Ask Your Father
by Nishalinie Sundaramoorthy
Nila shifted uncomfortably in her seat as she tried to avoid the bright sun attacking her eyes. She was sitting in the passenger seat of her father’s car, parked in front of a shopping mall, and unfortunately the sun was setting right in front of her face. She felt bored, having sat there for almost an hour now with a dying phone while listening to radio stations play the same pop song repeatedly, dubbing it the “hottest song of the summer.”
Her dad was sitting beside her and scrolling aimlessly on his phone. She thought she should say something—after all, she hadn’t seen him in a few weeks. He was busy working out of town during the weekends and she was busy with school during the weekdays. But now that it was summer break and her birthday was coming up, her dad thought it would be nice to take her out and buy her a present.
The present ended up being a laptop, something that Nila had been desperately begging her mom to buy for her. She didn’t want anything fancy, just something simple for her to do her work on. She was tired of fighting with her brother to let her use his laptop, knowing that trying to convince her brother to stop playing video games would only leave her feeling defeated and frustrated. When she brought up the topic with her mom for what was probably the 100th time, her mom’s only response was, Go ask your father.
That was her mom’s default response whenever Nila asked for anything she considered to be a luxury. Need money for new shoes? Go ask your father. Need money for a field trip? Go ask your father. Need to pay for antidepressants? Go ask your father.
Nila knew her mother didn’t mean any harm by it. She knew how hard her mother had worked to provide for her two kids, working tirelessly during nights to keep a roof over their heads and have food in their stomachs. He never did anything for you, her mother said, he left us. He should be giving ten times what you’re getting now.
While Nila understood that she should be entitled to ask her dad for help, she still always struggled to ask for virtually anything. It wasn’t because he would say no—in fact, he was always willing to buy anything she asked for. But asking for anything that she needed in her life was hard, because he was hardly in it. He was making up for it now, seeing her and her brother more often, but the space in her heart she had growing up where she missed having a father was already filled by her mother.
Her mother was more comfortable with the idea of letting her kids have a relationship with their father, despite spending the last 14 years of her life saying what an awful man he was, how he never deserved to be a father, and how her kids don’t need anyone but their mother. Maybe it was because they were older now and understood that the problems that arose between her parents were almost always about money. And the problems her mother still had were because of money.
So she pushed aside any uncomfortable feelings she had when her dad had asked her what she wanted for her birthday. And after a painfully long conversation of Nila speaking broken-Tamil, and her father replying in his slightly better broken-English, here they were, needing to wait for a few hours while a Best Buy employee finished setting up her laptop.
She fiddled with the necklace she was currently wearing. It was a present from her mother for her 11th birthday. It was a small golden chain with black beads that she had recently found while cleaning her room. She didn’t normally wear any jewelry outside of special occasions as she found it impractical, but for some reason she had become quite attached to it. The clasp was slightly broken, and threatened to fall off at any given moment. She had tried to fix it, but all her solutions proved to be only temporary.
Nila looked over at her father, thinking she should say something. But what should she ask? She took a sip of her ice coffee before putting her phone in her lap.
“How’s work?”
It was a simple enough question, but Nila was taken aback by how surprised her dad looked. Was it because she hadn’t said anything other than a yes, no, or I don’t know for the past three hours? Was it because this was the first time Nila had spoken to him without its being him initiating the conversation?
His face relaxed into a smile, “Work is good. Going to Montreal. How was school?”
“It was fine,” Nila shrugged. “I passed.”
He nodded approvingly. “That’s good.”
“Yeah.”
She looked down at the cup holder on her father’s side, where he kept his loose change and random small items. She saw a necklace that looked similar to the one her brother had. It was a chain that appeared to be made of gold, and she reached over and held it up. She recognized it; she remembered seeing her father wearing it when she was a child.
She looked at him, “Why aren’t you wearing it?”
“Too much for me,” he chuckled. “Sitting all day in the truck by myself. Who I try to impress?”
“Can I have it?”
Her dad shook his head. “No, this one for boys. I can buy you one for girls.”
Nila shrugged. “Maybe another time.”
There was silence again, but her dad didn’t reach back for his phone. He wasn’t looking at her either, but Nila felt like she should do better to keep the conversation going.
