I can’t understand why. Why the fuck did this have to happen to me?
Haven’t I asked God every night to protect my family from anything and anyone that can harm them physically or emotionally? Haven’t I repeated that prayer over and over again throughout my life? Haven’t I told God time and time again that nothing else matters?
Was He even listening? Is He listening now as I ask Him to dampen my dad’s pain and return him to good health?
I don’t know. I just don’t know.
The phone was on loud speaker that besodded Monday night. My mom was talking about the tests that the doctor ran. Then she said it.
“It’s cancer.”
My dad has cancer.
MY dad.
Not the dad of a friend or the dad of a stranger.
MY dad.
You can never again unhear those heart numbing words. You can never again see the world as you use to.
People keep telling me to stay positive. But How?
How do people stay positive? How do they blindly believe against all reality that their loved one will beat cancer?
People keep telling me to pray. Why?
What is the use in praying to God to help him when He has already made up his mind? If His plan is to take him from me now then that’s what He is going to do.
I can only hope He doesn’t.
He’s so young. Just 47-years-old. He can’t even walk anymore.
The man who protected his little girl from harm, but made sure she knew how to jack up a car and change the tire if she needed to.
The man who had a cigar only on occasion to celebrate the success of his daughter.
The man who raised me. The man who always loved me no matter how mean and disrespectful I was at times.
But why am I talking about him as if he is already dead?
I don’t know. I just don’t know.
I got a job. I heard just a couple of hours before my mother dropped the big ‘C’ bomb. It’s been a week and I haven’t even told him yet. He will light up another cigar. If mom tells him he is not allowed to, all hell will break lose. Although, it feels like it already has.
My brother and I went home to see him last weekend. We built him handles to help him stand up from the bed and toilet. The cancer is in the hip you see. His muscles there don’t work properly anymore. He soiled himself twice on Saturday.
The doctor confirmed its in the bone marrow and there is a possibility it has spread. My mom has been pleading with the medical aid for days to allow him to undergo more tests to see if the life sucking element has spread.
They said it will take time for them to help him. But we don’t know how much time he has to give.
I am barely holding on to my sanity. I am barely holding on to my faith.
I can’t imagine how my mother feels. While ill be losing a father, she’ll be losing her husband. Her best friend.
How do people deal with this shit?
How can I deal with this shit?
I don’t know. I just don’t know anymore.
Pitched & Unpublished: 1 October 2015.
Journo Junky 