HOLLY
I miss my dad. I’ve managed to go seven months without talking to him, but I still feel like an addict missing her hit of heroin or cocaine. I’m a Dad addict. I just need one hit of Dad. Just five minutes with him, and then I can go another seven months without talking to him. I just want to really quickly catch him up on everything going on in my life. Let him know that I dumped that guy he couldn’t stand, that I’m taking a break from auditions, and that I’m opening a bar with Jessie and Nat. That I got off the antidepressants. I want him to make a joke about the week I tried yoga because, let’s face it, nothing about my personality says, “Breathe.”
I want him to know that I have a huge crush on a guy whose last name is Erikson, and that I’m the worst stalker ever, because I can’t even figure out how to Google him. And that I’m so shy I’ve never even spoken to him. I want to bore Dad with details about how I went jogging one morning just because I saw Mr. Erikson stretching outside, and that after he smiled at me and said “Hi” as I passed him, I was so nervous, I gave a quick wave, then broke out into a run down the block that caused me to pull a hamstring, and surreptitiously limp back home once I knew he had left.
When I tell my story while getting my five-minute fix, Dad would laugh and shake his head. He would listen to me drone on about the guy, then hear me vent about how hard it is to date nowadays, because between texting and carrying our phones with us at all times, and Instagram and Facebook and that new site that a twenty-year-old at work told me about, now we girls have to wait by the phone 24/7. Dad would tell me that I sound ridiculous—that I might as well be one of those old biddies who said the world of dating had gone to hell now that men couldn’t stop by their homes with calling cards. He then would remind me that I am worth at least four goats, two chickens, and a mule, and to not stress out so much, because any guy worth his salt is going to do everything he can to be with me.
My father was my biggest fan in the world. He was always convinced that if the men didn’t know what they had, they didn’t deserve to have it.
This time, during these five minutes, I wouldn’t roll my eyes when he told me that I was as pretty as my mom. (I remember as a teen thinking that was the worst compliment ever. Yeah, Dad, genetics. Duh.) Instead, I’d say, “Thank you. I look like you too.”
And then, I would ask for Dad’s advice about the guy. And he would tell me to just talk to him. He’d say, “Just get on with it! Go smile and say hello to the guy. We really don’t like being the aggressors. We may say we do—we lie. Really, we want the beautiful woman to think we’re amazing, right off the bat. Most of us just want to know where our chair is. We want to ask you out. But in order to do that, it would be nice to get a little encouragement.”
Yup, that’s what Dad would say.
But, truth be told, if I had those five minutes, I wouldn’t talk about dating or finding a new man. I’d still ask for his advice, but it would be about a different man. It would be about him. And I would ask, “How do you ever get over losing your first love?”
And he would say, “You’re being a martyr. Knock it off. Life is for the living. Go open that bar. I’ll be there that first night, beaming with pride.”
There’s not a doubt in my mind, that’s exactly what he’d say.
I look over at his urn, a dark wood cube with a picture of a sailboat carved on the side. I kiss my index and middle fingers, and put them on the urn, then I sadly rest my head on the urn.
Yeah, Dad, I know: I am being a martyr. And an addict. Because I would still give anything for just five more minutes.