Page 62 of Dream with Me

I drank myself into near oblivion for the next decade. It took a friend of mine dying from liver failure to shock me enough that I decided to get help. I’ve been sober for fifteen years now, and not a single day goes by that my body doesn’t crave a drink. Hell, sometimes the urge is so strong the fight to stay sober isn’t one day at a time, it’s ten minutes at a time. How I’ve maintained my sobriety is a mystery to me.

I’m not telling you this to excuse myself or seek absolution for abandoning you when you needed me most. I’m telling you because, hopefully, you will understand that it was a me issue. I blamed my drinking on plenty of things back then... my job, the state of my marriage with your mom, and even you. The energy you had, the dreams you used to go on about, the imagination you had—it was all something that made you uniquely you, and I behaved as if it were too much. It was never that, though. I used that as another excuse to escape into the bottle. I’m sorry for all the times I snapped at you to stop talking so much or to calm down. I hate that I can still see the look in your eyes when I would do that to you. It was like you were trying to shrink, to be less, all because I couldn’t handle my shit. So, I left.

But here’s the thing: you were a kid, and I was your dad, but I was wrong. I loved you, I did. I’m absolutely ashamed to admit this, but at that point in my life, I loved alcohol and the escape it gave me more than I loved you and your mom. I didn’t find the strength to stop while I was still part of our family. It was my fault.

I’ve written letters over the years, and I don’t know if you’ve ever read them. I suspect you haven’t since you haven’t wanted to see me, which I get.

When I got sober, I started working in the trades as a carpenter. I guess I should add that it was two years before that I became sober. I started spending more and more time with Annette. Annette’s brother was my friend, the one who died from liver failure. We spent time together while he was sick and then as I helped her clean out his house and handle his final affairs. Eventually, it developed into more. I never married her, and she never pushed me to. I was always afraid to try again. I’ve done my best to be good to her, her daughter, and her grandchildren. Still, in my heart, it’s not the same as if I got to do all of those things with you and your family. I’ve heard through the grapevine you have kids, and I hate I never got to know them... to know you. Losing that because of my inability to stop drinking is my biggest regret.

Wow, it’s amazing how much pours out when you open the floodgates, huh? I guess I should get to the point besides what I’ve said above.

If you get this, it’s because I’ve become quite ill myself. I got more years than my buddy, Annette’s brother, but my liver didn’t go unscathed from all those years of heavy drinking. Now, I find myself at the end of a battle with liver cancer. There are no treatments left that could possibly cure me, and I’ve chosen to focus on comfort and spending whatever time I have left with Annette. At this point, I don’t think it’s much—maybe a matter of weeks? I don’t know, and it doesn’t matter because it’s not enough time to right my wrongs or make up for the things I lost.

I want you to know that I love you. I loved you when you were a boy, and I loved you when I left you. Even though it’s probably hard to believe since it’s been so long, I still love you. I don’t expect you to feel the same, but I imagine since you’re a dad now, you understand what I’m talking about. The love of a parent—even a fucked-up parent— for a child doesn’t go away with time.

My wish for you is that your life has been filled with love and happiness, and I hope I didn’t mess that up too badly for you.

I don’t know if I’ll still be around when you get this, but if I am, and if you ever change your mind about wanting to see me, know that would be welcomed at any time. Thank you again for reading this and giving me a chance to tell you how I feel when I definitely don’t deserve it.

You’ll get contacted again once I’m gone with some other details, but no worries about that now.

Dad

I think back to the past and the time I received another letter, which showed up at the fire station, of all places. I was only twenty-two years old at the time. In it, he attempted to explain why he left, said he was sorry, and that he missed me. He asked to see me. I declined.

Sorry doesn’t make up for the fact that he abandoned us. That Mom had to work two jobs and, in her exhaustion, became less and less like the mother she had always been. It doesn’t make up for me being left at home alone until after seven p.m. every night because that’s what her work schedule required. Still, this letter has a different tone, and my gut tells me I won’t hear from him again.

Though only minutes have passed, I’m overcome with emotional exhaustion. I don’t know what I expected from the letter, but it wasn’t this. Maybe I thought there would be a list of excuses and justification for leaving. I expected I might be angry. I’m not.

I don’t have love for the man, but I do feel compassion for him. Doug Willson is a man who spent much of his life a slave to the bottle, and it cost him greatly.

CHAPTER34

SHANNON

When I woke up this morning, a shroud of gloominess hovered around me... a sense of something being off. I got through the first half of my workday without anything coming to fruition. I figured the bad feeling would stem from something happening at work, but it’s been a fine day so far. There have been no stuffy meetings, and Will has stayed away from me. Maybe the feeling stemmed from my internal distress over not having a chance to explain to Troy that yesterday wasn’t what it looked like. Over not having a chance to tell him what I’ve been feeling. Or because seven days from today, I’m scheduled to stand before the same judge with Troy and our lawyers to finalize our divorce. To confirm the end of us.

Tillie and I step inside the doorway of the restaurant in Aron Falls, and the heat flowing from the overhead vents is like heaven on my wind-burned face. Even the short walk from the car to the door is harsh today. Temperatures are dropping rapidly, and the snowfall is expected to pick up significantly in the next few hours. I dust the snow off my coat while Tillie requests a table.

While we’re waiting to be seated, I glance up, and my eye catches on the smile of the beautiful woman sitting at a table about fifteen feet from me. She’s wearing a trendy winter hat on her head that makes her look adorable and gorgeous at the same time. She looks familiar, though I can’t quite place her, and she’s radiating as she smiles, then laughs, and I swear there’s a twinkle in her eye. She’s young, definitely younger than me, anyway, and I wonder if she’ll always be so happy or if life will kick her in the butt and mess up her dreams.

In the next few seconds, everything changes when reality bitch slaps me in the face. I wish I had only noticed her and moved on to idle chatter with Tillie, checked my email on my phone, or kept staring at the woman. I wish I hadn’t angled my head to see who she was smiling at like that. To see who was making her laugh like I haven’t laughed in a long time.

Now, standing near the hostess stand of this restaurant, I realize I was wrong to let my guard down about today. What I’m seeing feels cataclysmic to my heart. Because my husband is the man sitting across the table from her, he’s the man making her smile like that, making her laugh. He doesn’t notice me—not like I sensed his presence the day Will tricked me into lunch— because he’s too focused on her. He’s smiling, too. A smile that meets his eyes. A smile like I haven’t seen in ages.

I can’t think. I can’t speak. I stare, hoping that any second, something will clear this all from my vision and assure me it’s all a misunderstanding. Tillie must see something in the expression on my face because she shakes my shoulder a bit and then follows my line of vision.

I know she recognizes Troy when a slight gasp escapes her. “Fuck,” she whispers.

I don’t remember following her out of the restaurant. I just remember the vision seared into my brain of what my husband looks like with another woman. A woman who lets him make her smile and laugh like she’s full of joy. She looks like... a fresh start.

No!

This must be something benign. It can’t be a lunch date, which is absolutely what it looked like.

* * *

The first houror two after seeing Troy blur. Tillie drives me home in my car, then stays with me for a while despite my protests. We don’t talk, and she eventually helps me to bed—the only place I want to be—and tells me to nap, saying she’s already arranged for someone to pick her up. It takes a while to fall asleep. That happens when you cry so much you can’t breathe through your nose.

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