Love and pride
22 August, 2008
7:54pm
I have something now that I think may help people understand, I will try to upload it tomorrow.
The wife has kicked up a fuss. A number of issues about employment have been raised and apparently I’ve been distracted and ‘wasting a lot of time’ over the past couple of weeks. Things have been going fairly slow for a while I’ll admit but I still don’t have any idea how she could suspect me of being ‘distracted’. I haven’t exactly seen her all that much lately, so it’s probably nothing; I’m not going to jump to conclusions. The outcome was though, that I get a job or two on the side while things are… slow. The last few days have been fairly busy. I hate job interviews, there is not one thing I like about them. But if it keeps Jo off my back then it’s worth it, I guess. Though I can’t help but feel completely useless during the whole process. I doubt I’ll even get a place at Coles.. actually I think I walked out of that interview.
The only thing sustaining me through this week of hell has been the girl. I’ve come to accept that she is my daughter. There is no escaping it, once the thought took hold I couldn’t shake it. I should’ve known, I should’ve found out a long time ago, not in this way.
But knowing now is such a wonderful feeling, to think that such a perfect child could have come from me. She gives me so much hope; that there is a part of me that she represents. Maybe once upon a time I was more like her. This is what I could have been.
But it didn’t last. Purity like this should not have to be lost, but I can see the same things from my childhood happening to her. I don’t want her to turn out the way I did. If I have a chance to save my girl I will.
She is the only thing left in me that I am proud of.
I remember the boyfriend Monica had in Year 10, 1991. Jarred White, a thug with no brains. He didn’t know my name, but he wouldn’t have cared anyway. I’d always thought Monica was too good for the kind of trash she dated. I caught him making out with another girl after class one day, no one knew, I was too scared to tell. He wouldn’t have made a good father.
I have been returning to the house when I can, and in doing so I’ve noticed a few things. I’ve noticed that the man on most nights arrives home quite late, presumably he works long hours, but you never know. How someone could stand to be away from his family so much, away from this girl, I can’t understand. There is another child too, a baby, though I have only seen it once. That one must be his own.
I also noticed one night, shouting coming from inside the house, it sounded like a man’s voice. Sometimes my girl comes home with bandages on her knees.
I was almost surprised, somehow I didn’t really expected my suspicions to be so accurate. I had never been sure about this girl’s suffering, and I’ll admit I suspected myself of jumping to conclusions early on. But here it is, Monica has lived up to her reputation and married another dickhead.
It makes me so angry to think about it, and so isolated too. Maybe he knows that she isn’t his daughter, maybe he’s angry at Monica, and me, someone he’s never even met, and he takes it out on the child. He has no right to do that, I’d much rather it be me who is suffering.
I can’t help but think of my own father. I cannot let her turn out like me. She’s been so strong to maintain such a purity for so long, there is a strength in her that I didn’t have. But I know she needs me now. I understand that the life I could give her would only be marginally better than the one she has now, but at least she would be with someone who truly loves her, and that may make all the difference.
But then I hit a wall. Although I have learnt much over the past week, every time I return brings with it a greater sense of helplessness. The more I think about helping this girl, the more fantastic my imaginings become, and the more I realise how foolish and impossible my desires are. I assume that perhaps tomorrow will hold the answer, it never does, and so each day feels wasted. I want very much to hold this girl in my arms, to tell her I love her, that I will protect her. But I don’t know how.
