For the longest time, there was nothing else. No other landscape my mind would wander off to when the unconscious dreams and subliminal realities woo with their nocturnal opera—the falsetto of the stars, the baritone of loneliness. My head is supported by a pillow’s plush surface, the comforter’s warmth—soon reliving the nightmare in sleep. Night. After night. The three-month countdown. Bearing the guilt of knowing I would survive and he would not. All while knowing the rest of my life would be spent without the person I cared for the most. And so every night, I’d fall asleep hoping and praying that I wouldn’t have to go back to this place ever again—a request denied in perpetuity.
But as I walk across the soft soil, toward the front yard where brotherly football wars raged under tree shade, to the front door—its hinges never failing to squeak and haw when put into use—the farm lets go of its nightmarish reign.
Because this feels different.
The kitchen creaks as I watch myself—the version of me ten years ago—walk across its floors, past the sink with pans and plates overflowing. The dream-me never acknowledges my presence—probably because I’m just an observer this time around—and he heads for the room to my right, where my father lays on the gurney, yet to die. This younger version of Dash—Amir—makes that pit stop at the cabinets, reaches in, and searches for the gun that I know he’ll feel with his fingertips and soon pull out.
“No,” I mumble. Hold my hand out like a wand. “Not this time.”
With the words I speak—wishes communicated out to the universe—the dream-me freezes. Doesn’t move. Doesn’t blink. His arm reaches into the cabinet, but there it remains on pause.
And unlike all those nights filling all those years—the time before the cocktail or Lobotomy Pills—I can enter this memory on my terms. So I do. I step inside the living room where my father’s final hours occur and find him there. Eyes closed. Face sharpened by cancer. Lips blue and chapped and the dissolving pills in the back of his mouth searing the air beyond with bitterness. Next to his gurney, in the empty chair, I sit. Take hold of his hand and listen to the air exit his body—pained and gurgling. His chest deflates. Count the seconds off before the chest rises—the inhale wounded and lethargic.
“Why am I here?”
His chest falls back down. Five, six seconds before he breathes in again. But another breath does come. Another moment survived.
His left eyelid breaks free. Opens halfway. His mouth agonizes into a grin. “You made it,” he whispers.
“I’m here, Dad.”
He takes a breath, storing his energy to rebuild the supply running on low. He holds it so long I think it’s his last. “Did you save the dog?”
“He’s safe now.”
“I knew you would. You always do the right thing.”
“Dad—why am I here?”
His throat or lungs whistle as the oxygen leaves his body. I count to seven. Eight. Nine before air returns on the inhale.
“Is there something I need to do?”
“You needed to return,” he says, the last syllable trailing off in the lost hallway of existence.
“Because you want me to see it, don’t you?” My hand runs sweaty within the clasp of his. “You want me to see what happened here, once and for all.” I wait for his response, for his chest to expand with enough oxygen—the count growing to nine seconds, ten seconds, whistling and gurgling louder—hello death rattle, hello. I weigh the notion. Watching what happened. Knowing if I did it or not. Searching for the answer inside of me, forecasting out a life lived with that knowledge and wondering if it would ever feel normal, if it would ever fade away. Asking myself—is there peace at the end of that?
“My boy.” His hand exerts whatever strength he has left and tightens its grip on mine. “The choice is yours. You can see it exactly as it happened.” He moves the pills in his mouth around like cough drops. Licks his lips. “Or you can choose to never see it ever again.”
“If I do that—I’ll never know.”
“And what if you do know? What does it give you? I can’t come back either way.”
The words force the exhale out. Eleven, twelve, thirteen.
“Dad?”
Fourteen seconds, his rib cage expands, and he coughs—a small burst from the throat.
“Still here.” He grins.
“But how do I live with myself?”
“Did we not have many great times?”
“We did.”
“And did I not let you know that I loved you?”
“Of course, many times.”
“And you did the same for me, Amir. You did the same. You have so many other memories of us. Let those come to mind. Not this.”
“Where do I go from here?”
“Isn’t that the most beautiful question? I know you’ve struggled in these years since. But you must remember, there is always a tomorrow. Always another day. Another sunrise. And where do you go from here? You must go wherever you need. For whatever you need. And find your peace—my God, please find peace, Amir. And then find joy. Find love. Because good people deserve all of that and I know that’s what you are.”
Twelve, thirteen, fourteen seconds.
Fifteen seconds.
His head cranes back.
The inhale comes just in time.
“But you have to let this go,” he says. “For me. For you. For whatever person you decide to become from this point forward.”
“From this point forward,” I mumble. For the first time in years—all the hours and days and months of torture—I can stop looking back and start thinking about “from this point forward.” No more time to dwell. To hold regret. To wonder what happened and why it happened. No more heartache and all it produces in the face of loss and trauma—the thousand natural shocks of grief and suffering and denial and anger and depression and bargaining, bargaining, bargaining. I can let go because he’s right. I already have so many other memories of us together. This moment on the farm is the end but far from the whole story. And so there is no need to see what happened here once and for all. What’s done is done.
“Will I ever see you again?”
“You get to see me whenever you need. And you know it.”
I nod. Take inventory of his cold fingers and hairy knuckles and lasting paternal smell, commit it to memory—as if I ever had to—that voice and accent and warming grin and thick mustache and how he makes me feel, always made me feel, taught me right from wrong and this is the man, yes, this is the man I wanted to become and he is the king and I am the prince and why did it have to come to this? But I’m grateful I had this much time and I’m grateful he saved me, then, now, and forever and forever. Yes, forever and forever. And shouldn’t I tell him?
“Thank you,” I say. “Thank you for making me what I am. Thank you for showing me all that I needed to know. Thank you for chess. For the long walks. For quiet moments of love—for being my dad—for being there whenever I needed it—for helping me study for math tests—for taking me to the park and buying me that pitching machine—for always hugging me tightly after you lost your temper—for calling out all of your shortcomings as a way to caution me away from them—for joking—for smiling—for waking me up in the morning and taking me to school—for trying to spend time with me even when I was a dumb teenager wanting to do anything but spend time with his parents—for showing me what it means to be good—for the guidance—for the wisdom—for the lessons I’ll never forget.”
“Thank you for coming back for me.”
“Thank you for helping me find myself again.”
“Thank you for rescuing me.”
“Time and time again.”
“Thank you for being my dad.”
“Thank you for everything.”
I lean over his fallen body, thin and ravaged. Kiss him atop his head, and teardrops fall from the son to the father. Hold his hand close to my chest. “This is just goodbye for now—you know that, right? This is just goodbye for now.”
He closes his eyes, and his own tears crawl out of his lashes, falling to the corners of his mouth. He nods back. The breath escapes his body.
Eleven seconds.
I take a step back. And another. I’m in the doorframe between the hall and the front door, looking at him.
Fourteen seconds.
Thank him one more time. For this. For it all. One more time.
Sixteen seconds. Seventeen seconds.
“For now.”
The Next Chapter Begins in 3, 2, 1 . . .