“So,” he says, taking a seat near me on the couch where I’m reviewing the blueprints for the gym, “are you ready for this?”
I glance at him sidelong, incredulous. “Yeah. I’m ready.”
He sighs, and leans forward. “Look, you know you can still back out. I can spin the—”
“Reginald… Dad… shut up.”
Reginald blinks, his mouth turning down at the corners, and then sighs as he leans back again, appraising me. “You know, when I said do anything you had to—propose, knock her up—I was being sarcastic.”
“I didn’t do this because of you,” I tell him. “For once.”
“That much is obvious,” he mutters. “I’ve always believed that the best women for marriage are the ones without ambition. Pliable, demure, domestic. You know that Janie’s going to leave you in the long run, right?”
What do other fathers say to their sons the day before their weddings? “Like Mom left you?” I ask.
“Your mother… is she… you know…?”
“She’ll be here,” I tell him. “She’s flying in tomorrow morning. She can’t stay long. Busy with work.”
“I offered that woman the world,” he says. “She threw it back in my face.”
I turn to face him. This has been a long time coming, and it needs to be said. I’m pretty sure I’m the only one who will ever be able to do it.
“Dad, Mom left you because you’re an insufferable, emotionally abusive narcissist. You need to control everyone around you, compulsively, and because of that no one wants to be close to you. I don’t want to be close to you. The only reason I am is… because I keep thinking that maybe one day you’ll change.
“And I know that you’re too old for that. You probably will never change, and my guess is that you don’t think there’s even anything wrong. But one by one, as you grow old, you will lose every person you thought was a friend. They’ll either get tired of you, or they’ll betray you. Your shareholders will try to steal your business. Bit by bit, everyone will nibble off whatever pieces they can get off you, because you let them, thinking that if you give them a nibble you’ll have the chance to put a collar around their necks.
“One day, there will be no one stupid enough to nibble, and you’ll be out of mice to play with. And on that day, you’ll be all but alone.” My pity is genuine, though I suspect he can’t even tell it’s there. “The only person you’ll have left then will be me. In the very last days, I’ll be the one standing by you when you go. And you will go, eventually. No one lives forever.”
“Why?” he asks.
At first, I don’t get the context. I didn’t even expect him to respond, or at least, not with anything short of derision. “What?”
“Why will you be there, if that’s how you feel?” he clarifies. He looks truly baffled.
My father the narcissist.
“Because, Reginald,” I tell him. “You’re my dad.”
He quietly stands. I can see that he still doesn’t really understand. He doesn’t need to, though. The only part he needs to get is that the dynamic between us has changed and is never going back.
Then he holds a hand out. I stand, weary, and reach for it to shake. His odd little gesture, a salute that I appreciate for what it is, even if it isn’t much.
But to my surprise, he tugs me forward when I take his hand and for the first time in my life, I’m fairly certain, my father hugs me.
Then he leaves.
He isn’t at the wedding. But that’s okay. Janie is. And she’s all I need.
Her, and my unborn daughter.
Epilogue
Janie
“You look beautiful,” Toia tells me in the bridal ready-room. It’s a massive bathroom that could easily double as a day spa, and Toia is busy making a few last-minute alterations to accommodate my belly. I never imagined myself pregnant when I wore my wedding dress, but looking at myself in the mirror I have to admit—Toia knows her shit.
She has saved me. I probably could have hired a wedding planner, but no one who was excited as Toia to help me out. The woman lives and breathes this world and I feel like a fish in a slowly heating pot of virgin coconut oil.