Waiting for Perfect (25 page)

“I don’t know.
 
It’s just…” She looks at me like she’s considering
if I can be trusted.
 
She was just starting
to trust me.
 
I hope she still does.
 

She sighs.
 
“Do you ever feel completely overwhelmed
by life?
 
Like everything is
closing in on you?
 
Do you ever feel
like you’re drowning?”

Her questions
surprise me.
 
I know she’s been upset
about the whole mess with Morgan, but I didn’t realize she was hurting so
badly.
 
The thing is, she has no
idea how much I can relate.

“Yeah,” I say.
 
“Actually, I have.”

A moment of silence
passes between us.
 
It’s not
uncomfortable.
 
We’re just giving
each other time to reflect.

“Hey, Sebastian?”
 
Her voice comes out unevenly as we run.
 
“Can I ask you a question?”
 
She sounds like she’s about to cry, and
I find myself wanting to take her in my arms and hold her, sweaty and all.
 

“You can ask me
anything,” I say.
 
And I mean it.

She looks at me for
a moment, studying my face.
 
“Why
do you live with your cousin?”

I look straight
ahead and keep running.
 
I knew I’d
have to tell her at some point.
 
I
breathe deeply, knowing what’s coming next.

“Sebastian,” she
says carefully, “what happened in San Antonio?
 
Where are your parents?”
 

She’s asked me
before, but I wasn’t ready to tell her.
 
I haven’t talked about Texas with anyone.
 
Only my friend Ricky knows the whole truth.
 
But over and over, Kendra has opened up
to me, and I feel like I need to give her back the same trust.
 
I take a deep breath.
 
I’m about to lay it all out for her, and
I know it might change everything.
 

“I’ve been without
my mother since I was three.
 
And
my dad…” I hold my breath, finishing the sentence carefully.
 
“My dad’s in prison for murder.”
 

I watch to see if
she reacts with pity, revulsion, or judgment, but her face is completely neutral.
 
I slow down to a walk, and she slows
too.
 
I want to know how she feels
about what I just told her, but I’m afraid to ask.

She glances over at
me and says softly, “It’s okay, Sebastian.
 
You don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to.”

“No, it’s alright.
 
I want to tell you.
 
Nick doesn’t even know the whole story.”
 
I do want to tell her.
 
She deserves to know why I act the way
I do, why I have a hard time getting close to people.
 
I’m not sure what she’ll think of me after this, but I feel
like if I don’t tell her, I’m going to explode.

She lifts her head
to meet my eyes.
 
“Only if you’re
sure.”

“I’m sure.”

She smiles, and we
continue to walk as the sun rises above us.

“The last time I
saw my dad was in May, a month before I left San Antonio.”
 
My mind goes back to that day.
 
The day I’ve tried to push from my
memory.
 
The day I wish I could
forget.

Ricky pulls into the parking lot.
 
He tells me I don’t have to do this,
but I know I do.
 
I need to see my
dad before I leave.
 
I need to tell
him goodbye.
 
Ricky waits outside
in the car while I go in to see him.
 
A guard searches me before leading me into a room where hard plastic chairs
are facing a thick glass wall.

He tells me which chair to take, so I sit.
 
The Hispanic woman to my right is
crying.
 
She’s speaking Spanish to
someone who must be her husband, telling him about their children and all that
he has missed.

A middle-aged man sits to my left.
 
He has the telephone to his ear but
isn’t talking.
 
He’s staring across
the glass into the defeated eyes of a frail, old man.
 
I wonder if the man is his father.
 
I wonder how long they’ve been meeting
like this.

Finally, my father comes out.
 
He is dressed in an orange jumpsuit, and his head is shaved.
 
His jaw is tight and strong like mine,
but his eyes are sad and completely empty.
 
The last time I saw him was in the courtroom, when they took
him away after the jury found him guilty.

My eyes follow him as he makes his way to the seat in
front of me.
 
The metal cuffs on
his wrists and ankles clank together as he shuffles to his chair.
 
He slumps over as he sits, and instead
of picking up the telephone on the wall, he just stares at me.
 
I wonder if he’s sorry I came.
 
Maybe I should leave.

He makes a move toward the phone on the wall, so I lift
the receiver on my end too.

“Son,” he says.

“Hi dad.”

“Sebastian, you shouldn’t have come.
 
I don’t want you to see me like
this.”
 
The sadness in his eyes is
almost too much for me.
 
The fact
that he doesn’t want to see me almost kills me.

“I’m leaving in a few weeks,” I say.
 
“I thought I’d come to say
goodbye.”
 
My voice begins to
shake, so I cough and straighten in my chair, trying to pull myself together.

“You’re going to California?
 
To Maria’s?” he asks.

“Yes.”

“Maria’s a good woman.
 
My brother had excellent taste in women.”
 
He smiles, remembering something from
his past, remembering a time before his brother died.
 
“She’ll take care of you, Sebastian.”

