got there.

Stanley Medical is situated at the end of the hood, near the interstate. It stands out against the sky, all bright lights and windows. The waiting room is filled with all my “aunts” and “siblings”. I hate my father’s sisters with everything in me and I can bet my life that they feel the same. Yorke, Zion, and me were all born out of wedlock and we are the children of the woman wo was not my father’s wife. They have no problem reminding us of that; we are not important to them. Zeno, one of my brothers, looks up and then away again. The other two, Morty and Deon, don’t even acknowledge me.

Raven, Bria, and Zoaria haven’t arrived. Quita, the eldest and worst of the siblings has the hospital alive with melodrama Tears flow down her cheeks in pairs. Her eyelashes are stuck together and look like soggy broom straws. Her eyes are red-rimmed, yet she still manages to send my mom, Yorke and me a look remarkably full of disgust.

“What y’all here for?”

We don’t participate in this exchange of words, knowing what she wants. She wants a fight. She wants us to know that we are still only outsiders to them. We are not his “real” children; she doesn’t want us there. I think a thirty-three year-old could behave a little better, but I guess not.

I don’t have time for this. They’re all stupid wastes of space. We find a corner of the room away from them, an embodiment of the long-standing divide between us. I’m content with it and proceed to ignore them.

Today is Monday. Monday… which is today. The doctor said they would call Willis- Knighton in Shreveport to inquire about your transplant. Truth is, I’m scared. They say you had to have gone six months without alcohol to be on the list. That is a bullshit rule if you ask me. You are in critical condition. CRITICAL. All they can say is you’re an alcoholic and shrug their shoulders? That’s not worth shit. It’s not. They see you as Ronald Burns, another alcoholic patient. You’re not the first and you definitely won’t be the last. You don’t mean anything to them. You never will. I see you as Ronald Burns-my dad, my best friend, my everything. You are a brother, a friend, a grandfather, uncle, and so much more. Can you tell me whose opinion matters more? Can you tell me which one you should be judged upon? Can you tell me which one would save your life?

The choice should be obvious, right? If only you would have said something earlier. Maybe you could have gotten a living donor transplant. We wouldn’t have had to depend on the yes or no of biased doctors. This would be so much easier if liver transplants worked differently. If enough organs were available. If as many people were as compassionate as you are.

Speaking of compassion, I recently heard that you donated all of RJ’s organs. I truly did not know that. Just like mama says all the time, I wish someone would show you that same amount of compassion.

Sometimes, I think of all the things you can’t do right now. I think of the way you lay in the hospital bed, and I wonder why you can’t enjoy the reality of living. You can’t breathe or eat, talk or laugh, nor walk and play around. Instead, you’re “breathing” through a ventilator, mute, and immobile in a cold hospital room. I feel so bitter. It’s not fair. There are people who have done things far worse than he has and they’re living the good life. Why him, God? He drinks from loneliness and grief. RJ died before his time. He lost a kid. We always avoided him. His love interests don’t want him. His wife died; he lost his job. Who wouldn’t drink after that?

If anyone, why not punish us? I would gladly take this punishment for him, so long as he doesn’t suffer anymore.

I pray that you get the transplant that you need. I can’t lose you. You’re one of the constants in my life. If I lose you, I’ll have next to nothing. I love you dude. You can’t give up. You really do have to keep fighting. I wish I could do it for you because I feel like I’m not doing enough. Ever.

Brielle

That night, Daddy threw up three pints of blood. He had a soft stomach and we were told he was going into liver failure. We were told to prepare for long nights and tears. We had to expect the worst possible outcome and stick with each other through the hardest times. The doctors would be there for and with us through it all. Or so they said.

“He could make it through,” Cinnamin says, “We can put him on the transplant list and he might be able to get a liver. Don’t give up.”

Cinnamin is my dad’s nurse. She is somewhat nice and claims she does everything she can to help him.

“He’s a very difficult man,” she tells my mom.

Tell me about it.

The next three weeks were hell. My dad got worse. He was back in a coma and they were feeding him through a tube. The bag of food was mushy and brown. It was slop you’d feed to a pig. His blood pressure constantly dropped and I stared at the monitor, giving disgust an entirely different meaning. The monitor beeped and beeped and I wanted to throw it in the worst way.

