Cat's in the Cradle & a Silver Spoon

I’m going to disappoint you. But you knew that already. Your question stands between us: Dad will you be there? You know I probably won’t. I see it in the way you sit slumped on the leather sofa in the skimpy clothes that I hate, pretending. Pretending that it isn’t important to you. Pretending I’m a good father. Your eyes tell the truth when they won’t look at me.

I clear my throat in hopes that you’ll look my way, but you don’t. Instead you stare out the window at the perfect green lawn and I look too. As though the answer lies out there, in the world of responsibilities and obligations that I blame for my own parental inadequacies.

We sit in silence as I think. I can’t bear to let you down by saying no, but the simple truth is that I’m already booked.

I try to figure out what your mother would do, but it’s been a long time since she was here. It seems the older I get the more I blame time.

I cringe when you smile at me. That smile you got from your mother. That same dimple creases your left cheek, and you have that same crooked tooth. Every time I turn around you look more like her, and I didn’t know her any more than I know you. I’ll try, I say to myself, and hope that it’s true. So I say yes.

“Thanks, Dad, you’re the best!” The words echo in my head long after you’ve gone. I caught the doubt in your eyes when you gave me a hug. That silver tongue you get from me. Except that you still have the courage to say the lies to my face. I became a coward long ago.