Forgiveness

  ➳ F O R G I V E N E S S

THIS CHRISTMAS, MY father spent it alone.

My vantage point from behind the door allowed me to see him only partly, with his hunched back covered in a plaid shirt worn by time. It was his custom Christmas outfit. The sofas had been rearranged to make room for the Christmas tree in the corner of the room. My father sat on one of the sofa that was facing it, and his left side facing me.

The Christmas tree was a short one, its point only reaching halfway up the tall ceiling. Now that there was no one to help him with decorations, it had been done modestly. The last time I'd seen him, his back had deteriorated and it pained him to even stand up on his two feet, let alone do a proper decoration.

For someone who wasn't a fan of Christmas, my father went through quite an effort to decorate a Christmas tree. He'd once said that Christmas wasn't his favorite holiday. He didn't clarify why, but I pondered over it and came to the conclusion that it was because my mother had died giving birth to me, a day before Christmas. Christmas too, was her favorite season. Now it seemed that I'd added an unnecessary belonging to his baggage.

My eyes widened as a thought struck me. Christmas was my favorite holiday. I loved the rush of excitement that flooded me when I woke up in the morning to a present placed underneath the Christmas tree. I would see a joyful look on my father's face that mirrored my own, and we'd do a countdown before unwrapping the presents together. The tradition kept up even after my father deemed that I'd grown too old for it. Maybe I was the reason that my father celebrated Christmas this year, no matter how much it pained him.

I tried my best to keep my composure.

The Christmas tree didn't look too bare. It had LED lights spiraling from the top to the bottom as its only decoration. The subtle glow that the LED lights emitted illuminated the dimly lit room. No mini cupid decorations were present, no Santa's head, no candy sticks or other decorations that made appearance in the previous Christmases because I wasn't there to help him this Christmas. As simple as the tree had been, I wished I could capture the scenery right there. It'd still make a pretty Christmas card.

I expected to see vacant floor beneath the tree. But my heart slumped upon seeing two boxes of presents lying on the floor. One was small; a green box wrapped nicely with a red ribbon - green, my father's favorite color. And the other one was a yellow box twice the size of the previous one, wrapped with a cute pink ribbon.

Yellow. I bit my lip. Yellow and pink. They're my favorite color.

Were, my mind automatically corrected. I shook my head vigorously, chastising myself for using present tense when it was no longer my right to do so.

I could see my father opening his mouth, and then closed it as if he lacked the energy to articulate the words that were already at the tip of his tongue. He did so back and forth, and still, no sound came out.

I decided to leave my hiding spot and be closer to my father. I inched toward the nearest sofa and stayed close to it. I crawled my way toward where he was sitting, using the sofas to conceal my presence for no apparent reason. As if he could see me at all. The attempts to get my father to notice my presence had all gone down the drain. I'd tried everything I could think of. Boiling a kettle of hot water in the dead of a night. Alternating between the on and off switch while he was watching the television. Pressing the doorbell at arbitrary intervals. The more I tried, the more it dawned on me that if anything, my attempts wouldn't make him sense my presence. It would frighten the hell out of him.