The family fought a lot and tension lurked around every corner.

My mother prayed for my father’s well-being. My father’s sister hated it.

“You don’t belong here, Margie. You not family”

She usually sneered when she made those kinds of remarks. She believed everyone was beneath her, but she was the vilest human being on earth. We were never allowed around her. She even went as far as to tell the doctors that my mom was an outsider and might be doing voodoo on my dad. That little stunt almost got her barred from visitation. I hate her.

My dad was no longer married and had no current spouse, so the decisions regarding his care were left to the children. Correction, the children excluding us. Yorke, Zion, and I were left out of most of the medical decisions. What in the world could a thirteen, sixteen, and seventeen-year-old possibly contribute to something so important? My mom was left out because she was considered an outsider. She wasn’t family, as my aunts so nicely worded it.

I think the four of us could have contributed a hell of a lot more than a bunch of spiteful idiots who were mad at the world for things beyond their control. My dad could have been given better care. He could have had everything he needed somewhere else.

I cried myself to sleep for days and I hated myself for it. I shouldn’t feel emotions that tore me apart inside. Sixteen is the carefree age. I was supposed to be happy. I told myself to man up and got angry when I didn’t. The pain would only get worse and I couldn’t handle a little fear. Fighting to get through the next hospital day would be my new routine.

I watched a man lay in a hospital bed for two weeks, comatose. He didn’t say a word. He didn’t open his eyes or cough. The walls stayed the same- grey sheetrock the color of asphalt. Wires came from different machines but all connected to the man in the bed. The beep of the monitor echoed throughout the rom, sometimes frightening me.

The ventilator that sustained my father’s life withheld my own breathing. It was always pins and needles. I always wondered of it would stop working, if it would stop supplying oxygen for my dad. I wondered if the machine would cut off in the middle of the night. I thought that if it did, doctors wouldn’t get there in time to fix it. I hoped and prayed that they could fix my dad. I wished I could have done it myself. After all, if you want something done, you should do it yourself.

Right.

11/18/14

They said you couldn’t breathe today. That you were only breathing fifty times a minute and you have to sit up to do that much. You’d either get back on the ventilator or you won’t make it through the night. We have to make the decision. I don’t know how I feel right now. I cannot cry. I feel so numb and out of touch with everything and everyone. Everyone is thinking you won’t make it, but no one will say it out loud. I don’t want to believe that. I want you to make it. I want you to live. You don’t deserve this. It’s not fair. I’m sorry, but I choose the ventilator.

I prefer that if it will save your life. I think it’s funny though. The thing that restricts your freedom and dictates your life for you, is the thing that will save your life. It’s ironic in a way. However, if it will save your life, I prefer that. This hurts so bad and it is not a feeling I would wish on my worst enemy. Yorke is crying and I think Mama is too. Is it bad that I can’t? They make me feel evil. How do you grasp something like this? How would YOU grasp something like this? Reality is ugly; the last thing I want to do is face it. All I want is for you to be saved. That’s all.

Brielle

As we grow up, eventually we’ll have our first nightmare. We won’t necessarily remember what happened. We won’t necessarily remember what we were afraid of. But I think we will remember the feelings. I think we will remember what we did to stop the fear, and I think we will remember how it felt to conquer it. We’ll remember that we woke up from it and that it’s over.

I lived my nightmare repeatedly in that hospital. It was always loss after loss and this would be my biggest loss of all. My dad.

It’s over and if it isn’t, then it’s getting there. We sit in the same places staring at each other. The clock ticks monotonously. We nibble on waiting room snacks, which the nurses so kindly replenish every morning. No one can stomach anything else.

Oprah is on the television. Something about a new weight loss pill. She’s been there since I woke up this morning and I was getting tired of her. I was getting tired of this hospital period. I felt the first stirrings of anger at my father. Was his alcohol so important? Did he really need to indulge himself so often? why did he constantly put us through this? In that moment, I truly understood the meaning of red hot anger. It blinded me.

The anger made me nauseous. It consumed my very being. I began to hate the anger, something that seems impossible on paper. I grew weary of the feeling and figured out my only solution. I had to turn it off. I had to turn them all off. From this point forward, I would feel nothing. Nothing and no one would get to me like this ever again. I would feel nothing.

