The reason for my visit to father after so many years of short letters that held merely the common day inquiries of “I hope you are well” and “How is Jenna?” was simple. To be honest, I’m surprised he even knew about Jenna. His son’s relationships had never seemed to pose much interest to a man of so many other interests. He never made contact with mother. And despite this, despite this blatantly obvious stance against wanting to see her, and in spite of my conflicting feelings about their destructive relationship, I had come for the purpose of taking father back to my home town. To meet Jenna, to live in our home, to be a grandfather to my children, the children he had never sent presents to on their birthdays or at Christmas.
The truth is that in a few years’ time progress would come so close to father’s doorstep that in stepping out of the house to admire the view, he would no longer recognize the mountainous neighborhood that was once his beloved home. Just like weather, like relationships, like anything living and growing, places change. And they often change so drastically that you struggle to find something to hold onto. Dad sought comfort in this land, but there were things he did not know, and things that I did know. It was time to leave.
But how could we leave now that I had shared my secret?
I stayed in bed for four days, with father coming in every once in a while to check up on me and feed me if I was hungry. Silently. Yes, he did not talk. Ever since I had cleared my conscience of the nagging guilt imposed by Iqbal’s story, it was as if another part of my life had closed its doors.
Whenever he entered the room and focused those brilliant eyes on my frail face in a query of whether I was hungry, I often shook my head. I was hungry. But not so much for food. I was hungry for compassion. Couldn’t someone tell me I had done the right thing? Or at least that I had done all I could, and there was nothing else I could have done? The silent treatment was what I deserved, but when emotion mixes with rationality, what do you expect? It is not often that we reveal to a father of a long-distance relationship the hardest secret of our life, more so a secret in which we require comfort.
We can never predict the response. I have learned that. And just as on the fourth day I was ready to leave, father came into my room and iterated the three words I would have dreaded on any other day, but had been waiting for ever since the truth came out.
With a serious expression that let me guess at nothing, although perhaps the slight twinkle in his eye could have given something away, he spoke, “Come. Let’s talk.”
Anna Zhigareva (NZ)