Published Oct 24th, 2020, 10/24/20 3:08 pm
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Dear Diary,
It's late and I can't sleep. Because the quiet has been unquieted. Sound. Coming through my bedroom door. I wish it was something cool, like harps or drums, or even the weird creaking of this big house "settling" as Darryl sometimes says. But, no. It's just my father choking on his own snore. Choking on his own sleep. He probably needs to adjust, roll over, or something.
He's not choking.
No, I don't think he's choking at all, actually.
I think he might be crying.
Dear Diary,
It's Wednesday morning, and I'm pretending I didn't hear Darryl crying last night. I said good morning, and he said good morning back, which made the morning goodish. Better than the last three. But I wonder if he was just saying good morning in the same way people say fine when you ask them how they're doing, just because that's the answer everybody gives, and it's easier than the truth, which might be something like . . . constipated. I'm not even sure you can really have a good night after having a bad night, and it sounded like Darryl had a bad night. And I didn't have the heart to ask about it. Don't get me wrong, I'm not freaked out from hearing him cry. Crying is crying like laughing is laughing like sense don't never have to be made because it just is. Whoa. I felt like Coach with that one. Sunny Shakespeare. Anyway, what I'm trying to say is hearing my father cry is normal.
Every time we finish a puzzle and have to take it apart, he cries.
Every birthday, he cries. His or hers. Or mine.
Every anniversary, he cries. Of their marriage. Of her death. Which is my birthday.
Every first-place ribbon, he cries. Not around me. But at night.
But he didn't do that this weekend. There was no crying because there was no ribbon. And I learned a long time ago to never check on him. To leave him alone. When I was little, maybe six, I asked him if he was okay and he yelled at me. And that yell was a yell like nothing I'd ever heard. It was if my father's throat had become a revved motor, as if his eyes had become headlights, as if he had become something that would run me over. And he never has, but . . .never again.
Dear Diary,
On the way home, I tried to explain Baraka to Darryl. He also thought I was talking about the president, and when he found out I wasn't, he laughed. Just a little. When we got out of the car, we went into the house, where we heated up TV dinners that were supposed to be meat loaf but Darryl called it "some animal," and I explained the animals in Baraka, climbing and fighting, and dying, and moving, and then we were in the family room, standing at the big table where the puzzle pieces were scattered and just my mother's eyes -Darryl completed them last night on his own- stared up at us, attached to nothing, like random spots of dark and light, and I told Darryl about the cars and buses and clocks and sun and moon, ticking and changing and swerving and crashing and moving and moving. And fluuuuuuute. A sound that sounds both sad and happy. And that sad and happy made me bring up why I quit running.
I asked Darryl how come he never asked me about it when it first happened.
He said he asked me about it last night. But then Mr. Nico came.
And I said he said Gramps asked him to ask me.
And he said Gramps did ask him to ask me.
And I asked why didn't he just ask me.
He asked me what there was to ask.
I told him he could just ask why I did it.
So he did. Just asked. Just asked it while helping me piece my mother's cheek together.
And I told him, well, I didn't just tell him. First I counted to ten. I don't know why, after all that buildup. I guess I was trying to figure out the best way to say it. One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten. And then . . .
Diary, I'm going to try to tell you how it went, but I might get some parts wrong. But I'm going to try my anyways. This is how it went.
I hate running the mile.
What do you mean, you hate running the mile?
I hate running, I never liked it.
But you've been running the mile for so long. And you're so good at it.
Because you made me. That's not what I said. Not yet. I said
I know I'm good at it but
You're not just good at it. You're the best. First place. Your mother
I know my mother would be proud. I know I'm doing it for her, but what about me?
What about her? She didn't get to do this. To run her race, Sunny
But but but
And then I started counting again. One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten. And then . . .
But when do I get to run MY race?
I pushed the bottom of my mother's jaw into place, and judging by the shading of black and brown and gold, I could tell her cheek was lifted. She was smiling. I was not.
Then came the boomtick. But not with dance, with words. The stuff I usually write in you came out and flew right at him. And this time, I told him everything.
I don't like running, I like dancing.
Running is boring, and nobody
even pays attention to the mile,
and you never asked me if I liked it,
never even asked me. Never asked me
what I do like, or if there's anything else
I want to try. Never noticed my brown face
blue and gray like business suits. With one leg
too long. As long as I kept winning, right?
And even when I do, you tell me it's not good
enough. My form was this, my stride was that,
my breathing is off, breathe, Sunny. Breathe.
That's what you say? You say I have to breathe,
but I can't. I can't breathe. I can't breathe.
Dear Diary,
You know how I describe the face Darryl sometimes makes? The stone turning into more stone? Well, today his face was more of the melty face, and the stone, instead, seemed to fill up all the space between us. And I could tell that both of us had thoughts going boing boing in our brains
boing boing in my brain
like a jumping bean,
boing boing in his brain
like a jumping bean
our brains a moon bounce party we want
to invite each other to.
And as we pull into the driveway, Darryl sent me his version of an invitation.
He said he was going out with Mr. Nico's sister tonight. Ms. Linda.
That's a good thing. Finally. And finally Darryl also said -and this is the invitation part- that he was sorry about last night. And I knew what he meant.
