His voice travels to the kitchen, but even straining to hear, I can’t make out the words.
“So,” Rebecca says, fidgeting with a button on her blouse, “did you have a nice time yesterday?”
“Yeah, really nice.” I smile, but it’s to appease her. Something’s off, and I want to know what my dad’s doing in the other room. I start to walk over there, but Rebecca’s voice stops me.
“Hun.” She runs her palms down her skirt. “Just ... give him a minute? Please.”
I swallow, the lines around my heart hardening.
Give him a minute.
Hang in there.
We’ll tell you one day.
Just trust me.
I’m always waiting. Always trusting. I’m so tired of it.
Ignoring her, I walk into the living room to find my dad with the phone to his ear, his free hand in his hair. His back’s to me. “Thank you,” he says. “Yes, that’s correct. I appreciate it.” When he hangs up and spins around, he pauses at the sight of me. “Blue ...”
“I want to know what’s going on.”
He blinks. “It’s ... complicated, and not something you need to worry about right now.”
“But I do.” I step forward, surprised at the firmness in my voice. “If this is about my mom, then it’s about me too. Don’t you see that? I’m not a child. I’m an adult, just like you, and I’m so sick of everyone keeping things from me.” Something thick climbs up my throat. “Just talk to me already.”
My dad stares, his mouth opening then closing. He glances beside me, where Rebecca now stands, and she presses her lips together.
“Dad. Please. I’m not letting this one go.”
He inhales, slipping his phone in his pocket. Then he nods. “Okay,” he says quietly.
“Okay?”
“Okay. Let’s, uh ...” He swipes a hand across his forehead. “Follow me.”
Rebecca stays in the living room as I trail up the stairs behind him. He leads me to his office, where he shuts the door and opens a closet in the corner. I watch as he pulls out box after box. He has enough to build a small wall around him before he finally finds the ones he’s looking for. They’re white shoeboxes, both frayed in the corners, and they’re almost matching except that only one is sealed with duct tape.
“Come here, Blue.”
I cross the room, step over a few boxes, and sit beside him on the carpet.
He pushes the nearest shoebox toward me, the one that’s not taped shut. “Open it,” he says gently.
The unease I’ve been feeling flares, sweeping through me, but I pull the lid off anyway. Scraps of paper. It’s filled to the brim with scraps of paper. Most of them are small and uneven, like they were torn off other pieces. Others are full-length lined pages ripped out of notebooks. None are blank, and I recognize the smooth, kind of curly handwriting immediately.
“Remember when I told you about your mom’s poems?”
I nod, unable to look away from the countless pages.
“She used to keep them under her bed. The day she left me, she didn’t say goodbye. But she did leave two shoeboxes in my room, with a note on top asking me to keep them somewhere safe.”
Finally, my gaze slides up to meet his.The day she left me.
“She didn’t want her parents finding them, but she couldn’t bring herself to throw them away either. And she definitely didn’t want to bring them with her.”
“Why not?”
