My cheeks fire up and I glance over at her. “Amy, I never said that.” I frown. I don’t want Bob to know the truth. I want a dad. So. Much.
“You didn’t have to,” Amy says. Her face crumples up and she hiccups as she starts to cry, but she manages to do it at a low volume.
“Oh, sweetie,” Camille says to Amy and reaches across the table to pat her arm.
I push away from the table. There’s sweat on my top lip and behind my knees.
“Sit down,” Bob says in a voice that’s used to being obeyed.
Adam stands too and reaches for my hand. His fingers press against mine and it’s reassuring. It grounds me.
“Please?” Bob says in a softer voice. “I’m trying to figure out the right things to say. I have absolutely no idea what that is.”
“Me neither,” I whisper.
I look at Adam. I sense that no matter what I decide to do, he’ll stand by me. “It’s your call,” he whispers. I wish he would tell me. But this is my life. My decision. There’s no way to hide from this. I squeeze Adam’s hand and sit. He slowly sits beside me. Amy glances up, no longer making noise but still sniffling and wiping at her eyes.
Everyone stares at me. I feel more exposed than I did the first day of school after the video went viral.
“Why did you come?” Bob finally says as if he’s choosing his words carefully. He nods his head toward Adam and Amy. “You brought friends and drove all the way to Canada to see me. Why?”
I stare at him and blink, trying to remember the feelings that brought me here. “I just found out who you are,” I remind him. “She just told me,” I whisper. “And I thought you were aware of me. If I’d known earlier who you are…the truth…well, I would have come sooner.”
“Okay.” He picks up his tea. “But why like this?” He takes a tiny sip, puts his cup down. “You could have called.” He has a wary expression.
I almost smile and put my hand over my mouth. I can’t tell him what I wanted. Him. I wonder if he thinks I’m a parasite, there to suck things from him. Like, like money. I glance at Adam. He’s watching Bob, his eyes narrowed, his hand in a ball at his side.
“What are you implying? She wants a father!” Amy squeals.
Camille puts a finger to her lips and makes soft shushing noises at her.
My stomach turns, and I’m glad I haven’t had anything to eat. “I wanted to see you,” I say. “In person. But things haven’t turned out the way I planned,” I admit.
“And what did you plan?” Bob’s voice is slightly challenging.
Camille puts a hand on his arm. Amy covers her mouth again and makes a squealing sound. Adam makes a sound in his throat, and anger shoots from his eyes toward Bob. It’s tangible across the table.
“None of this is her fault,” Camille says. “Her mother lied to her as much as she did to you.”
My mom’s image seems to hover over the table like a ghostly apparition. For a moment, I hate her. I really and truly hate her—for lying to me. And for a moment, I hate him too—for getting her pregnant in the first place. But most of all, I hate me—for being a person who would let this go on as long as it did. I should have fought harder for the truth from my mom. I should have found out the truth long ago.
“This kind of brings up a new argument for abortion,” I say, and it’s awful and tears leak out again, and I drop my head, ashamed.
“Oh, Morgan,” Camille whispers.
Amy gasps and Adam puts an arm in front of me, as if to protect me. I glance up. Bob’s face is white.
“Morgan!” Amy yelps. I glance sympathetically at her. She’s going to need therapy after this, but this is not about her. I don’t want to need anyone. I don’t want to admit part of me hoped for more from him. That I still do.
Bob crosses his arms.
“I thought it was your choice to abandon me. I was angry. Maybe I’m still kind of angry,” I admit. But I’m sad too. So sad. How could I be anything but sad? “I don’t know why I’m here. I don’t know what to do now,” I tell him.
His body visibly deflates and I see tears in his eyes. “The truth is, I am your father.”
I sigh. “I know.”
We stare at each other for a moment, and I drop my eyes first.
“I think what I really wanted was to meet you,” I’m finally able to admit. A different waitress holding a pot of hot water and a pot of coffee in each hand approaches the table, but Camille shakes her head and the waitress turns quickly and veers off in another direction.
I sigh. “I kind of thought you owed her too, you know? I thought you knew about me and, knowing that, you still never contributed a thing,” I confess. “A part of me thought you should pay her back for those years.” I think of her bills—and then watch as my college years drift out of my reach. “But now, the way things are, you don’t owe her anything.”
“I don’t?” he asks quietly.
I lean forward. “No. None of this is your fault. “
Despite everything, I’ll give my mom my college money. I won’t let her go broke over her hospital bills. No matter what the circumstances, she raised me all alone. It was her choice. I don’t agree with it. But I still owe her for all she sacrificed for me.
I glance at Amy and Adam. Concern bounces off their faces and lands in my chest. They’re on my team. At least I got them out of this: the road trip. And I’m keeping them when it’s over.
“So that gets me off the hook?” Bob asks. I think there’s sadness in his eyes. But I wonder if I’m imaging it.
I press my lips tight. “Yes.”
“I’m your father,” he says, but he looks at Camille when he says it. Not me.
“Biological,” I say.
He winces, but there’s that truth thing again, sticking its neck out.
He rubs at his chin, his eyes still on Camille. “I don’t know what the right thing to do or even say is.”
