Skipping Stones

The sight of Humbo Lake, which I had always passed on my bike trail, made me stop in my tracks. That’s when it hit me. God, how had I been so stupid? September had been such an empty month; there was some shift in energy that was different than all the years before. I hadn’t been able to put my finger on what it was . . . until just now.

The lake brought back a memory from early July. My dad had told me we were going on a special trip, just for the evening. The windows of his rusty blue truck were down, and the air was cool. My dad turned on the radio and was humming along to Billy Joel. I watched the cornfields that surround our house disappear in the rearview mirror as we got farther and farther away. The sky was lavender. It was one of those things you could’ve looked at for hours if only it wasn’t so fleeting. 

Skrrt. The car came to a stop on the side of the road. I was surprised at how short the drive was, not even thirty minutes from the house. 

“Dad, this is the special trip? I come here all the time.”

“Well, you don’t appreciate it enough, Isiah.” He nodded towards the door. 

I reluctantly followed him out of the car to the shore of Humbo Lake, even though the thought of playing video games at home was much more appealing. We stood there for a minute or two. I glanced over at my dad, and his eyes were lost in the clouds and the sun that was slipping away. 

“It’s nice, isn’t it?” My dad asked, killing the weird silence. 

“I guess.”

“You’re going to miss it when you’re at university next year.” 

“I know, dad. We’ve had this talk a million times, about how everything’s going to change.” 

Instead of answering, my dad picked up a pebble and playfully skipped it across the lake. I picked up a pebble, too, and challenged him. 

My dad wasn’t one to say “I love you.” I can’t think of one time he said those three words. In return, I never said it either. I know it sounds sad or whatever, but my mom said it plenty, enough to make up for my dad. I wasn’t as close to him as my mom. I didn’t think about it a lot, to be honest. My dad took me to a baseball game a few times a year, and that was enough for me.

When I matured I realized that he does love me, but he says it in his own language. He drops clues for me to find here and there. Ever since I committed to Penn State, which is hundreds of miles away, my dad started lingering in doorways and asking me how my day was a lot more. 

The summer was strange, a universe in its own. I was a high school graduate. My friends didn’t come around as much, busy with their own lives and their separate paths. I spent a lot of time riding my bike around aimlessly; no destination in my mind. My town didn’t feel the same. Maybe my dad was right and I hadn’t been appreciating it. Or maybe it was because I was leaving soon. 

Sure, I’d be back eventually for holidays and summers. But when I did return, the town wouldn’t belong to me like it used to. It would belong to the high schoolers killing time at the park after school as if four years was an eternity, the lazy cats who lay on concrete driveways soaking up the sun, and the people who stood in line at the same coffee shop every early morning. 

There was one instance when I woke up late on a Saturday. The sunlight that came through the window was the color of golden honey, and I could see dust fairies floating in the stream of light. The house was completely quiet, except for the distant sound of pots and pans in the kitchen. I had this realization that I would miss living at home, even if it got lonely sometimes, being an only child. Sleepily, I walked out of my room and sat down on the top of the stairs, just soaking in the stillness of the moment. No one knew I was awake and the day was fresh like untouched snow. I peered down at the living room, where my dad sat on the couch reading the newspaper and drinking coffee out of a dark green mug. I always loved how my dad smelled faintly of coffee. Coffee and grass. 

My dad glanced upwards and I ducked behind the stair banister. I didn’t want him to see me. Not because I was scared of him, I wasn’t, but I would rather be an invisible ghost, peering down at him. 

That day was two weeks before I moved out for school. A lot of my stuff was packed in cardboard boxes, but the things I left behind were more a remnant of my past than my future. Trophies from Little League baseball, clothes that I had outgrown, and my senior portrait. I wondered how long it would be until my parents turned my room into a guest room or an office. My mom claimed they never were going to, but I thought that was kind of strange. It’s as if she will forever keep evidence that child Isiah lived here, that I once belonged here in this place and this town. Maybe I will belong again one day; maybe I’ll move back after college. A part of me is grateful that I will always have a place in the nest. 

My dad nudged my bedroom door open with his foot, standing in the doorway. 

“Hey, dad.” 

“You’re packed up?” 

“I’m getting there.” 

My dad usually doesn’t come all the way into my room but this time he did. He walked over to my dresser and picked up a baseball that I had gotten signed by my favorite player in 2011 at one of our father-son games. I jumped up from the chair I was sitting in and grabbed it from him. 

“Almost forgot this,” I said, tossing it into a box. My dad nodded. If I was being honest I had already decided not to take it with me to my dorm, but I could tell by the look on my dad’s face that he had been expecting me to. Over the years I’ve become fluent in my dad’s language of facial expressions and the things he says versus what he really means.

At least, I thought I’d been fluent. It was two weeks later, while I was on the plane to Pennsylvania that I truly realized what our exchange had meant at Humbo Lake. 

“It’s nice, isn’t it?” My dad had asked, killing the weird silence. 

“I guess.”

“You’re going to miss it when you’re at university next year.” 

“I know, dad. We’ve had this talk a million times, about how everything’s going to change.” 

“No, I mean, you’re going to miss this time with me, aren’t you?” Is what my father would have said if he wasn’t so stubborn. If he had the courage to speak his mind. 

If only I wasn’t just as stubborn as my father, if only I hadn’t learned from the most headstrong. Then I would have replied, “Yeah, I am.”