Always

Chapter Fourteen: Misters & Pictures

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   “Don’t leave me Dad...Please don’t…” I whisper to my dad’s weak body on the hospital bed.

   “Please Dad…” 

   Brian squeezed my hand every few minutes. But that just kept reminding me that this was real. It wasn’t a game that you could restart over and over. This was real, right here. 

   I look at my dad. His head was shaved where you couldn’t see a single hair. The light in his eyes were slowly fading. His face was sagging. He didn’t look like himself anymore. Like this wasn’t my dad. But it was. 

   “Dad...I love you.” I didn’t know if he could hear me or not, but saying the words at least made me feel good inside. 

   Brian kissed my head, telling me that I did something good. “I’ll see you soon Dad.” 

   Brian and I walk hand in hand out of his room, my words lingering in my mouth. “Thanks for being there with me.” 

   “I’ll always be.” I kiss his hand that I was holding. 

   As I sat in Brian’s truck, looking back at the hospital, I wished to be by my dad’s side at that moment. To tell him that everything’s going to be okay. That he’s going to come home to see his loving family. 

   But was I ever wrong on that one. Was I ever wrong, that it ruined who I was. And everybody around me. 

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