“I know,” I say. “Me neither.”
“We don’t have to figure it all out this second,” Camille says, her eyebrows tight and a worried tilt to her lips. “You are his daughter though, Morgan. And that means something. To both of us.” She wipes under her eyes.
“You better know that Morgan is awesome,” Adam says to Bob. His voice is louder than usual and it breaks. “You’re lucky you got to meet her.”
Bob coughs. “I kind of noticed how you felt about my daughter,” he says.
I drop my eyes to my lap. The memory of Bob standing outside and peering into the car window while Adam and I groped each other is not a picture I want to recreate in my mind.
“He said daughter,” Amy loud-whispers, oblivious to the subtext floating around the table.
Bob and I look at each other and drop our gazes at the same time, as if we’re on an awkward date. A father-daughter date.
“How long have you two been married?” Amy asks Camille.
“A long time,” Camille says with a smile.
“So why don’t you have kids of your own?”
There’s a pause. Noticeable. “Things don’t always go as planned,” Camille finally says, and then she slides off her seat and picks up her purse and adjusts it on her shoulder. “Excuse me, I have to go to the ladies room.”
Bob watches her leave and then turns to me. “Camille and I weren’t able to have children,” he says. “It was really hard on her.”
“Oh. Fudgsicle sticks. I’m really sorry,” Amy says.
Bob doesn’t look at her. “I loved her,” he says to me.
I glance at Camille. “Camille?”
“No,” he says. “Your mom. In case it matters. It was a long time ago. But I loved her. If I’d known about you, I would have married her.”
“I guess she didn’t think you would,” I say. “All she told me about you was that you didn’t want children.”
“Even if it didn’t work out with your mom, I would have been there for you.” He smiles at something in the distance, and I look over my shoulder and see Camille returning to the table.
I stare at him. If he had married my mom, taken care of me, maybe his life would never have led him to Camille. And he loves her. So what does that mean? If he had to go back and make a choice, would he change things? Would he pick her over me?
Something burns my stomach. Is it wrong I want it to be me?
Bob waves over the waitress and pays for the bill for the entire table. I make no move to stop him. When the bill is covered, we all stand. He walks over, looks down at me. I stare up.
“Dad?” I say softly, trying out the word on my tongue. He stares back at me, blinking. His eyes look moist. “Dad,” I say again, without giving the word any meaning or emotion. “I don’t know what to call you. I don’t know what to say. “
“I know,” he says. And that’s it. He turns to Camille.
The good-bye is awkward and clumsy, and I have to resist an urge to bolt. Bob reaches out and shakes my hand. I cringe as I hear myself say, “Nice to meet you,” as if we finished a job interview and I know my chances are slim to none because I didn’t get the answers right.
I feel as if I failed, that somehow I didn’t measure up, that I didn’t pass an invisible test—was found wanting.
I shuffle my feet as he reaches for Camille’s hand and then, without a look backward, he leaves. He makes no promises to see me again, to be my dad. He just waves. I watch his back as he walks away, expecting him to turn and say something about the future. I wait. He doesn’t.
I duck my head. I’m exhausted. I can’t shake the impression that I did something wrong, that I failed—that he’s leaving me.
chapter eighteen
12. I’ll never dance again.
#thingsithoughtweretrue
Even Amy is quiet on the walk back to the hostel.
It’s a bright, shiny day, but a cool wind blows off the water. We walk past old brick buildings mixed with modern buildings, and some of my negativity whooshes away with the breeze. The older buildings remind me of parts of Tadita, but almost every old-fashioned lamppost has a hanging basket of colorful flowers on it. The colors and fresh air take a little more off the edge. It’s hard to stay angry and dark when Vancouver Island is so beautiful and vibrant, as if it wants to cheer me up. We decide to take the long way back to the hostel, so we can stroll through the Inner Harbor by the water. Amy’s chatter restarts as we reach streets filled with tourists. People are selling food and beautiful paintings. Everywhere, there’s music.
Amy stops in front of two cute guys playing guitar and singing a lively song. Without warning, she begins to spin and dance with her hands up in the air, her head back, pure joy on her face. She has absolutely no rhythm, but it doesn’t matter. I smile, soaking up her happiness. When she grabs my hand and pulls me to her side, I decide to surrender to the music and dance with her. People around us stop to watch, but it doesn’t stop me. They clap and cheer, and the musicians smile, encouraging us. The dancing turns into something so much more than beats—a deep soul cleanse. When I dance and move, I feel free. I remember this. I love this and realize it was stolen from me. Dancing to music. Right there, I close my eyes and I take it back. Around us, people pull out their phones and cameras to take pictures of the musicians and Amy and me dancing, but it doesn’t embarrass or shame me. For the first time in a long, long while, I don’t care about anything but losing myself in the moment. Screw Bob White. Screw my mom. Screw Lexi. And screw me.
When the song ends, Amy hugs me. The crowd claps and yells for more, but hand in hand we run back to Adam’s side. He’s smiling and clapping and whoops for more along with the musicians.
“I have always wanted to do that,” Amy pants to me. “Thank you!” Her eyes shine and we hug again.
