Page 27 of The Nightmare King

“I know.” After a few moments, I asked, “Was his service nice? You know I couldn’t get out of bed to go.”

Sam shrugged. “A bunch of sniffling jocks and sobbing theater kids talking about how great Mare was.”

“He would have hated that,” I huffed a sad laugh. “Mare hated it when anyone cried, he’d instantly want to do something goofy to make them smile.”

Sam wrapped her arm around my shoulder and squeezed. “I’m glad you’re out of bed now, Lucy.”

Emotion gripped my throat, and though we were alone, I felt Mare with me. Felt his kind eyes, his gentle encouragement.

We sat in silence, leaning against Mare’s grave as the cold air cracked through brittle tree branches.

I held out my palm. “Can I have your bottle cap?”

Sam grinned. “Going to make something?”

“Yeah,” I fiddled with the ridges of the tin circle. “I think I’m going to make a lot of somethings.”

My nylon duffle strap bit into my shoulder as I stood on the old porch. I rang the doorbell, something I’d never done before. The walls were so thin I could hear the game from the television shut off, the floor creak under his weight, and his cane as he opened the front door.

A little less jolly, a little more grey, a touch more wrinkled. My dad smiled down at me with a happy but confused expression. “Hello, sweetheart. Are you here to… get more of your things?”

I swallowed, unsure why I was getting emotional. The realization that in my mind, I’d killed my dad. In reality, I’d almost killed my dad. In real life, I’d made myself forget he existed so I could bury the pain of losing my boyfriend. Instead seeping into the selfishness of sleep… in all that, my dad had to deal with the accident on his own.

For once, I felt grateful for my sister, because I knew she’d taken care of him. But I should have been there, too.

I rubbed the back of my neck. “No, I thought… I don’t know… that maybe I could move back in?”

Daddy, I’ve missed you. Daddy, I’m so sorry. Daddy, I’m so lonely. Daddy, please don’t be mad. Daddy, please don’t slam the door and tell me to go away.

My dad’s bushy grey eyebrows furrowed, and he pinched tears from his eyes with a sniffle. “Come here and hug your old man. Of course, Lucy, you can always come home. You never have to ask. You never have to ring the doorbell.”

The tears I’d hidden from him, from the world, from myself for months— splotched into my dad’s cotton T-shirt. “I’m sorry,” I wept into his big, bear-like chest.

My dad only held me close in that safe, nothing-else-matters way only fathers can hold their babies. And when he told me everything would be okay, I halfway believed him. Taking my duffle from my shoulder, easing the burden of the past and present with his loving arms, and he ushered me inside.

Home.

The house smelled the same. Like bacon grease and construction sheetrock and soil from my dad’s day job. It was comforting, even the hum of sports on his radio was nice. I found myself no longer wanting to burn it all down.

He joined me in the living room, holding a giant bag of red licorice. “Movie night?”

A smile, a real smile, warmed my face. And I felt a pang of guilt at that moment as I remembered. Part of me wanted to force the memory away so it wouldn’t hurt so much. Part of me felt like I didn’t deserve to smile. The spot on the sofa was still indented from where Mare would sit, ankle over knee, ready to laugh and heckle me as I hid from the masked killer in the horror movie. Memories flooded back of Sam throwing popcorn at me and my dad and his deep laughter at our joined antics.

But instead of hating the feeling, instead of raging against it, or burying it. I let it sit with us, let the emotions chew between my teeth as I tasted strawberry licorice again. Mare could be more than a nightmare if I’d let him. Mare could be an angel of care, a legacy of love. The memories would hurt for a while, or maybe even forever, but I wanted to keep him close, somehow.

“I’ll text Sam,” I offered as my dad thumbed through a stack of DVDs.

He pulled one out and stopped before showing me, remembering himself. I knew what he was remembering. “It’s okay,” I encouraged. “I’m okay.”

Was I? Would I ever be? All I wanted was to go to sleep and search for him again.

“Nightmare on Elm Street,” my dad said softly. “One of Mare’s favorites.”

“Let’s watch it with him. He’s still with us, in a way, I think.”

Sam was next to me ten minutes later as the film rolled.

Dad laughed, my sister and I clinked our glass soda bottles, and my boyfriend’s old seat sat empty.

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