North & West

Thirteen

I woke to the sound of my mother laughing and the smell of cinnamon french toast.

I knew that could only mean one thing, so I quickly pulled on the pair of pants I'd left thrown beside my bed on the floor and bounded down the steps.

Just as I'd guessed, my father was seated at the kitchen table, the black suit I almost always saw him wearing still on him. Almost as if he'd felt my presence, he turned toward me and grinned.

In seconds, I moved through the living room and enveloped him in a hug. I wasn't a short girl, not by most standards anyway, but my father towered over me. He was around six foot four and yet he was the nicest man I'd ever known.

Despite how rocky and almost borderline hateful my mother and I's relationship was, my father and I had always been rather close. It was embarrassing to hug my father like I was, hugging him tight and enjoying his deep laughter when I was an adult now, but I didn't care.

I pulled away from him, a grin so wide on my face that I almost worried that my face would split right in half. I noticed my mother was looking at us with a strange look on her face, some sort of look that almost seemed sad, but as soon as we made eye contact, she smiled at me and gestured for me to sit down at the table.

She hovered over my father and I, dumping her homemade french toast onto our plates. It was my father's favorite and I certainly wasn't going to complain. I was just so happy to have my father home – despite not really knowing how long the return would last – that I would've eaten even spaghetti, even though it was my least favorite food.

“So, Dad,” I paused, so glad to be able to say that again, “How was Tokyo?”

That initiated the conversation we always had upon his return, one of him retelling us of his adventures around the world while my mother and I sat by listening to him and trying to pretend as though what we did was at least interesting enough to share.

My father's face always lit up when he spoke about the things he saw and the people he met, and when I'd been younger, I'd just been so entrapped by his retelling of his adventures that I'd even wanted to go to college to be get some sort of job where I could always be away from home, seeing new places. My mother had laughed at that and my father had shook his head, and sometime after that, the dream had died.

I missed my father every time he was gone, often feeling like the house was too empty without him, but I knew that he was happy and I didn't have any right to take that away from him. He was a good father by all standards, and even my mother seemed to change entirely and take on a different personality whenever he was home.

It wasn't that she was fake around him, it was more like she could only be herself when he was around. I loved the way they were around one another and I always hoped that, if I ever found a way to figure myself out, that I'd somehow stumble upon the same sort of relationship they had.

I listened to my father talk, eating my way through at least half a dozen pieces of french toast. He occasionally paused to make sure we were still listening, and of course, we were.

When we were all finished, my father was just finishing telling us about how large the Imperial Palace had been and how breathtaking Tokyo was.

My mother and my father shared a look, one that I clearly wasn't invited to understand, before my mother stuck her hands in the sink and began the task of washing the many dishes that came with making her homemade cinnamon french toast.

My father led me into the living room and sat down, patting the cushion beside him. Before we'd even stepped into the living room, I knew something was up and I had really hoped that the conversation could at least hold off until I felt like shitting on the good mood I'd gotten just from seeing my father sitting at the kitchen table.