My mom would drive. My Dad would sit in the passenger side. Once we’d been going for awhile, he would put his arm around the back of her seat, how a kid moves closer to his girlfriend in the movie theatre.
His arm was always two shades darker than the rest of him, speckled with sun spots. It looked very strong. Father's always look strong when you're little, I guess. His skin was dry. Sometimes, there would be paint on it, little pieces of white paint that he couldn't get off, not with all the soap in the world. I would see my Dad’s hand, the one thick vein that ran up his arm and a leather seat.
I don’t know why, but lately, I can’t get that image out of my head. It’s tattooed in my eyelids. It’s there every time I blink.
Trust me. They loved each other. They can remember it as bad if they want to. I know the truth. They loved each other.
As a child, I was the third-party in their marriage, a silent observer. My point of view was informed by theirs, but also, created in spite of it. My version of them is a patchwork quilt of their memories. A piece of her, a square of him, sewn together how I think looks prettiest.
It's one of the great tragedies of contemporary life, that families fall apart. Almost everybody has that in common.
I’ll never see my Dad’s arm on my Mom’s seat ever again. He’s like me. When he feels he’s been pushed away, he runs for the hills. He hides in the corner, disappearing in shadows, fading into the walls. He'll never reach out to her.
Now, I wonder if my Mom ever saw his arm. If she knew it was there. He wasn’t touching her, he was touching the seat.
It's not like she would have felt him.
No comments:
Post a Comment