I come home late on the night of my thirteenth birthday, slowly unlocking, opening, and closing the door behind me so as to not make any noise. I tiptoe into the kitchen for a drink of water, where I find the outline of a man sitting at the table. It’s my father. Although the room is dark, the sparse beams of moonlight coming in through the windows are enough to see a glass of wine clutched in his left hand and the fingers of his right lightly tapping a tall, green, opened bottle. I greet him and walk over to the light switch, but before I can press it—
“You’re home,” he says. It’s not a question, just a statement, a matter of fact. Something in the tone of his voice tells me not to turn on the lights. He stops tapping on the bottle.
“Yeah,” I reply, unsure if he merely wanted his observation to be affirmed. He does not speak more, so I elaborate. “Mike’s mom, she just dropped me off.” Is this enough now? “I couldn’t stay there, they have people over. Cousins or something.”
He takes a drink of the wine in his glass. Somehow the sound of liquid passing down his throat is exaggerated; when he swallows, it’s deafening. He holds the glass in his hand and stares down at it. Anything more to say? When the silence seems to answer that, I go to the cupboard, get a plastic cup, and just before I place it under the faucet, my father speaks up again.
“Come here,” he says. “Sit with me.”
I obey, take my hand off the faucet, pull up the chair opposite him, and sit. I look around at our kitchen, the kitchen I’ve known my entire life. Cream-colored wallpaper with little...
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