“I know,” I tell him.

We sit there a while with the telephones to our ears,
saying nothing.
 
We don’t even look
at each other.
 
I hate this.
 
I feel tears come to my eyes, but I
will not cry in front of my dad.
 
He’ll think I’m a pussy.

Finally, my dad says, “I think you know why I had to do
it, son.”

I know he’s talking about the murder.
 
I really don’t want to hear the
explanation of why he had to kill a man.
 
I don’t want his excuses for why he’s not in my life anymore, why he
chose anger and violence over his own son, why he chose to leave me.

“Sebastian, I killed that man,” he said.
 
“I wrapped my hands around his neck and
strangled him until his breathing stopped.
 
He might have died right then.
 
Still, I picked up that piece of plywood and hit him in the
head until there was nothing left but skin and brains and blood everywhere.”

I cringe at his recounting of the incident.
 
I already knew he had killed him, but
this is the first time I’ve heard any details.
 
I don’t respond.
 
I’m not sure what he wants me to say.

He continues, “He raped that woman, son.
 
Pinche cabron!
 
He left her beaten and bleeding in the
alley.
 
She would have died if I
hadn’t been there to call for help!” He lowers his voice again.
 
“When I found him, I killed him,
Sebastian.
 
If I have to spend the
next twenty years in prison paying for it, then so be it.
 
I’d do it again.”

I stare at a scratch in the window between us, avoiding
his eyes.
 
I don’t want to hear his
explanation, but I guess he feels like he needs to tell me.
 
All I know is that my dad killed a man,
was charged with second-degree murder, and was sentenced to twenty years in
state prison.
 
I lost my dad.
 
That’s all I care about.
 
He made the decision to murder someone
even when he knew I’d be completely alone if he was put away.
 
I wonder if he even thought about me at
all that night.
 
I wonder if he
even cared.

He breaks the silence by saying, “She looked like your
mother.”

I dart my eyes to meet his.
 
How can he bring her up right now?
 
He’s never told me about my mother.
 
I don’t even remember her.
 
Why would he mention her now?

“The woman that was raped,” he explains, “I thought it
was your mother.
 
I know I hadn’t
seen her in fifteen years, but I could have sworn it was her.
 
She had the same long, black hair.
 
I thought I even saw the same birthmark
on her right calf.
 
She looked so
much like your mother, Sebastian.”

That doesn’t explain anything.
 
My mother is dead.
 
It couldn’t have been her.

His eyes are unfocused on the wall behind me.
 
Beads of sweat are dripping down his
forehead.
 
I don’t know what the
hell is going through his mind right now, but he looks like he’s about to have
a breakdown.

I finally say, “You told me mom died.
 
That woman couldn’t have been her,
dad.
 
Mom’s dead.”

He still doesn’t look at me.

I think about my dad’s constant aversion to speaking
about her.
 
I remember all the
questions I’ve asked about her over the years and all the times he’s ignored
them.
 
I think about why I don’t
have a single memory about her being sick or seeing her in a hospital.

My stomach is sick.
 
I don’t want to ask, but I have to.
 
“Dad, she’s dead.
 
Right?”

He looks me in the eye, but he doesn’t confirm it.

“She got cancer,” I continue.
 
“She died when I was three.
 
You told me she died!
 
You told me she got sick!”
 
My words are becoming frantic.

Still, he says nothing.

“Dad!” I’m yelling into the stupid telephone.
 
“What are you saying?
 
Tell me the truth!

My father clears his throat.
 
He adjusts his hands in the handcuffs that bind them.
 
Then, he says quietly, “Sebastian, I
loved her – the kind of love that cripples a man.
 
I would have done anything for
her.
 
I would have killed for her.”

“I get it dad, but what happened to her?”

“You
don’t
get it!” he hollers,
drawing a glance from a police officer at the door.
 
“She left us, son.
 
We both loved her beyond words, and she left us.”
 
He drops his eyes, but I can tell they
are moist with his memories.

My world stops.
 
It takes a minute for it to sink in, but when it does, I want
to scream.
 
Anger is surging in me
and is begging to be released.
 
I
want to crash my fist through this bulletproof glass.
 
How could he have kept this from me?
 
She is my mom!
 
I had the right to know what really
happened to her.
 
Instead of
telling me the truth, my dad fed me lies for the last fifteen years.

My breathing is labored.
 
I try to speak steadily, but my voice comes out shaky and
uncontrolled.
 
“How come you never
told me this?”

When he doesn’t raise his eyes to me, I slam my palm
against the glass and roar.
 
“Goddammit!
 
Why didn’t you
tell me?
 
She’s my mother!
 
That means she’s out there
somewhere.
 
She’s alive!
 
I could have been looking for her this
whole time!”

An officer walks over to my chair and says, “Keep it down
over here, or I’ll have to end your visit.”

People around us are staring at me – most with sad,
understanding eyes.
 
I glare at my
dad who still hasn’t raised his head to look at me.