Mum,
I never write letters. But I’ve tried to talk to you. To say what you don’t want to hear.
Part of me, a big part of me, doesn’t want to say it
at all. I want the pretence to go on. It
was a good pretence. A comforting pretense when I was growing up. Not anymore mum. I’m all grown up and I can’t pretend anymore.
I don’t want
to but I’m just going to say it.
Dad is not coming back.
He’s gone mum.
He isn’t working down South. He doesn’t write you weekly letters. I know you write them yourself. I know you post them to yourself. To us.
I saw you write one. I followed
you to the post box. You never saw
me. Don’t think badly of me mum. I was
seventeen. Two years I’ve taken to
write this letter.
He’s been gone for ten years. Ten years of letters. Of pretence that any
minute he was going to walk through that door.
He isn’t. He never is. And it’s not your fault. And I’m fine with it. Honest I’m okay. You
did a brilliant job. I loved you reading
me those letters.
I don’t want my dad to walk through the door. I don’t want to know where he is, or what he
has been doing.
You told me all about him in the letters. I saw him through your eyes. I saw the man he should have been. That was my dad. That was the husband you deserved.
I don’t need the letters any more mum. You don’t.
No more. Please.
I’m coming home this weekend. If you’ll have me.
We should go walking in the park by the bandstand.
Like when I was a wee girl. When you
used to read the letters to me. I’d
like to sit on our bench. I’d like to
talk about us.
Love
Jenny.
