Dad leaned back and sighed.
“One more?” he asked.
“Um.”
It was already past midnight.
“Please?”
Dad had this thing in his voice.
It broke my heart to hear it.
“Sure.”
So we watched another episode (“Hippocratic Oath,” which is kind of a forgettable one, to be honest), and I leaned my head against Dad’s shoulder when I started getting sleepy. Dad rested his hand on my head and played with my hair.
I couldn’t remember Dad ever doing that.
Mom did it all the time. But Dad never did.
He kept combing it back and playing with the three little whorls in the crown of my head.
“Hey,” he said, not much louder than a whisper. “Does it ever make you feel worse, being around me when I’m depressed?”
“No,” I said. “Not really.”
Dad’s fingers paused on my head.
“You sure? It doesn’t make you more depressed?”
“I’m sure. Why?”
Dad’s fingers started up again. He was quiet for a long time.
I stifled a yawn.
“Sometimes being around your grandparents... I don’t know. It makes me feel like I’m thirteen again, lying in bed and thinking depressed thoughts. And feeling their depression too, like a cloud over the house.”
“I didn’t know Grandma and Oma had it too.”
“Well, they don’t like to talk about it. And they’ve never been to see anyone for it, so they’ve never been officially diagnosed. I always thought they might be bipolar.”
“Oh.” I stifled another yawn. “Did they make it hard for you to get help?”
Dad rested his chin on my head. “Sometimes. They wanted me to manage it on my own.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be.”
My eyelids got heavy. I kept blinking, but I knew I had to stay awake.
“Is that why we never see them?”
“No. Maybe.” Dad sighed. His breath tickled my hair. “I don’t know.”
“Oh.”
