Apple Of His Eye After a suffocating silence his question needed an answer. She whispered into the mouthpiece of the phone, Yes Dad. I remember you. Had she laughed out loud when he said he needed her? The organ that houses emotion contracted, or was it just a gripey stomach? One too many homemade taco’s the night before. “You’re my daughter. I miss you.” I’m the product of your watery sperm. “How are you? Are you happy? Have you done all right for yourself? Oh you’d be proud daddy. I’m just like you. “Say something damn you. I’m begging here.” Are you on your knees daddy? Or better yet your belly? Speak to you? But daddy I wasn’t brought up to tell you to… Her fingers must have pressed the bar to disconnect the call. She hadn’t spoken a single word. The phone purred in her ear, the voice of her nightmares was gone. A single tear rolled half way down her cheek and then stopped, frozen in place, as though she had willed it to halt as she remembered her vow, never to waste her salt on him, as he had once wasted his salty discharge to produce her. She wiped angrily at the treacherous tear. Her nightmare wore slippers and had two blankets over his knees. Yet he still stomped through her sleep with a stamp of dread. This huddled husk was surely a clever disguise. She stood over him. For the first time in her life, she didn’t flinch or cower; neither did she make any effort to conceal her contempt. He flinched. She smirked, revelling in her new-found power over him. Some would say she answered his call for help out of a strong sense of duty. She was a good girl and would never cause hurt or suffering to another living thing. Not her. An eye for an eye was not an issue. It was a burn for a burn, a kick for a match, A punch for a pair, abuse for a duce, and maybe a drowning to even the score. Why daddy! You look shocked. Can you see yourself etched in my hatred? They say I have my mother’s face, but I got your warped mind. I’ve got my mothers hair, but I have your twisted nature. You’re my mentor; you’re my guru; Daddy. I’ve grown up and I’m going to do all the things that you taught me to do. I’ve come to kill you. Daddy. But first I want to play with you awhile. She swallowed her revulsion and saw to his needs. Coldly. Neither gentle, nor harsh. Mechanically. Following the guidelines of her profession to the letter. Doing no less and certainly no more. She fed him when his hands were too unstable to hold the spoon, fighting the urge to cram his mouth, so that she could have the pleasure of watching him drown in a pond of liquidated food. When he asked for a snack. She brought it for him. She didn’t lock him in his room for thirty hours and then beat him savagely if he wet himself. She had become a nurse, a good nurse. A professional nurse. Fighting with her lack of education, learning, taking exams and clawing her way through four years of training. Can you learn compassion? When had she first come to care about those under her care? She had witnessed so much suffering, so many people in pain and confusion. She had seen so many eyes scanning her gaze. Searching for warmth, or empathy. The bindings of thorn, that had cut into her psyche for so many years, withered and fell to the ground and the stems slackened their hold and sheathed to the floor like a silk stocking down an oiled calf. Want to know a secret daddy? It won’t be my first attempt to kill you. I’ve already tried three times. If you could hear that you’d think I was a failure wouldn’t you? Well I was only a child, ten years old I think. The first time was a roller skate on the stairs. I know, it was unimaginative. A cliché attempted murder. I read it in a book, or saw it on Television … or something. You found the skate before you trod on it. Do you remember that beating daddy? Despite my first failure, I was already a creature of habit. I had my M.O. I just figured that maybe the skate was too noticeable. My next attempt was to substitute the wheels with a bar of Pears soap. I love the smell of pears soap, don’t you? The luck of the devil was with you that night, or maybe the luck belonged to you, whichever. You somehow stepped over the soap and never noticed that it was there. My third attempt was identical to the second, only this time you did see it. Do you remember that beating? After that I filed my plan under’flawed thinking’ I did not dare make another attempt in case you discovered it once again and realised what I had in mind. Cowardice drove me back to my scheming. The first time she had assisted in a childbirth she thought she was perspiring in sympathy with the mother, She rolled that first tear between her forefinger and thumb, astounded that it was part of her. She had long before forgotten how to cry. She never did learn how to prevent her tears, at the wonder of childbirth. And she never stopped being amazed and awed by the beauty of it. Life had taught her to have a level head in an emergency. Coping with pain, suffering and death were sometimes rewarded with a smile of gratitude or one of genuine pleasure. She learned patience and discovered tenderness. Twice daily she saw to his needs. In those early days he was able to use the bath, as long as she was by his side to support him. On that first occasion she sat him on the hoist, making sure all the buckles were fastened. The slip mat was in the bath, the safety guards were raised. Checking and rechecking that every thing was in order and that he wouldn’t slip. She lowered him into foamy water of just the right temperature. Just think Daddy, if the water was boiling hot, you would have no means of escape. Remember the pan of boiling soup? I do. Oh the physical scars are almost imperceptible now, over the years the grafts have merged with the soft skin of my breast, Only the eyes or probing tenderness of an attentive lover would notice them now. Her skin crawled as she washed his withered body. The suds feeling like venom between her fingers. The sponge a welcome barrier between her skin and his. She had to wash him there. Kneeling down being careful to keep her eyes averted from it she began. That was when she saw his mocking realisation of her terror. Meeting his gaze firmly and with new resolve, she washed him thoroughly, professionally. Four seeded beads of perspiration on her upper lip the only indication of her disgust and revulsion. She washed his back, and stopped with a hand on each of his shoulders. Was this the position you were in when you tried to drown me daddy? Did you think of me in that cold water as you made your weak, but serviceable alibi in the local pub? You did commit murder though didn’t you? Circumstantial evidence, insufficient evidence, not guilty. These words all begged allegiance with you. Fawned to you, clung to you like strips of rotting meat to a damned corpse. And I was returned to your loving embrace. How much pressure on these slack old shoulders would it take to submerge you daddy? Should we find out? Did it take a lot of force to drown my Mother that day? For two years she went morning and night to attend to him. One day she walked in to see him contemplating his gnarled, arthritic hands. Tears streamed down his face, a broken man and his broken body. She smirked, a jolt of pure joy passing through her, but it was to be short lived. Suddenly she was gripped by a spasm of pity for this man that was so intense it all but brought her to her knees. She had never said one unkind word to him in all the months she had been caring for him. Neither had she ever said a kind word. She spoke only when she had to, said no more than needed to be said. She made milky coffee for them both and remembered for the first time, all the milky coffees he had made for her. She used common sense words to talk him down from his melancholy, and remembered that he had issued many words of wisdom, words which she would always live by. Sometimes she had to take her son with her. Throughout those two years the child was never left alone with him for so much as one second. He had never given her a single reason to doubt his clean love for the boy. It hurt her to punish his wonderful grandparenting skills with such distrust. The pain in his eyes was mirrored in hers, as she would take the child gently from his knee and trail the toddler through to the kitchen or bathroom with her. He never once raised his voice to the child, let alone his fist. He never caressed the child as anything other than a Granddad. His volatile temper had been replaced with an endless patience and wonder with his grandson. The baby loved him. She never did. Not once did she have the slightest temptation to trust him. A grudging friendship built between the father and daughter. They talked about anything but the past. She had so many questions, that she would one day ask, but his final betrayal of her was to die before she got the chance. She washed him a final time, and dressed him with meticulous care. He couldn’t help much normally, but dead he couldn’t help at all. Some would say she laid him out, through a sense of duty. But she prepared him for his travels through a sense of friendship, and respect for the man that he had become. She never loved him, she doesn’t love him. She learned to like him, and likes him still. She misses him. I’m your daughter. Daddy! But I’m not like you. You see I am my mother’s daughter too.
Copyright © 2000 Sue (Sooz) Simpson |