Two days shy of the six-month anniversary of my father’s passing I opened a blank Microsoft Word document in the spare bedroom of Matt Graunke’s house and sat there. My computer screen was like a crystal ball that portrayed foggy images of the recent past. A strange mixture of wet fear and damp curiosity rushed from the front of my brain and down, tickling my inner-most nose, scratching my throat with its moisture. As it ran through my upper torso my mind became aware of a frigid force field of stoicism that shielded my wounded heart.
Those first stages of mending had set in but it remained unclear when. It was evident it had been several weeks as the charge of imaginary liquid didn’t antagonize the injury; it didn’t pop open again or begin to weep. Instead some secondary or tertiary stage of definition had set in, acting as protective layers. Cells labored to construct outer shell upon outer shell, checking in on that primary cut with some sporadic measure. Those waters rushed past, though, like a herd of carnivores not noticing their hiding prey in the thick of the forest, a few mere oaks off the path.
