It’s a little bit like how I imagine missing a physical part of me that I can no longer see, feel or touch. Like having a limb removed. It’s like that.
“Why did you and my mother divorce?” I suddenly ask, shocking myself even more than my dad. That’s saying a lot because, with raised eyebrows and an open mouth, he appears pretty startled.
“Uh…” He leans back and sets the beer down, rubbing the dark stubble along his jaw. People say I look like my dad and I take that as a compliment, though I’d be more proud to be as good a man as my dad is. “We didn’t communicate very well…and I was spending a lot of time getting the firm up and running. She had two little ones at home. It was a lot of stress with me gone so much.”
Even now he won’t blame her—like couples who break up usually do. But not him. That’s my dad.
“And having me. I’m sure that was additional stress.”
His brows come down sharply. “No more than any other young child.”
“Statistics say that parents of autistic children—”
He makes a sharp chopping gesture with his hand. “I don’t care what statistics say. It wasn’t your fault, Liam. There are a lot of different factors that determine whether a marriage will work or not. We just weren’t as good a fit as we initially thought we were. Things change when you start your adult life. We were young and ambitious. We took on a lot—parenthood and a new business, among other things. It was no one’s fault, Liam. Or if it was anyone’s fault, it was mine and your mother’s. You were just little when we split up.”
“But—”
“Is this what you’ve thought all along? That she left because of you?”
I shrug and sip my beer.
His shoulders are rigid as he rocks in his seat. “Your mother’s relationship with you—or lack thereof—had nothing to do with the divorce,” he states. Then, he gets out of his seat and starts walking around the room. Mercifully, he knows better than to pick up my things and put them down. That really bothers me.
He shoves his hands in his pockets and says, “I wish I could have done more to make things better between you and her. I thought I was protecting you.”
I think about that for a minute. “There’s nothing you could have done.”
“I could have not interfered.” He hung his head for a moment before straightening to look at me. “I saw what it did to you the few times she made plans that fell through, so I…discouraged her from making plans after that.”
I’m silent for a moment, trying to recover from my shock before he notices. But he’s watching my face and he’s almost as good as Adam at sensing other people’s feelings. He starts talking again before I can think of anything to say. “I screwed up, and the damage was done by the time you were old enough to understand. I think I was hoping things would get better between the two of you when you got older, but…”
“But you didn’t know she was going to die.”
He was studying a painting on the wall, the signed and numbered Meyers print that I’d purchased last year. “It wasn’t all her fault, Liam. I share the blame in that, too.”
“Don’t blame yourself for her failings as a person.”
He turned back to me. “We all have failings, Liam. We’re human. Yes, she had hers, but I have mine, too.”
I blink, thinking how much those words sound like what Jenna said to me. You’ll never forgive any mistake I make—any human failing I have. It bothers me and I don’t know why. Tipping my bottle back, I finish the last of the beer.
A half hour later, I escort my dad to the door. He stops and asks for a hug, which I concede. “Love you, son,” he says as he grips my shoulders.
“I love you, too.”
“Liam,” he says, pulling back and looking at me directly. My eyes lower to his shoulder. “Try to forgive your mother. It will help a lot. I know she’s not here anymore, but…she’s your mother. She deserves your forgiveness. And as for your life, well… You should talk to Jenna. Sort this all out. She seems like a very sweet girl.”
“She’s a woman.”
He laughs. “Yeah, you know what I mean.”
I do, but it’s easier to correct him than to address the rest of what he said. It’s true, I could talk to her…but would she only hurt me again?
***
Another week passes. Another week of my comforting, regular routine. It’s during our usual Wednesday morning breakfast meeting that I finally summon the courage to bring up the subject with Mia.
“How is Jenna?” I say as quietly and as blandly as I can manage. As if my next breath isn’t hanging on the answer. But my voice still sounds like it’s strangled.
She stares at her breakfast plate for a long time, cutting everything up into smaller bites than she usually does. Then she sits back, suppressing a yawn with the back of her hand. “Sorry, I had a bad night last night. Up late studying.”
I fork a bite of sausage and pop it in my mouth, waiting for her answer.
“So, um, Jenna left.”
Suddenly, the sausage tastes like ashes in my mouth. I stop chewing as everything inside me tightens. And yet—I knew it. I knew she would leave. But somehow it still hits me like a ton of bricks.
“The Renaissance Faire doesn’t move on until the end of June, though,” I say once I’ve managed to swallow that dry lump of sawdust.
Mia looks away with a sigh. “No, I mean she left the country, William. She went to Bosnia early to spend time with her mom and sister before the wedding.”
“Did she say when she’d be back?”
“She didn’t, William. I’m sorry. She said that…there’s a possibility she might stay there permanently with her family.”
Suddenly, I’m done with my breakfast. I sit back and push my plate away, then quickly excuse myself. I do have lots of work to do, but I can’t think about anything else the rest of the day. Not that Jenna was far from my thoughts before this, but now she’s halfway around the world and I can’t stop thinking about how permanent this is. I’ve lost her forever.
I can’t explain why, but that night when I get home, I open the drawer that holds the stack of cash and birthday cards from my mother. After opening them at my dad’s house, I brought them to mine. They are still arranged in order from my sixth birthday to my twenty-first. I read through them in that order until I reach the last one—the one I didn’t read the night I was with Jenna.