His Dark Words

07 | Words You'll Never Say

I avoid Alex for the rest of the day and when I get on the bus I don't get off at my usual stop. I sit there; rigid, tense, cold, numb... 

I keep going until I reach the hospital. With all this anger still coursing through my veins I go right up to the front desk and bring my palms down so hard on the counter. It makes the nurse sitting there jump.

"I want to see my Dad!" I yell. 

It sounds so out of place in that silent, sterilised space.

"Okay, honey... What's your Dad's name?" The nurse blinks up at me through her glasses. She's young, probably only around twenty. She has dark brown, tight curls pulled back from her face and brown skin with a few darker freckles over her nose and cheeks. She looks kind, concerned. I instantly feel terrible for shouting at her.

"Marcus Riley." I mutter, drawing my hands away and holding them behind my back.

The nurse types into her computer then adjusts her glasses and looks up at me pityingly. "It says here that he requested that you didn't visit."

"I know," I swallow hard, "but I'm not leaving until he sees me."

The nurse's look of compassion is almost too much for me to bear, but I just continue to stare at her, knowing that if I break my concentration, I'll lose control and cry and that's the last thing I want to do.

"I'll go talk to him..." The nurse says quietly, slipping out of her seat. Her rubber soled shoes squeak down the hallway. I chew my nails distractedly, wincing at the taste of blue nail polish. As an unstoppable nail-biter, I swear each different colored polish tastes distinct. Blue tastes like super acidic marmalade.

"He has to see me, he has to..." I whisper over and over to myself.

I haven't been here since he took me off of his visitor list. Mom tried to explain to me why he did it. It still makes no sense to me.

The nurse comes back and overhears my little mantra. She must think I'm just as crazy as him.

"It's okay, honey, he's waiting for you."

I nod in an odd jerk. I wasn't expecting this. I thought it would be more of a fight, but maybe after all this time he actually misses me? I follow the nurse through ultra-clean, bleach-scented corridors to a large room filled with well-used armchairs. There are patients dotted around, some in regular clothes, others in pyjamas, sitting reading, or playing pool. It all looks so normal. You might even believe it's some weird kind of resort or maybe a play.

I don't recognize him at first. He's sitting in an armchair facing out of the window looking over the hospital car park. His thinning hair is rumpled, and he's wearing an old, striped dressing gown. His glasses are dirty, and he's grown a short, scruffy beard over his concave cheeks. I try hard to justify this image with the one in my mind. It's been a year since I last saw him. It may as well have been twenty.

Quietly I walk over and sit in a plastic chair facing him. The nurse says something I don't hear then backs away to give us some privacy.

"So, you came..." He says, in a slow, ponderous way as if he isn't much used to talking to anyone. His eyes dart nervously behind the smudged glasses and he rubs his chin as if to smooth down the hair or make it disappear altogether.

"I know you didn't want me to." I place my hands on my knees. I'm reminded inescapably of my interview for Mont Michel, how I practised for hours to sit just so, like Mia in the Princess Diaries. I so wanted to be poised... Ready for anything.

He swallows, goes to rub his face again, thinks better of it, then sits on his hands to keep them still. 

"I didn't want you to see me like this." He explains after a painfully long pause.