Father
"Buhbye!" called Tom. He stood at the door, about to do his weekly shopping. He looked hopefully up to the top of the stairs, where his daughter's room was.
"Bye," she called down, sounding as if she barely even turned her head from the computer screen. His face fell, dejected and sad that she was so unaffected by his comings and goings. Every once in a while, his one little hope would come true. He would say bye from the bottom of the stairs as usual, and instead of her just echoing his call, would yell down "Wait!" She would come bounding down the stairs, creating her very own version of thunder. "Bye!" she would say as she stopped on the landing and threw her arms around his neck in a wonderfully warm embrace.
But it seemed these occasions came fewer and fewer all the time. His beautiful, caring daughter had become as hard to spot as a bald eagle in Africa. He would pick her up to spend the weekend, and she would immediately flee to the room that she had renovated into an almost-apartment. She had a computer, TV, her own phone line, and the bathroom was the next door over. All she needed was a mini-fridge and a microwave oven and the girl would never have to surface again. He closed the door behind him, locking it as he always did, and making his little pact with God that his little girl would stay safe today. There was a sadness in him that she never offered to come out anymore, but he knew that it was just a trip to the grocery store. He went off, got into the car, and thought of how good it used to be, when she wasn't ashamed to be seen with him and enjoyed taking walks and playing tennis. There were the long games of chess and checkers, the scary movies where she would have to sit in his lap, and the days when she didn't flinch when he rubbed her shoulder. But those days seemed long gone, so he sighed and carried on.
With only a year before she was to go off to college, Tom felt his precious time with his daughter slipping away. And it pained him every time he looked at a calendar; it was like he could see the minutes, hours, days, and months flying by right in front of his face.
He tried to initiate things, anything from conversation to actually going out together. But she always found a way to get out of it. She didn't want to watch the ice-skating show because ice-skaters made her nervous. She didn't want to play tennis; it was too hot. She didn't want to take a bike ride; she was too tired. And she didn't want to talk because her show was on, or her friends were online, or she was on the phone. It especially stung when she was on the phone with her mother, instead of talking with him. She had avoiding him worked down to a science, and had turned it into an artform, seeing how long she could avoid him without him actually realizing it. Of course he always knew what she was doing, but whether he chose to recognize it was another issue. The one time he learned so much about her was when he watched her mom and her, goofing around and talking a mile a minute. They had so much fun, rattling off stories about guy friends and girl friends and work and school. One would start a story, but would be interrupted by the other's comment, followed by a completely different story, all of them unfinished. They laughed at silent inside jokes and couldn't even begin to fill him in. He sat back and watched, taking in what he could. She told her mother everything, and he never ceased to be amazed. All he ever wanted was for her to simply tell her what went on in school. He longed for a close relationship with his only daughter.
In her freshman year, they had begun a ritual for mid-year exams. He would pick her up when she was done for the day, and they would go out for lunch. This was one time she did talk to him. She told him what exam was hard and which ones were incredibly easy. She didn't mind seeing him and talking to him. This was when he drank in her joy and her time, saturating his need to feel like he was part of her life. His whole world stopped when her mid-year exams rolled around. The rest of the year he would rely on the joy he got from those five lunches.
But this year the ritual changed. She had her own car she could drive to school, so he no longer had to pick her up. The first day they met at a local diner, but she seemed distant; detached. She wasn't really in a hurry, but she didn't linger like usual. The hug he received was cool, and without emotion, like it was out of habit and duty.
For the next three days, lunch was carried out the same way as the first. Then on Friday, he got a call around ten o'clock. "Hi Daddy, it's me. I can't talk long, I'm on my cell and I have to go to my next test."
"Is everything all right, honey?" he asked with concern.
"Oh, yeah, Dad, it's just that something came up after for after school, and I was wondering if we could do dinner instead?" She asked so calmly and plainly, meanwhile he was falling to pieces. She had been slipping away from him; slowly, but still slipping, and now the only delight he had was when they had their lunches. Dinner should have been just as good, but there was a certain stab that came with it, as their ritual would be broken. Without it, he might not know what to do. "Dad?" she asked after a minute. "Are you still there?"
"Yes, honey. I guess that'll be alright," he said, forcing the words out of his mouth, as he proclaimed his own death sentence.
"Oh, thank you so much, Daddy! I'll call you later, I really have to go. Bye!!"
"Bye," he said softly after the click, trying to delight simply in the fact that she was happy.
Time began to escape him, and the countdown commenced. School was over, and Tom watched his daughter graduate, beaming proudly the whole time. Summer started, and Tom experienced the onset of minor anxiety attacks whenever he looked at a calendar. She seemed to have the same syndrome, but instead of clinging to her family, she spent even more time with her friends. Every night they were somewhere else, and she when she spent the night at his house, she came home too tired to talk. He would always wait up for her, hoping for some little story to help him feel connected, but it rarely ever came.
As the summer drew to a close, she began to say tearful goodbyes to friends, scattering themselves about the country. It seemed like someone left almost everyday. She started her packing, deciding what to keep, what to toss, what to take with her. The time came when it was time for her to say goodbye to everyone, and to leave for school. The night before she left, he heard her sobbing into a pillow, and fought the urge to go in and comfort her. The last time he had tried, she had gotten even more upset.
In the morning, they loaded her bags into her car and his. Her mom drove her car, and brought her half-sister. In his car, the ride was long and silent, as he tried to think of something memorable to say to the grown woman sitting beside him. He glanced over at her and thought of all the little joys he had collected throughout her life. The year she insisted on decorating the Christmas tree herself, but forgot the lights and cried because she thought she had ruined it. The time she starred in the elementary school production of The Wizard of Oz. The family trip they took to Disney World before the divorce. Damn that divorce. He would have had so much more time with her and been a bigger and better part of her life. But would the extra involvement have been worth the aggravation and misery caused by an unhappy marriage? Could he have survived that? More importantly, would his daughter have survived it? Looking back, he had enjoyed having his little girl around, even when she was holed in her room with the computer, TV, and radio all going at once. She had just always added something to the atmosphere of the house. He always turned down dates when he knew she would be at his house for the night. The ever-so-faint sounds of her television and radio drifting out her door and down the stairs to his ears made him smile, and it was good to know he wasn't alone in a typically empty house.
It was a long ride, but when they reached the college, he felt it was too short. He was not yet ready to let his little girl out into the world, but would rather take her in his arms and protect her forever.
They helped her unpack and get settled in, but that was all. It was late, and they still had the three hour drive home. She brought her family to the door to say a final goodbye, but remembered her mother's purse that was left in her room. Her mom and sister went with her to find it underneath some pile of clothes or books or cds. Her father, already having gotten his goodbye, and wanting to be out of the other student's way, called "Buh bye!" from the bottom of the stairs.
"Wait!" came a frantic voice he could hear only faintly. She came trampling down the stairs, just like old times. She reached the landing, and just before she threw her arms around his neck, he saw that her eyes were filled with tears. He accepted the warm embrace, determined to never let her go. He knew that he would have to, and a tear rolled down his cheek, but he knew that everything would be alright.
-The End-