Doctor Nash finally arrived with the results of the shunt procedure. It was what we had been waiting on all morning. They would inject a sensor with a balloon on the end into his veins to stop them from collapsing. It would increase his blood flow and buy him a little more time. I felt a buzz in my chest.

“The procedure failed,” he announced. “We were not able to get the shunt through his veins. The veins are all too shallow and blocked. I’m sorry.”

I felt nothing.

Daddy,

11/20/14

If only you knew how you looked right now.

Lord, if you are going to take him away from us right now, all I ask is that you stop his suffering. In all honesty, I want you to keep him here and I somewhere deep inside that it is a selfish want. I did a lot of selfish things now and when things weren’t this bad. I wish I could take them back. I don’t want him to go. I just want my daddy back. If you take him, take good care of him and let him find the peace he’s been looking for and the happiness he needs. Let him know that we all loved him. We have always loved him. Let him know that I always loved him even if I failed to show him seventy-five percent of the time. I hope he can forgive me and I hope he’s a perfect little angel for you if this doesn’t work in my favor. He’s always been too good for this place.

Daddy, I love you. So much. If you are saying goodbye now, I miss you already. I’m going to continue missing you for an eternity. I hope you are not suffering and I hope that you’re okay. It was scary walking in today. Your blood pressure had dropped tremendously and blood was coming from everywhere. Tubes from the dialysis machine carried blood from unknown places and you were just lying there. Your eyes were open but you were unresponsive. It was weird. You were bleeding out...Doctors were stopping it and it seemed so unreal. That was the scariest thing I have ever seen. I just remember wondering how we had gotten to this point and not knowing the answer. I had so many questions and none of them had answers. It was aggravating.

Zeno said we didn’t need to see you like that. They said you died twice, but they brought you back. Was that what you wanted? Do you like what you’re seeing now?

Mama talks about you. She speaks of all those times you called her fat. You really were an endearing man Daddy. I don’t know how to feel. I would say numb, but you’ve heard that before. I have cried but I hate when others do the same. It makes these feelings so much worse. I. DON’T. KNOW. WHAT. TO. FEEL. This is a dream. I will wake up one day, right? I miss you talking and laughing. I love you.

12:32 a.m.

Brielle

Happy endings don’t exist. Life teaches you that. It shows you. If I believe otherwise, I become foolish. I learned a long time ago that hope is a dangerous thing.

Sometimes memories come back to us in the worst ways. They drag themselves from the dark recesses of your brain and they take over. They drive cars into ditches. They run over stop signs. They beat your heart down right in front of you and all you can do is watch. All you can do is feel. You welcome the rawest of emotions and you let them take over because there is nothing you can do to stop them.

The last time I saw my dad speak is the one memory that does me in. I keep reliving. The hospital room was colder than usual, but the mood was the complete opposite. That day all my brothers and sisters and their significant others filled the room. Raven, the second oldest, was singing. Her voice had always been heavenly. I walked in and I could feel all my burdens being lifted. I could feel the rainbow after the storm. Daddy had woken up from his coma today. He could hear me; he could see me.

He looked up as I entered the room. His eyes were red-bloodshot from being closed for so long I guessed.

“Hey Daddy,” I whispered.

My voice had left me. I didn’t realize how scared I had been until this moment. I had been waiting so long for him to wake up and the time was here. He smiled and continued to listen to my sister. I was grateful for that. I wasn’t ready for a full conversation just yet. I wasn’t even sure he was completely responsive.

I turned to my eldest sibling, Quita.

“Can he hear me?” I ask tentatively.

“Yeah, he up,” she said.

I can remember walking to the bed and sitting on the edge. My little brother held my dad’s left hand. I go to grab his right hand, which had the IV connected. He pulls away hurriedly and shakes his head no. Shock overcomes me, then anger, and last hurt. What could I possibly have done in so little time?

Mama must have seen the look on my face. She stares at me for a few seconds and I despise the look of sympathy in her eyes. She grabs my hand instead and rubs my back.

“The IV is in that hand,” she starts. “You probably hurt him with your touch; that’s why he doesn’t want you to hold his hand. Cheer up, little one. “

Relief washes over me and I shoot her a grateful smile.

