SUBJECT:
Dear Marisa,
I hope you’ll never have to see this. I hope tomorrow I’ll be able to come home and you’ll run up to me and give me a big hug like you always did when I came home from the road. But now I’m not sure of much, least of all when I’ll be able to see you again.
No matter what happens, I want you to know I have always and will always love you. And I hope this message never makes it to you. I hope I can delete this account or forget about it, but a part of me is scared to death it won’t be the case.
Love you always,
Dad
I chose another email a year later.
FROM: [email protected]
SUBJECT: Happy Belated Birthday
Marisa,
I’m struggling today. I really am, and I wonder how much to even tell you in these emails. Your birthday has come and gone. Did you get the presents I sent? Your mom said she’d give them to you, but at this point I don’t even know. She’s missed more court dates than she’s made, and each one seems to mean I’m further away from finally being able to see you again.
I refuse to bad mouth your mother to you, and I hope she’s doing the same. I truly love you and miss you so much. It hurts knowing I won’t be able to watch you open your Christmas presents again this year.
I’ve turned down two jobs on the west coast because I don’t want to be too far away, in case you need me, but every day it seems like my chances of getting to hug you on your birthday are worse and worse.
Love you always,
Dad
I skipped to the email from right after I contacted him about coming to Fulton U. As much as I’d hated to reach out to him, once I found out about the tuition waiver and knowing LJ had been there, I’d been willing to send the email. New York had been everything I’d hoped for, but I’d missed LJ. It hurt how much I missed him. So I’d leapt at the chance to go to Fulton U where I had the perfect cover for following him there. They had a great museum studies program, stellar museums and the one person I didn’t want to live without.
But sending the email hadn’t been easy. And two months of psyching myself up to meet with Ron after he’d said yes.
FROM: [email protected]
SUBJECT:
You’re so grown up now, Marisa. It makes me so proud and hurts me so deeply that I’ve missed all your milestones. It’s been so long since I’ve seen you, it’s hard to reconcile the strong, determined young lady who showed up in my Coach’s office with the little girl missing two front teeth who I carried around on my shoulders.
Coming back to Philly was the best choice for me because it meant I was closer to you, and the risk paid off, but from our first talk I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to make any of this up to you. Actually, I know I won’t. For some reason, saying those words to you is so much harder than writing these letters. I still don’t know if you’ll ever see them. You’ll probably think I was crazy for talking to myself all these years.
I hope we can bridge the gap between us and get to know one another. It’s my fault I missed so much. I should’ve fought harder, no matter what the lawyers or judges said. I should’ve, but I gave up because it hurt too much to get my hopes up only to have them killed over and over again. It’s no excuse. What kind of father doesn’t fight for his little girl? I was a coward, afraid I couldn’t do right by you, and now I don’t know if I’ll ever even get to know you.
You’re a beautiful, driven woman, and I wish I’d been the father you deserved.
Love you always,
Dad
FROM: [email protected]
SUBJECT:
Marisa,
You were right about so many things today. It hurts to know how true it all was. So much of my frustration and anger was taken out on someone you love, who loves you too. I see the way you two communicate with a look, never saying a word, and I wish I knew you that well.
I don’t and he does. In a lot of ways, I see myself in LJ, but he’s proven he’s better than I was. He’s willing to make the big sacrifice plays to protect the people he cares about. Maybe my testing him was trying to see how far he’d go, but I already know it was farther than me.
He’s exceptional on the field. Even without playing, his star will rise, and I’m afraid of what that’ll do to you two. I don’t want to be the reason another person in your life lets you down. I do hope he’s a better man than me like I suspect he is, but I’m still afraid that once his star rises, it’ll end with you hurt again.
I’ll do what’s right because I don’t want to lose you. I never wanted to lose you, but I think I might have. Forever. I hope that’s not the case. I feel like I use hope so often in these letters to you, but here’s one thing I know. I love you and I’ll always love you.
Dad
I read the last email when the sun rose over the horizon. My eyes felt like they’d been buffed by sandpaper. A mountain of tissues sat in a pile beside me on the bed. I’d gotten snapshots of my dad’s life over the past fourteen years: the way he’d jumped at the chance to take the position at Fulton U, how hard it had been for him to not say a word against my mother. Even if the emails didn’t go into details, I could fill in the blanks—hell, I’d lived them.
The presents he’d sent. The visits he’d tried to make. The court dates that came and went without the chance to see me.
My brain understood it all. I could piece together how difficult it had been, but in my heart, that little girl still wanted her dad to be the guy who rode in on the horse to save the day. Only, this wasn’t a fairytale. It was the real world, and in the real world, there were court orders and job opportunities, and none of it worked out how we wanted it to.
This didn’t solve anything, not by a long shot. The gaping wound in my chest that I’d tried to cover over when it came to Ron wasn’t deepening, though. It might even be healing a little.
And it showed me how alike he and I were. Just like LJ had said.
I fell back in the bed and stared at the shadow pattern on the ceiling from the slitted blinds. The first people I was supposed to depend on had failed me. There was no other way to slice it, even knowing more about my dad’s side of things—so how could I have expected LJ to weather the storms coming our way?
Only, I should’ve.
He’d been the one person I could turn to no matter what. The one person who’d never let me down. The one person who’d lied to protect me when all it did was hurt him. He’d proven himself time and time again, but at even a hint of trouble, I’d run. No, I’d pushed him away.
He’d been right about me, but I wasn’t going to be that person anymore.
All I could hope was it wasn’t too late to show him how much I loved him and salvage our relationship.