After My Father Died, I Couldn't Live With What Sobriety Cost Me
Self-improvement stole our love language.
I drive up to Derby, turn down the potholded road that leads to my dad’s pebbledashed old farmhouse. Reach around the outdoor toilet door to grab the key from the hook where we have always kept it. The present I posted for his birthday lies on the floor.
What was I thinking? Avoiding him just before his seventy-first birthday. What kind of a selfish idiot would do that?
My guts drag at my stomach. Guilt claws at me, wishing to devour.
