Goodbye Daughter
opening excerpt
My time with Tat had gone by too fast.
I thought this day would get easier each year. I believed I would either grow numb to the pain or strong enough to bear it. Neither happened. I never imagined that I could feel this way, that I could feel like a real father.
I didn’t know how I’d survive, but I had to put on a brave face for Tat.
She was still asleep upstairs, but soon the smell of the pancakes I was cooking would draw her to the kitchen like a moth to flame. She liked hers thin, not fluffy, with red currant sauce, not maple syrup. “And whipped cream, please, dad?” I could’ve made them in my sleep.
Between batches, I looked out the kitchen window. My backyard was a wild and tangled place; a melding of my cottage land and the forest that surrounded it. Blackberry bushes encroached on the neglected flagstone path that snaked through the garden. Vines swooped up the worn brick walls. Apple and pear trees vied for sunlight.
There was no one there. Not yet.
Tat’s footsteps thundered across the ceiling. I turned to the staircase in time to see my daughter come bounding down. She wore a lilac bathrobe, but she was unwashed. She never bothered washing on our last day together.
She ran to the stove, inhaled the smell of the pancakes, then turned and gave me a big hug. “Thank you, dad,” she said. She peeled off me, snatched up an orange from our fruit bowl, and bounced onto a stool at the counter.
“My pleasure,” I said, forcing a smile as I flipped one of the pancakes. I glanced out the window again. Still no one there. “Excited to see Bear-Mom?”
“Mm-hmm.”
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