All of Me

three • the pool noodle

• • •

As August slips into September, the weather becomes a lot more aggreeable with a delicious breeze to accompany the heat that lingers on. The temperature has finally dropped to the seventies and it couldn't be more perfect this weekend. Lying out in the garden with a new book from Mom's store, while she lies next to me with an old favourite, I feel truly happy.

Sometimes I catch myself in these moments and my brain scrambles to fixate on the most devastating tracks of my life, as though I don't deserve to feel good, but today there seems to be a filter blocking out the worst of my memories.

When my thoughts land on the creep from the two days ago, I don't focus on how afraid he made me feel, but on the relief that came with Liam's smile; when Dad enters my mind with his trademark beam, I don't think about every word I regret saying to him, but on the highlights that play like a movie trailer.

I don't have closure and I probably never will, but I've finally reached a point where I've made peace with Dad's death. I don't begin to entertain the thought that he's out there, a thought that only brings indescribable pain, but I pray that he's watching down on Mom and me, willing us to move on.

It took a while to reach this point. Honestly, it's only since moving to Five Oaks that the feeling has had any degree of conviction to it, and I wish we'd moved sooner. With a bit of distance, I can see how stifled we were by the apartment that was all him, Mom's closet still half-filled with his clothes, the scent of his cologne in the air.

Mom was right. This has been good for us. Maybe it's the clean country air or the water I can actually swim in, but I feel like a weight has flown off my shoulders, leaving just a chip behind. Since we've been here, I haven't googled Dad's name once.

After he went missing, I couldn't stop refreshing his name in the search bar. It was a drug I was hopelessly addicted to, scouring the internet for some clue as to what had happened. At some point after locking up the bookstore, he had vanished without a trace. After Mom and I spoke to the police and we rallied up all the entire neighborhood to search, an article finally popped up.

IMMIGRANT STORE CLERK MISSING

That was it. People lost interest, if they had ever cared at all. I called the site, I emailed them, I begged them to change the title of the piece. Dad landed in America when he was a toddler; he was forty-three when he disappeared. As soon as he turned eighteen, he fought for his citizenship and he got it.

He grew up here; he worked here; he was just as American as anyone else. But he was reduced to four words that ensured nobody cared.

I pleaded the website to change the title to DEVOTED HUSBAND or LOVING FATHER or ACTUALLY A PRETTY COOL DAD but I learnt that you can't choose your adjectives. They're chosen for you, slapped on like a product label without the full list of ingredients.

Nobody cared that Dad was an incredible chef. They never saw the way he and Mom cuddled on the sofa at night. They couldn't see how proud he was of his bookstore. He wasn't a clerk: he owned the place.

If the papers had read DEVOTED FAMILY MAN AND SUCCESSFUL BUSINESS OWNER MISSING, then people would have looked for him. Maybe they'd still be looking; maybe he'd be right here, but he's not. People saw a man with dark skin and an unfamiliar name and they decided that Levente Sovany wasn't worth looking for.

Mom's sure he's somewhere out there, that he's going to show up one day and everything can be more, but I know he won't. He's dead. He has to be. It's easier if he is. Because what if he's not? If my dad is still alive, then why did he go? Why did he miss my birthdays, my graduation, me? Why would he ignore my prayers and my pleas, every poster I pasted with his smile?