Chapter 26 - What Dad knew
Three years after the kitchen floor, Dad and I sat on his porch.
Emma was seven.
She was drawing chalk planets on his driveway.
Dad said:
“You know people still tell the story like I knew everything.”
“What everything?”
“That David was stealing. That he was violent. That I built some rescue plan because I saw the future.”
“You did build the phone.”
“After you told me he blocked the garage.”
“Fair.”
He watched Emma.
Then:
“I missed plenty.”
“Like what?”
“You kept saying David handled money. I thought that was foolish.”
“Thank you.”
“I didn’t ask why you had stopped wanting to look.”
I thought.
I had no answer.
Dad continued:
“I was so busy being right about the arrangement that I never asked whether you were afraid of what you’d find.”
That landed.
I had been.
Not physically at first.
Financially.
Emotionally.
What if the account was fine and I looked paranoid?
What if it was not fine and my marriage changed?
Avoidance had protected uncertainty.
Until it could not.
I said:
“You told me to leave that morning.”
“Yes.”
“I didn’t.”
“I know.”
“Do you blame me?”
Dad looked almost offended.
“For being shoved?”
“No.”
“For having Emma there.”
He took a long breath.
“I wish you had left.”
“So do I.”
“That isn’t blame.”
May you like
It took me years to understand the difference between regret and blame.
Both can occupy the same room.
