Come back soon…Part three

I fell asleep….The crying and the tension and Teddy leading to the whole thing with mom and stuff. I guess it all just added up and was too much too soon for me to stay awake.

It’s dark in my room when I wake up and there’s a telling scent in the air. Leather and cologne but over that the scent of wine dipped cigars that were a hallmark of my dad.

Dad…he’s scruffy looking as usual and smells like he just came back from having a smoke and he sets down the Grisham he was reading and fixes me with that dad stare.

It’s late and I’m pretty sure past regular visiting hours and he’s looking at me. I had no idea what to say or to do really. I mean my father’s not a mean guy but he’s really a guy. He’s that guy that works with his hands and he’s one of those guys that just does it all.

He’s got his mechanics course under his belt and small and heavy engine repair and he wears engine smells like aftershave sometimes. I mean when he bothers to shave. Dad’s no Duck dynasty guy but he’s one of those shaves when mom asks him guys. Hunts and fishes and all that stuff too and he’s just one of those guys.

Did I mention the cigars and the leather jacket?

I mean Teddy, he gets a pass with dad because he’s a kid and Dad doesn’t like expect that much from him other than that.

Okay he does…we all have to have good grades and do chores and dad didn’t doesn’t believe in being too easy on us because he says it builds character. Like never using the ride on mower we have or the snow blower because me and James were old enough to shovel, the same with doing dishes.

Okay I didn’t mind the dishes that much.

I blink and take a breath. “Hi dad…”

“Hmm…yeah that’s it hi?”

“I…I…I’m sorry…”

“Well there’s a start, you need to be sorry with what you did? What you have been doing?’

“I know…I know it’s I’m sorry it’s…I just can’t be someone I’m not anymore dad.” (Snuffle.) “I just can’t”

“Good.”

Good?

Huh?

“Good?”

“I never raised you to be one of those people that would rather lie than face up to the truth.”

(Snuffle.) “What should I have manned up to face it?”

“Yeah I think you should have.”

“Well I’m not a very good man dad in fact I’m not a man at all.”

“That doesn’t really matter Jennifer.”

Uhm what!?

I think I’m looking at him in a freaked out way.

“It doesn’t?”

“I thought that I raised you well enough that you’d have known better than to do this. Pills and wine and trying to kill yourself when you have family that loves you and people that love you and you put us all through a living hell by doing this.”

“I’m sorry….” My chest hurts and I feel like crying again but I’m still kind of dried out from my last big bout of crying with mom.

“Good, you should be. You imagine how it would feel if you actually did it? We’d have no warnings just this part of you that you hid and kept from us for who knows how long suddenly there and out in the open…and leaving all of us wondering why, why wouldn’t she trust us? Why wouldn’t she tell us what was going on? And what if it was something that we did or way more that we didn’t do that led you to killing yourself?”

Dried out or not the tears are coming. “I’m sorry dad; I’m so fucking sorry I was scared! I was scared that I was a freak no matter how much stuff I read and looked up I felt like I was failing you just like I’ve been doing all of you all my life!”

He looks at me. He gets up and goes over to my little service table rolly thing and he pours me a cup of water. I take it and take some grateful mouthfuls. I look at him and I’m still kind of lost.

“Dad…?”

“Hmm?” He makes that question sound he’s so good at.

“I’m sorry…I really am…but what do I do?”

He looks at me and he goes back over and he sits back down and does that groan huff of being overworked and stressed and tired and I lower my eyes and just stare at my waxed paper cup. It just kind of highlights that he’s here and he’s likely been here too the whole time and as disappointed as he is of me because of what I nearly did he’s still here.

And he does look more tired than I’m used to seeing him being.

Work’s one thing but this.

He looks at me. “You make up for it Jen. You do the hard stuff and you own up to what you’re feeling and you make the changes that you need to make to tell the truth…not just to me or your family or Marlene but to yourself.”

“I know…”

“Do you? You said you keep failing me and that’s not really true. All those things that you’ve been doing weren’t you. They were Michael and you’ve said that’s not you.”

“It’s not.”

“Then by God you don’t just quit. You pick yourself up like your mother did and you keep going. You’re her daughter; I want you to act like it.”

“Dad….”

He holds his hand up. “I love you; I will always love you you’re my daughter… (He looked like he was trying that one on for size.) but you really, really fucked up here Jennifer.”

“You don’t hate me?” (Sniffle.)

“No…not by a long shot.”

“But…?”

He gets up and he heads for the door and his voice is hoarse and thick with emotion. “But you have a lot of work to do before I’ll trust you and be proud of you again.”

“Dad…”

He opens the door and he steps out of the room and before he closes it I hear him say. “But I want to be proud of you angel…so much.”

He leaves closing the door and I can still sort of see him through the blinds and the glass and he’s wiping at his eyes.

I feel sort of happy and heartbroken by want he said all at the same time and it hurts…I mean it hurts so much that I did this and that I hurt him so much.

I made my daddy cry…

I’m hugging myself and the water cup gets spilled as my own tears and hurt because of what I did comes flooding up and I roll over onto my side facing the blank wall and bawl and whine.

“I’m sorry daddy…I’m so sorry…!”