Raven had finished singing. We all hugged each other and smiled. Today was going to be a great day. Daddy looked at us and I swore I could see tears in his eyes.

************

Can we go now?” I ask him as he sits there.

He just stares at the ditch across the field, sipping the beer from his can. This is the waiting game. Which one of us will break first? I sit in anger. He always comes to this gas station, the Exxon off the highway. It is always teeming with men, who sit and drink and discuss the football games.

Today, my dad doesn’t participate. Something is wrong. Somewhere in the darkest part of head, I’m afraid. I don’t want him to cause a scene in front of so many people, something he’s done so many times before. I don’t have Zion or Yorke to help restrain him this time, it’s just me. I would definitely lose.

He takes another sip from the can.

I watch him from the corner of my eye and he watches the windshield in front of him.

Suddenly, he turns.

“Y’all don’t care about me. Y’all don’t give a damn about me.”

“My son, my baby, they ran him over. I shouldn’t be living and my child is dead. Lord, please help me.”

RJ had died two months ago. He was walking in the street and a car hit him. He laid there for a few minutes before another car hit him, killing him. My dad never recovered from that.

His eyes are wild. He grips my wrist, a little too hard for my liking. Our eyes lock in a death glare, neither of us looking away. He always hated when I challenged him- a trait I had picked up from the man across from me. This continues until he looks away, something that has never happened before.

Water pricks the corner of his eye and falls over his eyelid. The drop goes down his face and travels to his beard, where it disappears.

This is new.

Never had my father ever allowed any of us to see him cry. He believed that men never cried. Crying makes you a wuss. If you can’t handle your own pain, how could you ever call yourself a man?

I wanted to hug him, to help him sort out whatever he was feeling. I didn’t.

I often cried, and I often cried to him. He listened and he comforted me. In those moments, I felt like he was the only one that understood me. He was my friend. I only wish I had done the same for him in that moment.

I felt the salt on my tongue, realizing I had been crying with him. This life was not something we wanted. He wanted better for me and I especially wanted better for him.

“You’re still my daughter,” he said.

And you’re still my father.

The broken man in front of me was not someone I recognized. Tears fell freely and he gripped the steering wheel, the color in his knuckles paling. The veins on his arms stood out, pronounced against his muscles. He was letting go. What I saw was a man so consumed with grief. He was in pain, apparent pain.

He gritted his teeth before banging his fist into the steering wheel, doing it over and over and over and over again. I waited and waited for the end but it never came. I waited for him to completely lose it and throw us forward into that ditch. I waited for the truck to flip over and I waited to feel the glass shards cut into my face, into my arms and legs. I waited to feel the pain he was feeling. I waited to feel the end.

It never came.

**************

“My family,” he whispered. “My family all here together.”

Content for the moment, I sit on a nearby stool and watch everyone around me. I hadn’t felt this happy in so long and I had forgotten what it looked like. The scene painted before me was one I had only seen in movies. My dad looked so peaceful in the dove colored hospital sheets. His pillows were fluffed to perfection. His black and grey speckled hair was a nice contrast to the white surrounding him. He was telling stories and making everyone laugh, finally comfortable in this environment. His face mimics that of a three-year-old in a candy store. His grin stretches from ear to ear and he lies back, satisfied with himself. He was happy and that’s all that mattered. He had finally gotten what he wanted and I was, in turn, ecstatic for him.

My mom and Zion were sitting in the window, Yorke standing close by. Quita, Raven, Bria, and Zoaria stood in various spots around the bed, staring wide eyed at the miracle that was upon us. Zeno, Morty, and Deon were behind them, all holding back tears because God forbid they shed tears.

Cinnamin, the nurse walks in and smiles before turning back around. She understands how much we all need this moment.

“…and it was beautiful. It was magnificent.”

Interested, I tune into this story.

“He opened the gates for me and it was beautiful. It was the most beautiful thing I’ve seen. Flowers were everywhere and there was a fountain with water so bright. It was so pure. I just know I saw heaven. I didn’t even want to come back here.”

“You ain’t wanna come back?!” Zeno asked, astounded.

“Hell no,” Daddy exclaims.

“Not even for us,” Deon said.

“Not even for y’all,” Daddy confirms.