Actual Reality

Daughter of Mine

The house was in the Borough of Queens, a place where smog reached for the sun in thick tendrils, and the air tasted salty like brine. Dead trees lined the roadway, and I stalked the streets like a phantom.

My hollow knocks were met with silence until the door inched open. She stood in the candlelight, an empty look in her eyes, with an expression somewhere between surprise and disgust. She turned her back without saying a word, leaving the door ajar.

Inside, the walls were aged; faded pictures hung beneath the staircase. The sitting room was small and homely; books were piled next to drawing pads filled with sketches. I found her in the kitchen.

She had a thin, brittle frame; her skin was ashen, dirty. Gone was the long, flowing hair, replaced by a shaved scalp. She was stirring a pot atop a gas hob, and I heard the sound of the wooden spoon scrape the sides in circles.

"Nancy?" I said with a quivering voice.

She kept stirring.

"Are you going to talk to me?"

She dropped the spoon.

"You and Charles have a lot in common: you're both horrible liars."

She covered the simmering pot and brought me into the sitting room. She sat me down on one of the settees and took the adjacent armchair. The air felt heavy, encumbered by all the things left unsaid, and the settee was dirty, thick with the dust of disuse. I spent precious seconds in silence.

"Don't get many visitors, do you?"

The moment I said it, I died inside. I had one chance to turn things around, and I was ruining it.

"I'd be happier if I had one less," she growled, "but since you're here, I might as well listen to your empty words."

"I'm sorry," I said, eyes on the grimy floor.

She laughed.

"For what?"

"For everything."

"You'll have to be more specific than that, Dad. I want to know exactly what you're sorry for."

My eyes left the floor, settling on her taut, severe features.

"Is it your callousness?" she demanded, "the fact you never let me see my grandparents? How about the complete disregard for my privacy in coming here?"

"Nancy, I..."

"No. Not those things – they never did bother you, did they?"

She put her finger to her lip in a mocking gesture.

"But it can't be! You can be sorry for choosing that woman over me?"

"That woman is your mother."

"Is she?" she scoffed, "because it doesn't seem that way. She hasn't spoken to me since... since"

"Since you broke her heart."

Nancy got to her feet and pushed right past me. My muscles tensed. She was gone for a while, and when she returned, she was carrying two ceramic bowls that clattered unceremoniously. She set one down in front of me and, after sitting, she took long, unloving sips from her own.

"I still don't know why I let you in," she breathed, "l was almost sick when I saw you."

I was unhurt by the words, and I ate her brew out hunger and despite the taste.

She shook her head, thoughtfully.

"But when you came to the door, you looked so frail, so fragile. I thought you might die if I didn't let you come inside."