I made calls to work and my close friends and then called my little sister. She was eerily calm and quiet. I wondered if she truly knew what had happened or if her stepdad had softened the blow for her. A twelve-year-old girl sat alone in her bedroom at her mom’s house, miles from my reach. How could he do this to her? She shouldn’t have to face this. She shouldn’t have to hear grownups explain that her dad was gone and, even worse, that he was gone by his own hand. My instinct was to go rescue her, but I wasn’t in a position to help anyone else. I was a mess and could hardly keep myself together. I wouldn’t have been able to be strong for her.
Slowly my house began to fill with people. I couldn’t decide if I needed them there or wanted them all to just go home. I was mad at everyone, even though the person who was truly at fault was gone. I wanted someone to blame, someone to curse and hate. My friends and family came to love on me, but I couldn’t pretend to care. One of my friends pulled me into the bathroom, sat down in front of me, and let me just cry and shake my head in grief. Very softly she asked if I had called my dad and told him that I forgave him, something we had talked about me doing only a month before. I continued to shake my head no and felt guilty for not forgiving him. I offered few words on how I was feeling, but words weren’t needed. I remained still, staring forward with tears streaming down my face and shaking my head.
Maybe if he had been a good dad, then the people gathered around me would have known what to say. Maybe if he had died a different way, they’d have known how to act. Maybe if they’d liked him, they’d have had the right words. But this was a man that very few people had truly cared about. This was a man that people had intentionally removed from their lives in an effort to protect themselves. I had done exactly the same thing. I wasn’t a fool. I knew how everyone in the room felt, and I knew they were truly at a loss for words for very good reason. But I needed to pretend for one second that he was a great loss to everyone.
I went to kiss my daughters goodnight and saw my little girl with the nebulizer mask on her face. How had I forgotten how sick she was? What kind of a mother was I? In my selfish despair, I simply kissed her head and turned to leave. I was a selfish little girl again who didn’t want to give any of herself to anyone else, not even the innocent little girl who was struggling to catch a breath. My chest hurt as deeply as hers did, and I struggled to catch my own breath. I didn’t bother to hide my tears or wipe them from my face; I let them form a trail behind me as I left her room.
Eventually everyone made their way home and my house stood quiet. I wondered how they could dare leave me like this and gave thanks for them leaving, all at the same time. Brandon was emotionally and physically exhausted from keeping the kids on their normal routine and getting them to bed on time when things were anything but normal. Within minutes of us getting into bed I heard his breathing slow down and become rhythmic. I knew he had fallen asleep. I lay quietly with my eyes wide open for the rest of the night.
Details about how my dad died and how he was found began to emerge early the next morning. My brother picked me up and together we headed to the funeral home to meet our aunt and uncle. My dad’s twin brother took the lead for us, as he had done many times throughout our lives. From the time we were small children, he acted as a disciplinarian when we needed it and loved on us the way our dad should have. He tried to help us through life’s big decisions and gave as much parental guidance as possible. As my dad’s twin, he was the closest person to him, and we viewed him as an extension of our dad. We clung to the hope that somewhere deep inside of our dad he was, on some level, like his brother. Our uncle did his best to stand in the gap our father left wide open in our lives, but he also had a family and kids of his own. We simply couldn’t take top priority and we understood.
My brother pulled his truck into the empty spot next to our uncle. We got out without saying a word and got into the backseat of his car, waiting for the funeral home to open. My uncle turned his body toward to us but never made eye contact. I don’t know if it was for his own sake, sparing himself from looking into my swollen eyes, or for my sake, sparing me from seeing the face of my father reflected in his. In his most fatherly voice, he asked us if we wanted to know what had happened that night in our dad’s hotel room. Simultaneously, I said yes and my brother said no.
My yes must have been louder than my brother’s no because my uncle began to detail the last actions of our dad. He gave us the short version, and it sufficed for the moment. I knew I would need more, and if it didn’t come from him, I would seek it elsewhere until every corner of my mind was satisfied.
My dad had tied one end of his makeshift noose to the towel bar in a hotel room and the other end around his neck. He then sat down and let it slowly strangle him until he let out his last breath. There wasn’t a single sign of struggle. He never once grabbed at his neck in a last ditch effort to save himself. The thought of his five children wasn’t enough to make him hook his fingers around his noose and attempt to pull it loose.
He sat there for three days until the maid came to clean his room and discovered what he had done.
My brother, uncle, aunt, and I sat in a tiny room inside the funeral home and made small talk, some about my dad and some about life in general. They did their best to be lighthearted, even sneaking in a joke or two, but my face never changed and the tears never stopped escaping from my eyes, no matter how hard I tried to stop them. Nothing was going to ease the pain I was feeling. It was a toxic mix of grief, guilt, and anger. I was so angry with everyone, especially the people in front of me. They were an easy target and I had a loaded bow, shooting arrows at everyone in my path.
We collectively made the choice of cremation and my uncle wrote a check so that neither my brother nor I would feel the financial burden. He tried to take away the burn of our dad sticking it to us one last time.
