Discovering Delilah(80)

“Aunt Lara?”

“Delilah? Wyatt called and said you’re already at the house. I’m coming down tomorrow, unless you need me today?”

“I don’t.”

“What’s wrong? You sound upset. I can go through your parents’ room, sweetie. Don’t stress over it. I know it’s hard to face.”

She’s so supportive that I feel guilty for dragging her into this.

I’m sick of feeling guilty.

I’m alone in my sea of guilt, and I’m so sick of it I could scream.

“It’s…I was going through my father’s closet and I…” I don’t tell her about the letters. I’m not sure why I feel like those are his private thoughts and I’ve already done something I shouldn’t have, so I cut to the chase and tell her exactly what I want to know. “I want to know why Dad was so against same-sex relationships.”

Silence fills the airwaves. I look at the phone to see if we’ve lost connection.

“Aunt Lara?”

“Yes, I’m here,” she says just above a whisper. “It’s a little complicated. He wasn’t really against them. He was uncomfortable with them.”

I pace again. “Why?” The need to understand gnaws at my stomach.

“Delilah, honey. Why don’t I come talk to you in person? I can be there in a half hour.”

This is bad. I can hear it in her voice. I grab my father’s desk to steady myself.

“No. Tell me, please. I can take it. Just...Was it because of me? Did they know before I told them?” She was with them at my graduation. I’m sure if they’d told anyone about my confession, they’d have told her, since she drove home with them.

She’s silent again, but I hear her breathing. “No, baby. No, it wasn’t because of you.”

Tears spring from my eyes and my legs crumple beneath me. I hadn’t realized that I was so scared of that being true.

They didn’t know before I told them at graduation.

It wasn’t because of me.

Even though it’s a relief, I can’t breathe. I still don’t have the answers I need.

“Delilah? Are you there?”

They were prejudiced against gays.

I can’t move.

“Delilah, honey. I promise, they didn’t know until you told them.”

Anger blasts from my lungs. “Then why? Why would my parents be so pigheaded?”

“Dee, calm down. Please. Please, honey. Take a deep breath.”

I shoot to my feet and storm into the living room, feeling completely out of control. This isn’t new information, but it feels new, like because Aunt Lara doesn’t dispute that my father felt that way, it is somehow more real.

“Dee, you’re breathing so hard.” The cadence of her voice tells me she’s on the move. “Please, just sit down and relax. I’m getting into the car.” I hear her car door shut and the engine turn over. “I’m coming there. Don’t go anywhere.”

I’m panting like I’ve run ten miles. I wonder if it’s hard for her to come here after being in the car when my parents were killed. She was right there in the backseat. She heard their screams, and may have heard them take their last breaths. I know she’s recovered from her injuries, but it’s not the physical scars I’m worried about. I freeze, weighing my selfish need and her suffering, but my need to put this behind me is so big I can’t move past it.

“I need to understand.” It comes out strangled.

“Delilah…” She says my name so seriously I stop walking. “I’ll be there soon. Stay put.”

The world spins around me as she continues talking. My head is swimming. I can comprehend only a few words past the blood rushing through my ears.

Our parents were strict…Did the best he could…Loved you…

“Delilah?”

I need answers. Real answers.

“I gotta go.”

I grab my car keys and storm out the front door toward my Jeep. I start it up and toss the phone on the passenger seat as I pull out and speed toward the cemetery. I don’t remember stopping at stoplights, although I’m sure I did. I don’t remember driving through the iron gates or navigating the winding road toward their freshly turned graves. I don’t remember getting out of the Jeep and walking to their graves.

But I’m here.

Staring at their headstones.

I read my father’s headstone. Loving husband, father, and friend.

The word conditionally is missing.

Why? Why? Why?

I pace the recently turned earth, too upset to think. “You made me feel like shit. I wasn’t a legal case for you to steer in a direction you approved of. You should have looked at me like I was your daughter, not a case to win or lose. You should have been compassionate, for fuck’s sake. I hate you for making me feel like shit.” I fall to my knees, and tears steal my voice. My chest burns, and my entire body quakes with every forceful sob.