KARMA

25. FEARLESS

SUSAN

"Why?" my father asks. He looks so old and worn, a frail ancient man with sadness in his eyes.

His breathing has changed to a rumble; since when has my father breathed like that? I stare at his collapsed face, remembering the last time I saw him, smiling so kindly, so warmly at me. These things happen, he had said, squeezing my hand. Some marriages are just not meant to be. Don't mind what your mother says.

Why do you stay with Mother? I had asked him.

I took vows, he had said. I believe in fidelity. Your mother is not an easy person to live with, but she's my wife and she gave me you, our beautiful daughter. I understand your mother. I'm used to her ways. We've lived together for years, and I'd never leave her.

Poor Dad. Too honourable and too loyal to leave my mother, even though she treats him like dirt.

"I gave you that money to help you, and you --- you --- " his face crumples, his voice cracks. "I trusted you, and you --- you --- and Ryan --- oh, God --- "

Tears run down his wrinkly cheeks, and he closes his eyes, squeezes them back.

"She needed to pay. She and Ryan." My voice is flat, dead.

When he opens his eyes, the horror has been replaced by an awful pity.

He looks at me for a long, silent moment.

He must think I am much changed, transformed from the person I once was. Now I am a woman of bone and skin. Prison food is unpalatable, and my appetite is non-existent; I am sullen and uncooperative, drifting on a sea of memory, caught between islands of fury and remorse. Fury that Lisa walks free. Remorse that Maxim is hurt.

"Is Ryan alive?" I ask my father.

He inhales, then answers me, his voice rusty, "He's alive. He's out of danger, but" --- he pauses, then adds, his voice dipping low --- "he's permanently impaired."

I laugh, like he's just said something really funny. I laugh and laugh, and when I stop, my father is silent, staring at me.

"Serves the bastard right. He was going to leave me," I chuckle. "Bad decision."

"Don't you feel remorse for what you have done, Susan?" My father has never called me Susan before. He's always called me love or sweetheart. "I didn't raise you this way. You were a good girl, a loving girl..." his voice trails off. "It's all my fault. I should have --- "

"Oh, Dad. It's not your fault," I say impatiently. "If Mother were here, she'd tell you it's what she would have expected of me. Where is Mother, by the way?"

"She --- she's feeling poorly --- " A poor excuse. My father struggles to meet my eyes.

I take pity on poor Dad.

"It's fine, Dad. I don't want to see her, either."

"Jesus forgives all sins," my father says, softly. "We have to acknowledge our responsibility."

He looks at me, really looks at me.

In his voice I hear the love that has always buffeted me, shielded me from my mother's barbs, and the pain in his eyes draws me back from my dark thoughts.

"I am paying for my sins, Dad. They are my sins. They have nothing to do with you. You are a good man, a good father, the best. I'm sorry that I disappointed you. Don't you ever blame yourself. I am what I am. It has nothing to do with you," I say, my voice softening, and he leans forward and I know he is hoping for something, a tiny piece of light that will prove to him that that daughter he adored is still in me somewhere, hidden, but not dead. "I love you, Dad. Don't come anymore, if it hurts you. I'd understand."