As delicately as my aunt could, she asked if we were going to cremate him and be done. I know she meant no harm in it and was only seeking information about our plans, but the question broke me. It reminded me of who and what my dad had truly been, and I wasn’t ready to deal with all that. I wasn’t ready to set aside the hurt of his suicide and face the realities of his life. I knew that no one liked my dad, many people even hated him, but I hadn’t considered that people would choose to quietly say good-bye and then move on, barely even blinking at what had just happened to his children and the gravity it had added to our lives. I knew I couldn’t do that. No matter how the world felt about my dad, I had to honor him on some level. It sounded crazy in my own head, so I can only imagine how it sounded when I said it out loud.
This wasn’t a mere moment for us. This was a life event that would change who we were forever. It had derailed us, changing the course of what we thought our future lives might look like. Aside from my brother and me, my dad had left three children who had not yet reached adulthood. I needed them to know that it was okay to love our dad and remember him with smiles, that someone loved him enough to hold a funeral in his honor out of respect. I needed them to understand that we can love people from afar and can forgive in all circumstances. I needed them to see people walk into a church and remind them that they are loved. Then again, maybe I did it just for me, because I wanted to pretend that my dad had loved me and I owed it to him.
I saw the shocked look on my brother’s face when I said I was going to have a funeral, but his words did not match his expression. I knew it was because he loved me more than he loved himself. He lovingly put his arm on my back and told me that he would do whatever I wanted. He would support me in my decision, like he had done my entire life.
We made arrangements for his cremation and funeral service, and then went to the police station to collect the items our dad had left behind. After a few hours of filling out paperwork and waiting, we walked out with a trash bag full of my dad’s belongings. My heart was racing to tear it open and inspect every single item. If it had been up to my brother, we wouldn’t have recovered the bag fro
m the evidence room. He wanted nothing to do with anything our dad had left behind.
Room 101
The moment my brother dropped me off at home, I almost ran to my room and emptied the contents of the bag onto my bed. His clothes, glasses, wallet, and a cane all sat on my bed. On top of the pile a small ziplock plastic bag caught my eye. When I picked it up I didn’t expect to get the information I was so desperate for. Written on the bag that contained the $16.34 the detectives pulled from my dad’s pocket was the hotel name and room number where they had found him. I had a piece of information in my hand that would slowly start to haunt me.
Room 101.
He took his life in room 101 of a Days Inn that I just happened to pass several times each day when I worked. I knew this hotel and the exit from the highway that led right to it. My desire to go there began to overwhelm me. I couldn’t focus on anything except that room. I wasn’t new to the feeling of wanting something that I knew was unhealthy for me. The craving I felt for this room was stronger than anything else I had ever felt. I wanted to know the color of the carpet and the layout of the room; the pattern of the bedspread haunted my dreams. I knew deep inside that nothing good would come of me experiencing room 101 for myself. But the need was like a lion to a lamb, and I didn’t stand a chance.
Only days after discovering where my dad took his life, I found myself on autopilot in that direction. I was going several miles per hour slower than the rest of the traffic so as not to miss my turn. I didn’t notice my breathing speed up as I slowly made the right turn into the Days Inn parking lot. Room 101 was the first to welcome me. Its entrance faced the highway, and as I turned in I almost ran into it.
There it was. I was only a turn of a door handle away from being in the very place my dad took his last breath. Desperation filled me. I parked my car and sat, staring at the door, unable to take my eyes off it. I stared at the door handle to room 101 for almost an hour, wishing I could turn it. I fantasized about booking the room but wondered if my request for that specific room would set off some internal alarm and they’d be on to me.
My dad left so much behind in that room, things invisible to the eyes. He left the shattered hearts of five children. He left questions that would never be answered. Room 101 was where all my worth sat, waiting for someone to rescue it and return it to me.
How was I not enough? If not me, how were my siblings not enough? When he tied that noose around his neck, did pictures of his kids flash through his mind? Did he cry? Did he whisper out loud how sorry he was for what he was about to do to us? How did the visual of my sister’s little chubby cheeks not stop him from tying the other end of the rope to the towel bar? He was a grandpa. How did the desperation of wanting to be a part of their lives not make him a better person? How did their precious names not weigh heavily on his heart in that very moment and force him to stand up?
Just stand up.
Why didn’t you just stand up?!
Room 101 turned me into a thirteen-year-old girl again, desperate for her dad, desperate for his approval. Desperate.
How?
Why?
I hate you, room 101.
I put the car in gear and slowly made my way out of the parking lot, knowing I’d be back. I was a moth and room 101 was my flame.
As I was pulling away I noticed that room 101 was the only room at the hotel that didn’t have blinds over the window above the door. It was a half-moon-shaped window and for some reason it was naked. Like a pot of water on a hot stove I slowly began to boil. My feelings were so mixed up and confused. The fact that the place where my dad took his last breath was exposed through a window was too much for me to handle. I needed the window to be covered. I needed the secrets to be hidden.
Please, God, make them cover the window.
That simple oversight by the hotel management was added to the list of things I obsessed over after my dad’s suicide.
