Married to my Dad’s Best Friend

“Hey, Kiddo,” my dad says from behind me, “wait up.”

I slow down, waiting for him to catch up. We walk side-by-side, not talking for a while. We’ve always been able to be in the same space with my folks in comfortable silence, but not this time. Not with this secret hanging between us.

“Remember when you were young, and we used to come to this beach all time? You used to beg me to go see the dolphins. We never did get to go see them. Lonnie promised he would go with us.”

I raise my head, the pressure on my chest lifting as he talks about the past, and I start to think he’s about to tell me what this secret between them is. But he just keeps walking. My mom is heading toward us. When I realize he has no intention of telling me, something inside of me snaps. I’m so pissed I can scream. I can’t take this anymore.

I pull the ring from its hiding spot in my pocket and slip it onto my finger.

My dad stares at it a moment as if it’s some foreign object he can’t make sense of. “What the hell is that?” he asks.

“I’m seeing Lonnie, Dad.”

My mom is close enough now to overhear our conversation. She stops in her tracks, her mouth hanging open in shock. I start to tell my dad about the fake marriage but he’s not listening.

His voice booms and startles me. “I warned Lonnie all those years ago to stay away from my daughter.”

I’ve only ever heard my dad yell in court. At home he was always so mellow and easy-going.

“I’m going to kick his ass,” he says.

It’s laughable to think of my dad trying to kick Lonnie’s ass. My dad has let himself go soft over the years while Lonnie has only gotten fitter. Dad always makes the same lame joke “I don’t have a dad bod, I have a father figure.” But as mad as he is right now, he might just be able to give Lonnie a run for his money.

My dad storms off, cussing under his breath. Cussing is also something I’ve never really heard my dad do.

I look at my mom. She’s still silent.

“What does he mean he warned Lonnie to stay away from his daughter all those years ago?” I ask her.

My mom sighs and puts her hand on my shoulder. My heart starts to constrict with fear about what she’s about to tell me. She always puts her hand on my shoulder when it’s something bad.

“Before you went off to college, your father and I were concerned about the way you were behaving around Lonnie. I found your diary.”

I hold my stomach, feeling sick all over again even though I’m on land. “Where was I when you were invading my privacy?” I ask, spitting venom.

She flinches at the tone of my voice. “You were with your friends, scouting schools.”

I try to remember everything that was in those old diaries. I know every page was about Lonnie. She would’ve read about how much I cared about him and how I’d planned to kiss him the next time I saw him. I never spared any of the details, the things I wanted to do to him, the ways in which I wanted to touch him and how I wanted him to touch me. The reality turned out to be so much better than the fantasy.

I remember when I got home from scouting, my parents were acting weird and I never saw Lonnie again after that, but I had no idea it had anything to do with me.

I start to blush profusely because I was sure that only my eyes would ever see those words. I wrote all of my deepest fears and colorful fantasies in it. No details were missed. Even though it’s been years since then, I’m still mortified that my parents read about those things.

I hear my dad screaming in the distance. My mom and I take off in that direction. It’s so hard to run in the sand. Especially when you want to run fast, it feels like we’re standing still.

When I get closer and the voices get louder, I see my dad pushing Lonnie. I can’t believe what I’m seeing. Lonnie is just taking it, not fighting back. He’s pissed though. I can see it in the set of his jaw. I can tell he wants to hit my dad but is holding back. I wonder if he’s doing that for my benefit.

My dad punches Lonnie in the face and I scream, “Dad, stop! I love him, please stop.”

My dad jerks his head toward me and backs away from Lonnie. It would be the perfect opportunity to take advantage and hit my dad, but he doesn’t do that. They’re both watching me, breathing heavily. My dad gasps for air. Lonnie wipes at a line of blood running down the front of his nose. He doesn’t look hurt too bad other than that. Nothing seems broken. Just a little scuffed up. My dad is lucky Lonnie doesn’t seem more pissed than he is. My dad is barely holding himself up after exerting his energy on the fight. He’s in a vulnerable position with his hands on top of his head, trying to catch his breath. If Lonnie wasn’t such a good man, he could punch my dad in the stomach and take him down. But Lonnie doesn’t seem at all interested in my dad right now. His eyes are wide and pinned on me.