“No. Thank you,” I tell her. I dig into my purse and throw some coins into the musician’s guitar case filling with bills and coins from the crowd. We drift off with leftover giggles that fade as the singers begin a new song. I twirl and walk and my exhilaration starts to fade, but I won’t forget it. This moment. The beauty of music and dancing is back.
Amy buzzes and chatters as we walk, until finally our hostel is in sight. “What time do you want to leave in the morning?” Amy asks when we reach the front walkway.
“The earlier the better for me.”
Adam nods.
“Are we still driving to Butchart Gardens this afternoon after we pick up the car?” Amy asks.
Adam shakes his head and mumbles about going to a flower garden, but we ignore him because we know he wants to go too and is only pretending to protest for his male ego.
Inside the hostel, we take turns using the washroom and getting ready. While Adam is out of the room, Amy comes over and sits beside me on my bed. “I’m really sorry about what happened to you.”
I nod. “I know you are, Amy. Thank you.”
“He doesn’t seem too bad. Your dad, and Camille’s real nice.”
I wince when she says the D word. I’m still processing. Disappointed, like it’s Christmas morning and I unwrapped all the gifts and didn’t get the one I wanted. It makes me feel like a jerk—unappreciative of what I do have.
She pats my leg. “Do you think it’s better this way?” she asks. “That you know the truth now? Or do you wish that you’d never found out?”
I pick up the pillow and hug it close to my chest. “I don’t know.”
“I’d want to know.” She hugs her knees in tight so she’s a little ball. “I think it’s better to know the things we have to deal with.”
She stares off into space, seeing something that I can’t.
“Is everything okay, Amy?” I ask her.
She shakes her head back and forth and unwinds herself from the ball. “It’s fine.” She swings her legs off the bed and stands up. “Thinking about you is all. I mean, your mom committed to a big lie a long time ago, and I wonder why she didn’t just say he died or something and leave it like that. I think it’s because she knew it was wrong. Deep down. And she left it open to fixing.”
I shake my head. “I can’t even begin to understand.”
She looks around the room and is quiet for a minute and turns back at me. “Where’s your phone? Let’s check your followers. Think of some new hashtags to tweet.”
I pull my phone from my hoodie pocket, and Amy sits down again and looks over my shoulder, squealing when I show her how many new followers she has. Earlier, I tweeted out a follow request to her Twitter name.
“Write something true,” she tells me.
Some days you’re the dog, some days you’re the hydrant. #true, I type.
She laughs. “I like the true hashtag, but I like ‘things I thought were true’ better.”
I smile.
“You’re going to be all right,” she says. “You know that, right?”
I punch her on the shoulder. She chews her bottom lip and it quivers for a second, and then she smiles and lifts her knuckle and we fist bump.
***
The afternoon is nice. The gardens are beautiful. We go for dinner and talk about everything except things that matter. I keep a lid on the things bubbling inside until we get back to the hostel. After I crawl under the covers, I start to shiver. I tuck up my legs and wrap my arms around myself. I make myself as small as I can. I hold my breath until my lungs ache, but I’m unwilling to let anyone hear me cry.
My body is stiff. I continue holding my breath until forced to suck in a breath. My eyes are squeezed tight, and for a moment, I see an image of myself as if I’m floating over looking down. My inability to do anything except squeeze myself into a fetal position troubles me. I have to deal with this.
The girl I was before this trip is dead. I’m worried who will take her place. It frightens me. I’m afraid my bitterness is bigger and will never be contained. I’m not sure I want to meet the new me.
chapter nineteen
13. Statistics don’t lie.
#thingsithoughtweretrue
Adam gets shotgun for the drive home. I didn’t actually give him a choice and took the backseat without asking.
Amy pulls out of the parking lot, giving Adam the rules for front seat passengers. I don’t want to listen. I want to be left alone. I don’t want to drink in beautiful scenery. I don’t want cheering up. As if we’re on the same page, the weather is hazy and gray. I approve. Even Amy gives up and lifts the car rules, and they leave me alone.
There’s no line at the ferry, and we’re able to pull on right away. We park and wander to the seats on the top. Clouds drizzle. I hunker down under my hoodie, half listening to Amy telling a family of four about the whales we saw on our trip out. Adam sits behind me, and I feel him watching me.
I’m glad Amy’s able to carry the conversation because I’m not ready to be pulled from my mood. I want to stay the center of my own universe for a little while longer, relishing my negativity, bathing in it. I make up speeches to say to Bob and my mother—words I worry I’ll never be brave enough to deliver.
“You okay?” Amy says.
I stare at her. Bob didn’t call or anything before we left. My mom even stopped texting. “No.”
“Well, say something then,” she says in a voice that implies she’s fed up with me. “Get it out.” Adam nods in agreement.
I squint at her. “I hate him!” A blackness that’s nibbling at my soul pours from my mouth. People turn to stare. I sound ridiculous, but Amy is right. I don’t want to keep the negativity inside anymore, afraid it will take over completely. “I hate him. I hate that he didn’t even bother to call me before we left. “ I shake my head. Why didn’t he bother to call? Am I really that bad?
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