But as soon as I was in my car, I regretted leaving the way I did. As I shut my eyes and let the hot air from the heater blow its gust across my face, I thought about how we would come back from this. School wasn’t even back in session and I’d lost her.
When I got back to my house, everything was quiet. I knew Ari had to be home because until high school, Mom thinks it’s rude to go to other people’s homes on Christmas Eve or Christmas Day. She says it’s a time for families. I paused as I entered the foyer and tried to figure out where everyone was, but I was greeted by total stillness. Soft white twinkles danced across the walls, the ceiling, the surfaces; everything in the house was bathed in a shimmering glow. It felt magical, even to me, and all my usual doom and gloom was washed away in a tinsel baptism that made me feel pieced together. The tree was tall and full in the center of the living room and its pine smell drew me into the living room. Mom was cozied up on the couch under her favorite waffle knit blanket, tv off with a book open across her lap. She was staring at the tree with a sad smile.
“What’s wrong?” I asked, perching on the available corner on the far end of the sofa.
She startled when I spoke and I was surprised she hadn’t heard me come down the stairs; I hadn’t made any effort to be quiet. The smile spread wider becoming a little less dead and a little more genuinely happy. She sat up slowly, flailing her arms with a giggle. She pulled me close, and I snuggled back against her as she leaned against my shoulder. It was funny how often I found myself holding her to me these days instead of the other way around and as she rested her head on my shoulder, I reached up to stroke her thick hair.
With an exaggerated stretch, she turned her face up towards mine. “Do you remember when you were little how your dad loved to put up the Christmas tree?”
I stifled a sigh because I knew my mom wasn’t still hung up on my dad; that wasn’t what this wistfulness was. She missed being with someone, missed having someone whose joy motivated her own. Sure, she had me and Ari, but we were getting older. That magic of Christmas didn’t quite exist in us anymore. This would probably be the last year Ari believed in Santa Clause and even now it was more that believing because you want to, not because it feels real kind of thing. One last cookie for the reindeer hurrah.
I could remember it; Dad was always crazy about Christmas. Christmas themed episodes of sitcoms always show these harried parents choosing a time and instructing their kids not to knock before their clocks reach that time; we should have set that kind of limit for Dad. It would be four or five a.m. and there he would creep, tiptoeing into my room just to wake me up because he needed all of us to come empty our stockings and open the presents right then. And of course, we could never just get started and then go back to sleep; we would have to wait for him to get a fire going in the fireplace. He’d turn on some Christmas cd. Once Ari was born, even she wasn’t exempt; that last year he brought her from her crib to her swing so that she could be present and accounted for—and asleep—during all the festivities.
“She’s family!” He had declared vehemently when Mom protested waking a newborn. “We can’t celebrate without the baby.”
Even though we all knew she was exhausted, even though even I could see she was slightly frazzled by being awakened when she actually had a chance to sleep, Mom had grinned at his enthusiasm and put her arm around his waist as she snuggled up to him.
“Mom,” I started. I ducked my head, not able to make eye contact with her as I asked what I needed to know. “Did Dad leave because he didn’t want Ari?”
The pause was humid and overwhelming, full of too much for any one moment to hold. As her arm went stiff around my shoulders, I regretted asking my mom something that I knew would hurt her, but I had spent too many years working on this puzzle alone. I just couldn’t reconcile how my Dad—my overeager family man dad, the one who had insisted that little baby Ari had to be in the room while we opened presents that she wasn’t even aware of--had become the kind of guy who didn’t even pick up the phone on Christmas morning. It was like the man who’d been there my whole early life was gone and I didn’t know where to find him.
“I need you to understand something before I talk to you about this,” she began and each word stretched languidly like she was suddenly relaxed. There was something deceptive in this shift. “I told your Dad that I wouldn’t lie about what I’m going to tell you, but that I would never bring it up first. That I would wait until you asked.”
I feltmy body stiffen and I was flooded with possibilities about what she was going to tell me. Was he a spy? Had he been in some sort of covert agency when they’d met and been called away from us after Ari came along? Did he have a secret family in another country that he’d gone home to when he realized he loved them more? I knew my mom was trying to lead into something carefully to lessen the blow, but I wished she’d just tell me. There was a reason “rip the band aid off” was a cliché: because there is nothing more painful than anticipation.
With a trembling hand, she reached over and smoothed down a stray strand of my wild hair. “Your dad did leave because of Ari, but not like you think,” she started, and the tears filled her eyes. “Right after your sister was born, your dad started hearing voices. They told him to hurt Ari.” She choked out a sob. Her hand rested against my face and I was frozen, eyes lost in her wet ones.
“What do you mean?” I asked.
She continued, a deep sigh vibrating her chest as she continued, “Your dad is a paranoid schizophrenic. He left to get help, not to leave me.” Tears fell like snowdrops as she shook her head and I hated every moment of the conversation I had started. “But he didn’t get better and he isn’t compliant on his meds because he is just too afraid. That’s why he doesn’t call consistently or visit. He’s just sick, kiddo.”
Everything went frozen: my blood, the room, the world. The only thing left that moved were my thoughts and I couldn’t control them in the least. They wouldn’t slow. I was overwhelmed by conflicting emotions: I was angry at myself for bringing this up, for blaming my dad, for sending my letter. I was angry at Mom for letting me be mad at Dad for so long, but angry at Dad for leaving her behind and making her carry the burden of his secret. My heart broke for Mom, still wiping tears away as they just kept coming.
I had always thought she was over my dad; they’d been divorced for more of my life than they’d been married, so I just assumed that my down to earth, levelheaded mom would have let it all go and moved on. Until now she’d never dated, but I’d always attributed that to her focus on me and Ari and her busy job. Now, though, as I watched her cheeks get puffy from the crying, I could see her pain was from more than just the release of a long-kept secret: she was crying for the loss of the man she loved.
The next morning, I sprawled across my cluttered bed, eyeing the new swag that was piled by my closet door. Albums, film, sweaters. All stuff that had made me so happy when the day began and I tore into their metallic packaging, but now seemed like bullshit. With my new information, all I wanted was a remote control so I could zap myself back to my dad waking me up in the middle of the night. I just wanted to zap him back to normal.