Guilty

Chapter Four: The Tradition

        "Morning Mark!" I don't know why but, Mark an I always seemed to just get along. I never saw him as a brother in law, or the guy who bangs my sister and is the loins in which my nephew was spun from. No, I always thought of him as my friend.

        After all I was the one who introduced him to my sister. "Morning Emily." He said with oh so much enthusiasm. Note the sarcasm.

        Well okay then. "Hey I was wondering if you're coming to the park with us this weekend?"

        "I can't. I have to go to work. And plus Abigail hasn't been feeling well this week."

        She sure sounded fine last night. And that just sounded like two excuses. Lame excuses. We didn't need him to have a family picnic. And I'm sure Abby wouldn't let me down because she knew how important Sunday's are.

"But its a tradition. A family tradition." And it was. My dad died when I was seven, and it was hard on all of us. But not as hard as it was for my mom. For a week all she did was stay in their room, curled up on the floor hugging a pillow.

        She said it hurt to much to lay in the bed without him next to her.

        For a while we thought that we were going to lose her too. I was old enough to understand death but not old enough to understand my mother's broken heart.

        I always admired my father not only because he was a hard working man who paid the bills on time, and made sure we always had food on the table. But also because the fact that he was a big advocate of family time. Instead of sleeping in on his one day off, (Sunday) he would get up at ten o'clock to take Abby and I to the park so our mom could sleep in. Then that night we would have a family game night.

        And my father never let us see how tired he was. He didn't even let us see how much pain he was in as the cancer took him.

        So being a determined seven year old I packed a couple of Hello Kitty fruit snacks, some juice boxes, and a lasagna that our neighbor made into a picnic basket and told my mom that I was running away. And that's exactly what I did.

        I ran away.

        To the park across the street.

        When my mom came chasing after me I thought I was in trouble. But when she saw me, she sat on the ground right next to me and held my hand.

        And I was proud of myself because I had achieved my goal, my mother was out of the house. We sat out there for three hours, but we didn't talk, we just watched the families play. I kept quiet because I didn't know what to say and was afraid of saying something stupid and she seemed at peace for the first time in a long time.         

       

        Later on Abby joined us with plates and silverware. I told my mom I was sorry, she smiled and thanked me.

        I think that was one of the best things I've ever done.

        That seemed to be the catalyst my mother needed to rejoin society. So that Sunday, a week after my father's passing we sat in a park eating cold lasagna and fruit snacks reminiscing about my Dad and all the good times we had.

        And we had done it every Sunday since, even after Abby moved out.

"Please, please, please, Mark! Try to get off you know how important this is to Abby and I. It's even more important to do as a family. Please!" Even to my own ears I sounded like a whiny child, but I couldn't ignore the fact that this family seemed to falling apart.

        After I spoke Mark looked at me with laughter in his eyes. Like he heard something funny. Which made me angry because this family tradition was nothing to joke about and I don't like to be laughed at. "What's so funny?"

        "What's funny is the fact that you seem to think the world is all cotton candy and flowers still. Just wait until you grow up kid. Wait until you have responsibilities, like a job, a mortgage, or a child of your own. Then you'll see that there isn't really time for family picnics, or bedtime stories. And that sometimes family isn't the most important thing." He told me all of this with a consistent condescending tone, then walked out like I was irrelevant.

        Now I said I never thought of Mark as anything but a friend, except at the beggining and that was true. But here's something else that's true, I don't like to be talked down upon.