Three days after I drove away from the hotel where my dad took his own life, I stood in front of a packed church and delivered his eulogy. The church wasn’t packed for him. The church was packed for me, my three brothers, and my little sister who hadn’t yet reached her teenage years. Unlike the time I spoke to a packed court about how terrible my dad was at being a dad, this time I had to find a way to speak about the good in him. My knees were shaking uncontrollably, and I made every effort not to make eye contact with my siblings. The last place I wanted to be was standing at the pulpit of my church, where I had been saved only a year before, trying to find the right balance of words not to glorify the man, who had lived unrighteously, but to honor his children. I took a deep breath and let it out.
My dad wore Levi jeans. He wore them with white tennis shoes almost every day. You could probably ask any one of my childhood friends, and they would know what jeans he wore; it was kind of a joke with us. We called them Richard jeans, after my dad. When I was a little girl, I would put my hand in his back pocket so that I wouldn’t lose him when we were in public. I never had to look up; I just knew he was there. I grew out of it, or maybe his jeans got too tight for my hand. Either way, my hand didn’t fit in his pocket anymore and I lost him. I lost him to a world that I couldn’t understand and probably never will. Most of us lost him in our lives at some point.
My dad had a good side and when my dad was good, he was great. My friends always wanted to stay at our house because he was so much fun. He would barge into our rooms at the crack of dawn on a morning after a slumber party with friends and sing a ridiculous song as loud as he could, “Wake up, get out of bed, pull the covers across your head!” He later did the same thing to my younger siblings, except he spared them that stupid song. Then he would make a huge pan of sausage and eggs, something my little sister said he did for her and my little brothers too, so it was clearly something he enjoyed doing for all of his kids. He spent weeks learning the big mac rap on YouTube with my little brothers, and he and Josh became quite good at being rappers. He was Jordan’s hunting partner, and of course they always took the fanciest car into the woods to bring the animals back. I once watched them strap a buck to the top of my mom’s yellow Cadillac and drive it home.
His brothers and sisters at one time had a fun, adventurous, and extremely wild brother that gave them some amazing memories. I’m sure he has friends that could sit and tell stories about their adventures that would make you question their sanity. My dad had a very loving side to him; he just didn’t know how to express it or sometimes did it in the wrong way.
The most amazing thing about God is his amazing grace. God gives us an unconditional love and forgiveness, but I am most thankful that he gave us the ability to forgive not only others but ourselves as well. The last week we have had to face feelings that are more up and down than a roller coaster. The anger, guilt, grief, and overwhelming pity and sadness have gone back and forth without any control. I know that for me, my brothers, and sister this is a time to finally heal, forgive, and move forward, none of which would be possible without God’s amazing grace.
When my dad passed away he left nothing behind. My brothers and sister have nothing of his to hold, nothing to pass down to their children, nothing to cherish. I felt desperate to have the clothes that were left in his closet. I was allowed to go to his house and collect his clothes. I’m not sure why this meant so much to me. I asked my friends and family over and over if they thought I was crazy for being so desperate for his clothes. I felt like I was grasping aimlessly for anything that attached me to my dad. When I got to his room it was left just the way that he left it. His last change of clothes were thrown on his bed: a T-shirt, a flannel shirt, and a pair of those Levi jeans.
For one last time, I got to put my hand in the back pocket of my dad’s Levi’s. I didn’t have to look up; I knew he was there.
The last communication anyone had with my dad was an email that he sent to his girlfriend. It was in all capital letters and it read, “TELL MY KIDS THAT I LOVE THEM.”
Victoria, Dad loves
you.
Joshua, Dad loves you.
Ricardo, Dad loves you.
Jordan, Dad loves you.
eleven
The Day the Bricks Came Crashing Down
“Mrs. Curry, we need you to come in first thing tomorrow. Are you able to do that?”
“Come in where? Am I in trouble?” I asked.
My GPS led me to the building by the quickest route possible. I wished there was a setting that would have made it take me the extra-long way. Maybe I should have driven around aimlessly and then called to say I couldn’t make it because I was lost. Technically that was true, I was lost, or rather, I was at a loss. The idea that I had been called in to FBI headquarters seemed like something out of a movie.
I parked far enough away to give myself time to think while I made the hike across the parking lot to the front entrance. The cold wind hit me as I opened the car door, and it stole my breath like a thief on a jewelry heist.
Don’t give it back, I thought, sell it to the highest bidder.
Maybe not being able to breathe would make this all go away. But as I felt my chest rise and sink, I knew walking into the building was inevitable. I had no other choice.
I held my head high with what I thought was confidence and walked steadily to the front gate. Even though my mind was telling me that I gave the impression of knowing what I was doing, I knew darn well my steps were more like those of a marionette. It was freezing cold, and I had never been more terrified in my life. My legs forced themselves one in front of the other, awkwardly bending at the knee and swinging each foot forward. My brain fought to turn around, but my legs kept moving as if they were completely unattached to my body. As my mind and body fought against each other, my heart was caught in the middle. After thirty-six years, he still managed to somehow make me his puppet. I still somehow craved his approval.
The Con Man's Daughter Page 11