My father lives in a small, one-story stucco house with the same flat, red roofline as every other house on his street. Two giant, spiky cactus plants grow out of a bed of pebbles in the front yard, and two empty terra-cotta planters flank the wood-and-glass front door.
“You hungry?” he asks as we step into the air-conditioning. He drops his keys next to a pile of mail stacked on a table that consists of three unopened moving boxes.
“I need to shower first.”
What I need most is to avoid my father.
“Sure.” He sets his hat on a hook on the back of the front door. “I’ll start dinner. You want hotdogs or frozen pizza?”
For a moment I think he’s joking and then realize he isn’t. My mother always did the cooking. With a sudden pang of longing, I think of her marinated chicken and pasta dish. Suddenly I understand my dad’s new, leaner look. “Pizza.”
There’s no lock on my bedroom door, but I shut it with a definite click. The room is like walking into the pages of a Pottery Barn catalog. My dad basically went for it, and although I’d never tell him, I’ve always wanted a room like this.
On the back wall, there’s a white vanity flanked between two towers that have hooks and cubbies for every kind of accessory. A brightly colored quilt covers the twin bed, which has hot pink sheets and pillows in four different shapes.
My room is the only fully decorated one in the house. Apparently guilt, especially divorce guilt, has a price tag.
Kicking my sneakers off, I head into the bathroom. I peel back the straps of my tank top and catch a glimpse in the mirror of a fairly good sunburn on my shoulders. For some reason, it makes me happy, as if finally the outside of me is as painful as the inside.
Dinner is awkward. My father doesn’t have a kitchen table, so we eat in the living room on the smelly green velveteen couch that used to be in our basement. After a feeble attempt to discuss the great surprise of Emily and a long monologue on Dr. Shum’s exciting 3-D computer model of the ruins, he abandons the conversation effort and turns on CNN. Occasionally, he asks my opinion, and I reply in monosyllables. I think we’re both relieved when I retreat to my room.
Settling myself on top of the quilt, which according to the Pottery Barn website is ironically called “Peace Patchwork” and costs nearly two hundred dollars, I log onto Connections. The first thing I see is a connect request from Emily Linton. I accept it and then check out her page. Her status says, “So excited my BF is finally here!”
I scroll through a few of her conversations. Most are from friends I’ve never heard of, and it makes me feel sad that we’ve fallen so out of touch. I spend a lot of time looking at Emily’s photos. Most have been taken at the park, and the ruins, miniaturized by the massive cliffs, show in the background.
In one shot, Emily has her arm around my father and a wide smile on her face. I study this shot the longest. Both of them are tanned and blond and wearing green park shirts. I think Emily looks more like his daughter than I do.
By the time I log off, it’s late and the house is totally quiet. I think about calling my mom, but can’t bring myself to do it. The conversation will turn to how much she misses me, and I’ll end up comforting her instead of the other way around.
I love her, but I’m also mad at her.
Last fall, she could have fought harder for me. She could have given up the Yamaha piano and set of sterling flatware and maybe gotten more of me. Instead, she gave my summers to him, even though it wasn’t what I wanted. When I tried to talk to her, she simply said, “Please, Paige, you’re just making things harder.”
Slipping out of the room, I feel my way silently down the dark hallway, avoiding the edges of the framed artwork, still wrapped in brown moving paper, which lean against wall. The lights in my father’s bedroom door are off, but a small beacon shines from the kitchen.
I open the refrigerator and peer in. There’s a gallon of skim milk, a carton of orange juice, jars of some random condiments, a package of hotdogs, and several takeout containers.
I systematically go through every drawer and every cabinet. I’m careful not to clang the silverware or rustle the plastic grocery bags stuffed beneath the sink. I note the brand of cereal and the kind of coffee he drinks. I hold a half-empty salt shaker to the light and see the tiny grains of rice mixed inside—my mother’s trick to keep the salt from clumping. I read the ingredients on an unopened bottle of Blue Desert Barbeque sauce and drink from the plastic jug of Tropicana orange juice. I smell his dish towels to see if they smell like Tide (they don’t) and sample a semi-stale chip from an opened bag of Doritos.
None of these things give me the answers I want, but then again, I’m not quite sure what I’m looking for anyway. After a while, I pad silently back to my Pottery Barn room and slip beneath the covers of the guilt quilt.
Staring at the dark ceiling, I promise myself that if things don’t get better, I’ll steal my father’s credit card and book a flight back to New Jersey. I’ll hitchhike to the airport if I have to.
It doesn’t help to know that I can probably get myself to the airport and maybe even to New Jersey, but it doesn’t mean I belong there, either.