Chapter 13 - Michael Finally Asked Richard What Made a Father
The conversation happened two years after the country club incident.
Richard and Michael were repairing an old wooden dock at the family lake property.
Not symbolic on purpose.
Just maintenance.
Michael asked:
“When did you first feel like my father?”
Richard looked surprised.
“When you were born.”
“Not when you decided to marry Mom?”
“No.”
“Why?”
Richard thought.
“Before you were born, fatherhood was an idea.”
Then:
“You screamed for three hours the first night home. Your mother was exhausted. I walked around the kitchen holding you until sunrise.”
Michael smiled faintly.
“That did it?”
“No.”
Richard continued.
“It happened a thousand times.”
Fever.
First bicycle.
School suspension after Michael punched another boy at twelve.
College acceptance.
First business failure.
Michael calling at two in the morning before proposing to Rachel.
Emily’s birth.
Nothing about DNA.
Michael nodded.
Then:
“Why didn’t you trust that enough to tell me?”
Richard stopped working.
There.
The question beneath every other question.
Finally:
“Because my father made me feel that raising you was an act I would always have to defend.”
Michael looked at him.
“And you believed him.”
“For too long.”
Then Richard said:
“I should have told you when you were old enough to understand. Not because David outranked me. Because you outranked my fear.”
That was the closest Richard ever came to saying it perfectly.
Michael accepted:
it.
Not absolution.
Truth.
Then he handed Richard another board.
“Hold this.”
Richard smiled.
Dad again.
Still complicated.
May you like
Still dad.
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