OPEN ARMS

It was seventeen years ago when I saw my father sit helplessly in front of the steering wheel. I must’ve been five, and he a man of wealth and happy life. The thought of that day hits me hard now. When I asked him why he was crying, that day he told me I was too young to understand. His hands slipped away from my tiny arms, and I never knew why.

I always hear people tell me I observe everything with the eye of a hawk. Is that why a scene that took place that long ago registered my mind with such perfection? My old man is sitting next to me, sipping his coffee and watching a lonely bird build a nest. They both had the same sense of emotions in their eyes, as though they felt a connection.

“Dad,” I tried to capture his attention from bird watching. “What happened to you seventeen years ago?”

He looked at me, and in my eyes he saw a ghost. His expression said otherwise.

“Hmm...’ He mumbled. “Why do you ask, Kenny?”

“I remember when you sat on the driver’s seat crying, and that just popped into my mind today.”

“Do you remember where we were?” he asked. I said I remembered a hospital sigh. “You remember a bit too much Kenny, your mother did too.”

My mother. I haven’t seen her for a long time, and all I knew about her was very little, and I never asked what happened.

“You were five years old, weren’t you?” he asked, and I nodded. “That day, I lost something that was precious to me and to you; your mother.” He sat silent for a moment, giving me some time to register the thought.

“What happened?” I asked, curious again.

“She took the wrong medicine, her heart rate dropped, and she bid us a farewell, only we were late to the party before she parted.”

“So you broke down and told me that I was too young to understand anything,” I replied.

“No, that wasn’t it. I didn’t shed a drop of tear. Not even a teardrop from heaven. I stood still, I looked petrified; and she, your mother, had the most peaceful smile. I didn’t cry because I knew she wouldn’t want that.

“Then what happened?”

“The doctors were too concerned about my reaction that they sent me to a therapist. I asked you to wait in the lobby of the hospital with a nurse.”

I had a souvenir from that day, a doctor’s mask they kept in a box at the end of the reception.

“I was hard to break, harder than a diamond. The doctor began his session, and his words were: ‘you will never see her again, Issac.’ I remained calm, and he continued: ‘no more slow dance under the fireworks, no more long drives with your son...’ I stopped him right there and asked him what he wanted. He wanted my reaction, and so I gave him mine: ‘The brain works for seven minutes after death. All the synapses finally go to sleep, and that’s when the person sees the things they want to see at last. I’m sure she had seen me smiling with my son when he was born, and that is enough for me. If she had lived to see my death, she would’ve been a mess with no one to comfort her but our son, and he would’ve been a mess too. Now? I can live peacefully knowing that the woman who loved me more than anyone did will never have to bear the pain of my funeral. That is fine by me, that is all I need to know for me to keep my emotions together.’ I shook his arms and left the room. But his words were alcohol. It took me some time to register what he said, and that broke me down and I cried.”

My dad smiled. He got up and left the chair, all while moving an inch closer to the window where the bird had began to build a nest. The bird and my father shared something, he and I knew it well.

After all the rise and fall in his life, he raised a son who wished to conquer the world, and he set me a world to conquer with nothing but love. I was made of the better half of my mother and my father; and I, a son, gained the courage to face anything with head held up high. He lived a world without a love he craved for. He lived after all odds. He lived, and so will I.