3am.
I walk past piles of mail,
clutter on the table.
Dad sees my reflection
in the hallway mirror
before I see him.
He tells me to sit down,
says he knows I’m upset,
that I’m trying to punish him
for what happened,
for things being different than they seemed.
He says he never meant for his choices to hurt us.
Somehow this makes it worse,
like he wasn’t even thinking of me, April, our family.
I ask him why he’s even awake.
He says he’s not feeling well,
been up all night, in the bathroom.
Says not to distract him from the issue at hand,
this is unacceptable, I’m grounded—
something I’ve never been before.
His face changes then,
Dad looks so different
than the person who
used to help me with my homework,
hushed me back to sleep after a nightmare.
This man is
unfamiliar.
But all I say is fine, I’m grounded.
Whatever that means.
He says no going out this week after school.
No talking on the phone either.
He says there have to be consequences
for bad behavior.
Then he walks down the hall,
steadies himself
hand to wall.
In the mirror
I watch
his giant shadow shrink,
disappear.