restricted love | e.g.d

one - it is so nice to meet you!

If I've learned one thing about books and movies: that LA is the coolest city with the coolest people and the coolest beaches. I have always dreamed of visiting the Golden State, what girl hasn't. Some time I want to go jogging on the sands of Venice Beach, touch my favorite celebrities stars on the Walk of Fame, stand behind the Hollywood-Sign and look at the beautiful city, and all that other boring tourist stuff.

I wait at the baggage carousel, one headphone in, the other dangling itself, I'm only half paying attention to the music as I search for my bag. People around me push other people to get their suitcases. A woman shouts at her husband as her baggage drives past them, he shouts back it that it wasn't hers at all. I twist my eyes and focus on my khaki colored suitcase on its way to me now. I know it's mine because I wrote song lyrics on each side with an expo marker. Forcefully, I grab the handle and pull my case as quickly as possible off the baggage carousel.

"Over here!" Someone behind me shouts. I recognize the astonishingly deep voice of my dad straightaway even though it was half drowned out by my music. I could turn my volume on maximum and I could probably still hear my father 100 miles away. That voice is attached with too much pain and fury to ignore.

When mom told me dad invited me to stay the whole summer with him, we laughed our asses off because it was ridiculous. "You don't need to keep in touch with him," she has told me every day since then. We haven't heard from him for three years and now suddenly I'm supposed to stay the whole summer with him? It would have been enough if he had called me occasionally to ask me how I am or took part in my life from time to time. No, he decided to grab the bull by the horns and invite me to stay with him for eight weeks! Mom was totally against it. She thought he didn't deserve eight weeks with me, even if it was to catch up. Eight weeks wasn't possibly enough time to catch up on a lifetime of events but, dad didn't give up. He was very persistent in trying to convince me that I would love California.

Why did he suddenly decided to get in touch? Maybe he hopes he can build up our relationship again - a relationship that stopped when he left us. I doubt that's at all possible. After some time I gave up and called him to tell him I'm coming to California. My decision didn't have much to do with him though. There was this image in my head of hot summer days with beautiful beaches and the possibility of falling in love with a tanned Abercrombie & Fitch model who has an eight-pack. There was another reason as well why I wanted to leave Portland one thousand five hundred kilometers behind me.

I am not very enthused to see that person approaching me. A lot can happen in three years. Three years ago I was eight centimeters shorter than I am now. My dad didn't have visible grey strands in his hair. Had the last three years not happened, this situation wouldn't be as pathetic. I try my best to smile or to grin so that I wouldn't have to explain why I look so grumpy. It's always easier to smile. "Look, there's is my little girl!" dad says. His eyes go wide as he shakes his head in disbelief, I don't look like thirteen anymore. It's really shocking that a sixteen year old girl has changed since eighth grade.

"Yes," I say and put out my headphone. The cable is dangling in my hand and soft music vibrates from my headphones.

"I missed you, Noah," he says it like it would make me overjoyed that my father, who left his family, misses me. Maybe he expects that I fall into his arms and forgive him straight away. It doesn't work like that. You can't expect forgiveness, you have to deserve it. However, I'll live with him for eight weeks. So, I should at least try to hide my hostility.

"Yeah, me too," Dad beams from ear to ear while his dimples dig into his cheeks like a mole in the earth.

"Give me your suitcase," he says as he takes my suitcase and pulls it behind him.