Page 37 of Missing Moon
I hate myself for staying away so long. Dammit. Understanding (sorta) what happened to Mom changes so much about the past. Dad freaking out about me going to college might not have been his thinking girls weren’t smart enough for school. What if he was simply terrified of being alone? He didn’t want me to go away. He wanted me to stay and help. I think.
When we arrived a few minutes ago, I think we caught him sleeping. Or he’s on some serious painkillers.
Dusk leads Mom around to sit in the chair beside the bed. Mary Lou takes the other chair in the room. Ruby Grace sits cross-legged on the floor in the corner, still reading her tablet.
“Carolyn?” asks Dad in a weak voice that’s more whisper than anything.
“Mom’s right here.” Dusk guides Mom’s hand over to Dad’s.
Silence hangs for a moment before Dad gives a disappointed sigh. “Where’s Carolyn?”
Dusk and River exchange a glance that says they think Dad’s losing his mind. Clayton simply stares at the floor looking every bit as uncomfortable and awkward as I feel. I’m sure he would rather be anywhere but here… but we stay because, yeah. I’d hate myself more for running away now.
“When’s Carolyn going to be here?” asks Dad.
Mom (Carolyn) doesn’t react.
My brothers give him pitying looks. Dusk continues to try reassuring Dad that our mom is right next to him, holding his hand. It’s falling on deaf ears, though. Part of me wonders if Dad’s seeming incoherence is deeper than it looks. Does he somehow understand that she’s actually ‘gone’? That her soul is somehow missing? In a sense, Mom isn’t really here. Her body might be, butsheis not.
After another couple of minutes of Dusk trying to convince our father that Mom is, in fact, here, Dad makes this ‘yeah, okay, whatever’ face at him and looks up at the ceiling. At that point, he appears to realize the room is full of people. The strangest thing happens. He just starts randomly talking to us like it hasn’t been fourteen years or more since any of us have been in this part of California.
Mary Lou has been a bit more dutiful than me. She’s taken her kids out to visit more than once. I want to say the last time they were out here, Ruby Grace was about twelve… which would be four years ago. Dad recognizes the grandkids without too much difficulty. He mistakes Anthony for Danny. When his attention finally goes in my direction, he gets this little sparkle in his eye.
“Sammie.” He chuckles dryly. “You look great. You go vegan?”
An argument could be made that a vampire who hated drinking blood counts as a vegan in some way. More so now that I’ve left that whole cycle behind. Feeding on psychic energy hurts no one. So yeah, I suppose Iama vegan in technicality.
“Kinda,” I say. “I’m on a new diet now. Not so much protein.”
“Come here, Sammie.” Dad reaches for me.
I walk closer to the bed and take his hand. He feels so brittle now. “Hi, Dad.”
“Glad you showed up before I checked out.” He coughs, almost hard enough that the oxygen tube in his nose comes flying out. “Wasn’t sure if you would.”
“Sorry. I…” I look down. “Should’ve visited you before. Things got complicated.”
“I don’t blame you.” He reaches up with his left hand to adjust the oxygen hose. “I wasn’t the best dad. Sorry I didn’t do a better job.”
“You were hardly abaddad,” I say to the mattress beside him. “Just a bit… umm…”
“Neglectful at times,” says Mary Lou in a flat, nonjudgmental tone.
Dad wheezes a chuckle. “Yeah, that’s about right. I gave in to my demons and hid in a bag of weed. Sometimes, my memory is just a blur of baseball games and rattling around the house.”
I don’t know what to say. All the anger I’d felt for him over the years is gone. In its place is something made of pity and guilt.
He starts crying. “I don’t really have too many memories of my family. Was so afraid of messing things up I just… ran away from you all.”
River, Clayton, and Dusk rush over to the bed at the same time. We all reassure Dad that he did what he could. He worked his ass off, even if that meant being away for months at a time. Paradoxically, Mary Lou is the one being standoffishnow. She’s absolutely entitled to feel resentful for the parents dumping their duties on her when she was still a child herself. My sister probably thinks I’m weak for caving in to guilt and not being angrier with Dad.
Pops mumbles apologies to the boys for being gone so much, then looks at me. “Sammie, you know that argument we had?”
It’s tempting to say I barely remember it, but it feels wrong to lie to him. “Yeah. I do. Look, Dad. I’ve been mad at you for a long time for that. And, umm…” I glance at Mom. “I just recently started thinking you might have been dealing with more than just the idea that girls are too stupid for college.”
Ruby Grace looks up from her tablet at last to give me a quizzical stare. A brilliant girl, she’s going to ask me to explain this later tonight, I bet.
“I didn’t mean any of that.” Dad stares down at his chest, where wiry grayish hairs poke out the neck of his ill-fitting hospital smock. “You were the last one left. Sadly, I tried to convince you to stay, and I ended up driving you off even faster. I’m sorry, sweetie. I never meant to say you were stupid or not worth getting yourself an education. I’m just a stupid old man stuck in his stupid old ways, and I was afraid of being alone.”