Dear Diary,
Darryl's gone out, and right now I'm sitting on the floor in my room. I've been sitting here for a while now. I know I already asked you this, but I just have to ask again.. Do you know what it feels like to be a murderer? I do. Do you know what it's like for something to be wrong with you. To be incorrect. To be born a hurricane. I do. I've been thinking about my mother all day. Since Gramps gave me the picture in his office. Since I stuffed it in my sock, it scratching against me with every discus throw. I forgot to take it out and give it to Darryl when we got home. Forgot until I peeled my socks off and discovered it stuck to my sweaty ankle. Now I'm looking at it. And thinking about her more. I've also been thinking about choking, about not being able to breathe, and about Mr. Rufus. About everything. But mostly her. Thinking about her dancing, and who she was and who I am and who we could've been together. Wondering how things would've been different if she was here. Would I have ever been a runner? Would I have ever been a dancer? Would I be me? Maybe a different me. A me with more mother. That's for sure.
I should stop here, I think. I should.
Dear Diary,
I'm still awake. Second night in a row that I can't sleep. There are no sounds. Nothing is settling. I need to move. And maybe . . .
I don't know.
Dear Diary,
Dad. Dad. Dad. Dad. Dad. Dad. Dad. Dad. Dad. Dad. Dad. Dad. DAD DAD DAD DAD!
D A D ! DADADADADADADADADADAD! dad.
You looked cool in your tan suit.
I hope you're having a good date with Ms. Linda.
I hope she makes you smile a little. I think you deserve it.
Dear Diary,
I wish. Stuff.
I wish stuff like a good job from you. And if you don't want to talk much, maybe just a hug. Maybe a kiss on the forehead like how I kissed my discus. But I'm not as cold or as hard. And neither are you.
I wish you knew that.
I wish you knew I know that.
And I wish I knew why you made me call you Darryl. And not Dad.
And I wish we weren't statues with no arms.
I wish we weren't like puzzles.
Dear Diary,
I have some news. Last night, after not being able to sleep, I got up and did something I've never done. Ever. I crept across the hall to Darryl's room. He wasn't home yet. I didn't just go in there for no reason. I went to put the picture Gramps gave me on his nightstand. That's all.
I pushed the door slowly open, slipped in, and closed it behind me.
I had never been in there. Not that I can remember. I only remember being in my own room. In my own space, my own crib, my own bed. My whole life. But now I was in his room. It was much cleaner than I thought, from what I could tell, minus the towers of stacked boxes of finished puzzles along the wall. In the dark, I crept to the bed. Slid onto the side where the covers where already pulled back. Climbed in. Yanked the covers up to my chin. I laid on the left side. The side I figured he laid on.
I have to tell you something, and it's going to sound weird. But by now . . . you know.
I sniffed his pillow. Buried my nose in it and sniffed and sniffed. It smelled like nothing. Tried to know him. Tried to feel what it must be like to be him. To be here in this room, one-half of a whole plan, broken. One half of a person. Maybe. And then -and I don't know why I did this- I slid over. Slid over to what I guessed was her side. It was cold and the sheets were so flat, so stretched that they seemed hard. Like maybe bodies on cotton makes it softer or something. It was like resting my body on a thin sheet of ice, it shattering underneath my weight into water. I pulled the pillow from behind my head and while lying flat on my back, I hugged it.
I sniffed it. I imagined
it smelled like
something
something maybe
her. It smelled like
her. Maybe her,
I imagined.
And I started to cry. And sniff. And cry. And sniff. And bury my cry. And cry. And squeeze. And squeeze. And sniff. And cry. And cry. And try. As hard as I could to swallow my howl. Squeezing the pillow. Tighter and tighter until I felt something on my skin. Something soft, like feathers. But not feathers. Too big to be feathers. Too . . . I don't know. I didn't know what it was, so I reached over and yanked the lamp chain, the room instantly warming with light. Then freezing once I realized what was happening. What was tickling me.
Not feathers.
Not feathers at all.
Ribbons.
First-place ribbons.
Years' worth of them.
I sat up straight in the bed and snatched the pillowcase off the pillow. The ends of it badly stitched together were bursting, ribbons pushing through like guts. My squeezing had caused the seams to come loose. I started yanking the ribbons out, years and years and years of them. First place, first place, first place, long ones, short ones, first place, first place, And the whole time I'm still crying and now it's louder because I wasn't trying to swallow it anymore. And I'm pulling them out, and crying, and pulling and crying and suddenly Darryl opened the door. I didn't hear him come in the house, or walk up the steps or anything. He just appeared, just stood in the doorway, staring at me covered in ribbons as if I had jumped in a pile of leaves.
First-place leaves.
He didn't say nothing. He didn't ask me what I was doing in his room. In his bed. He didn't ask me why I had destroyed the pillow. He didn't say a word.
He just stood there. It was only when he came in that I even looked up long enough to see all the other pictures. The ones from their marriage, them kissing, them laughing, them in college, in high school, in middle school. Them, everywhere.
He was shaking as he slowly walked to the other side of the room, his eyes never leaving me. Then he sat on the edge of the bed, crawled into the midst of the mess I'd made, and hugged the rest of my tears out. He said he was sorry again, but this time for everything
for what happened to your mother
for making you run
for running
for shutting down
in a voice that sounded like a sound I don't think I've ever heard. He said it over and over again, his arms wrapped around me, my eyes on the nightstand. We were two S's. SS, lying side by side. Ships, finally docked in the night.
| Gender | Male |
| Format | Java |
| Model | Alex |
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