“I don’t know, Dad.” I don’t. I don’t know what to think or feel. I don’t know what’s appropriate or what’s wrong.
“You’re scared of getting hurt again,” Dad says. His accusation is partially correct, but I’ve been more concerned with what Ellie would think if she could see everything I’m doing.
There were times in our life together when she would get this unsettled look in her eyes, a look worth a million thoughts. It would sometimes take me an entire day to crack the code. She didn’t like to vocalize her worries; instead, she would write them down. A lot of times I wondered if I had done something to make her upset or if I just completely messed up or forgot something, and I would have to pull it out of her if I had any hopes of figuring out what I did wrong. That was the only part of her that truly made me nuts sometimes. I’m a fixer. I like to fix problems, especially ones that I cause. The only thing I don’t seem to know how to fix is myself.
“Yes and no,” I tell him. “Do you think she can see me? Do you think she knows what my life is like, the decisions I make, and the feelings I have? Do you think she can sense all of it?”
“You know I don’t believe in that stuff,” Dad says, shifting his weight around to lean back against a tree. “I think once a person is gone, they move on to the next part of their life, and I don’t think that’s here on earth. She’s gone, Son, and it is okay to move on with your life. It’s okay to be happy.” Dad leans over to pick up a dirt-covered penny from beside his foot, bringing it back up to inspect it under the bit of sunlight poking through the trees. “Huh, will you look at that?” His attention is quickly diverted to the penny as he brings it up closer, flipping it from side to side. “This isn’t just a lucky penny, it’s a 1955 double-die penny. This thing is worth money.”
Dad has a thing with coins. Nope, not just a thing, an obsession. I spent most of my youth with a metal detector in my hand, combing beaches for pennies. The world could freeze around us, but if he’s looking at copper, nothing else matters. “Dad,” I say, trying to pull his attention back.
He slips the penny into his front pocket and refocuses. “I’m sorry. What was I saying?” he pauses for a second. “Oh right. If God forbid, you were the one who died and you had the chance to tell Ellie one last thing other than ‘I love you’, what would it be?” I would want her to be happy and to live a life that we could both be proud of. “You’d want her to be happy, wouldn’t you?”
Then it hits me. I promised her I would live for both of us. I have broken that promise in every single way possible. I have taken care of Olive and I have been a good dad to her, but when that little girl isn’t looking at me, I feel sorry for myself and I know it has taken over who I am. “Yes, I’d want her to be happy,” I reply simply.
“That is what she would want for you, too. I know for a fact that she would want you to be happy,” Dad says.
“You know for a fact? What—what are you talking about?”
“Remember the car accident you two were in?” Dad asks.
“I found ten, Grampy! Ten!” Olive shouts, running toward us with two handfuls of rocks.
“Good, now go find ten little sticks that are green inside.” Olive looks at him, puzzled at first but then runs to the grassy area, falling to her hands and knees.
“Yeah, I remember the accident.” Obviously. We both almost lost our lives that day. Some drunk asshole in an eighteen-wheeler sideswiped us on the highway, pushing our car down into a ditch. I was told the car had rolled four times before a tree stopped us. We were both airlifted from the scene and taken to Mass General.
“She woke up before you did, you know that right?” Dad continues.
“Yeah, I know,” I tell him. It may have been twelve years ago, but I remember it like it was yesterday.
“I remember sitting with her right when she woke up. Her parents were in Scottsdale or something, I don’t know. Anyway, your mother was with you and I sat with Ellie so she wasn’t alone.” Dad pulls in a deep breath and sinks back against the tree a little harder. “One of the nurses came in to tell us you had woken up and everything looked like it was going to be okay.” He reaches over and places his hand over my shoulder, squeezing it during a pause in his story. “I cried like a goddamn baby, Son. You know that?” He laughs an uneasy laugh. “Anyway, within minutes, a doctor came in to tell Ellie that one of her ribs had slightly punctured her lungs and she needed emergency surgery. She was so scared when they were taking her away.” Dad closes his eyes briefly, smiling through silent laughter. “They told her she was going to be just fine, but she didn’t want to believe them, so right before she was rolled out, she grabbed my hand, looked me in the eyes and said, ‘If anything happens to me, I want you to tell Hunter to live a happy life. Tell him not to worry about me. Tell him I want him to live his life without regrets and to always keep that smile I love on his face.’ Naturally I told her not to worry about a thing, but her words hit me hard.” Dad takes another couple of short breaths before continuing. “Anyway, her parents finally arrived some time while she was in surgery and asked me to leave, so I wasn’t there to tell her ‘I told you so’ when she got out. Otherwise, I would have.”
“Why didn’t you tell me any of this before?”
“Because she woke up from the surgery, survived just like you, and went on to live a happy life.” He pushes himself away from the tree, peeking around me to see what Olive is doing. She’s peeling sticks apart, looking for a green center, and appears to have now killed an entire tree with the pile she is creating. “Honestly, I hadn’t thought of it again until just now when you asked me what she would be thinking. I just remembered her saying all of that.”
“Do you think that accident had anything to do with Ellie’s aneurysm?” I don’t know why I never considered this before, but I have to wonder if that could have been the reason?
“I’m guessing it’s possible,” Dad says. “You both had head damage from that accident. Although I don’t remember hearing anything about her CT scans. She got all of those tests back after her parents came in so I don’t really know what those results were.”
“She would have told me though, right?” Surely she wouldn’t keep something like that from me. She wouldn’t. We told each other everything, unless she was mad at me, of course.
“I would assume so,” Dad says. “You ever ask her parents?”
“No, it never occurred to me that the accident could have affected her seven years later.”
“And it may not have. I don’t think it’s something you need to figure out at this point. It won’t bring her back,” Dad continues.
There’s no sense in arguing this with him, and it’s just another question that will nag at me until I come to the conclusion that there is no answer available. “Olive, how are you doing over there?” Dad calls out to her.
“Almost done!” she shouts.
“Look, my point here is that Ellie would want you to be happy. You got a great girl back there at home. Charlotte cares about you a lot. You shouldn’t be so quick to push her away.”
And just like that I remember exactly what brought me here. “Dad, she was sleeping with AJ.”
“Hunter, what have I always told you since you were a young boy?” I roll my eyes and throw my head back, focusing on the branch above us while waiting for what I know he is about to say. “Don’t you know what the word assume means?”