Her dad beat her to it, though. “You don’t have to worry about school,” he said.
Nila pursed her lips, “I guess, but school is important.”
“Do you need any tuition? For math?”
When he said tuition, or as he had pronounced it, too-shun, he meant tutoring. Nila didn’t know if it was a Tamil thing to call tutoring “tuition”, but she had quickly (and embarrassingly) learned from her classmates that the two words are not synonymous.
“No, I’m fine.”
“For chemistry?”
“I’m fine.”
“Physics? Surya went to a good one for physics—”
“I said I’m fine.”
Nila didn’t know why she had become so annoyed so quickly. School had become a touchy topic for her, and no one could talk to her about it without her becoming irritated. She didn’t mean to be sensitive and wanted to apologize, but she had already chosen anger and was looking outside the window with her arms crossed over her chest.
“Okay. Sorry, Ammu. Don’t be upset.”
Nila’s face softened and the guilt began to set in. She should be making conversation, not exploding at every word he said. She knew he was trying hard to not upset her, which is why he wasn’t pushing for any sort of conversation.
“Appa?”
“Yes?”
Nila brought her knees to her chest and wrapped her arms around them.
“I did a project on my family’s immigration. I asked Amma how she came here, but I never asked you. How did you end up in Toronto?”
“Ah,” her dad paused. “I can’t remember exact. My older sister was in Switzerland after she get married. Me and my brothers had to get there, too. We went to lots of countries. Like Thailand,
and—”
“You went to Thailand?” Nila exclaimed, “That’s crazy!”
Her dad smiled. “Yeah, and we shared a passport, too.”
“Oh wow. That sounds a little illegal.”
“Yeah, but better than dying in the war.”
“Oh. That’s true.”
“Then we come Canada,” he said.
“That’s wild,” Nila replied. “Amma’s story was so boring. Appu was able to come easily because he was a lawyer and then he sponsored everyone.”
“Yeah, he’s a good man. But not so easy for us.”
“And then you met Amma. In high school?”
“Yeah.”
“And you got married.”
“Yeah.”
“Then Surya was born, and then me.”
“Yeah.”
“Yeah.”
The familiar silence fell upon them again. She sighed, “Do you regret it? Getting married?”
He looked down at his hands. Nila noticed how neither her father nor her mother ever wore their wedding rings, not even when they did live together.
“No,” he finally said. “We were too young. Should wait longer. I was stupid.”
“I don’t know if it was just you,” she said. “Amma… Amma wasn’t perfect, either.”
“We shouldn’t fight in front of kids so much. Kids shouldn’t know about their parents’ problems.”
“I thought kids were the problem.”
“No,” he said hurriedly and Nila could’ve sworn he sounded slightly offended. “Kids never the problem. Parents give problems to kids. They should only give love.”
“Oh.” She didn’t know how to respond. She never thought her parents had given her problems—it almost always felt the other way around. Having a kid was exhausting and expensive. Growing up, she felt like a burden to her parents and felt guilty for existing. Maybe it would’ve been easier for her parents to split up if she and her brother weren’t in the picture.
His hand reached over to Nila’s seat. She saw how he hesitated slightly before holding one of her hands that was wrapped around her legs. His hands were rough and calloused from years of driving a truck, yet he held her hand softly. He squeezed her hand delicately and his eyes appeared glossy.
“You shouldn’t—” he said, and his voice cracked. “You shouldn’t have tried to kill yourself.”
Nila saw the tears welling in his eyes. She felt a tug at her heart; she had never seen her father cry.
“Or take me, too,” he sobbed. “I don’t want to live without my children.”
“You left, though,” Nila said, yanking her hand back to her chest. “You left and you didn’t come back for five years.”
“I’m sorry.”
“It was the same when Appu left, too. I came home every day waiting for you to be there until Amma told me you weren’t gonna be there.”
Nila was getting angry, and her dad didn’t seem like he would say anything. He was either letting her vent it out, or he didn’t know what to say.
“It’s not fair,” she said. “I had to live without you! Do you know how awful I felt? How Amma would tell me I always get close to the wrong people?”
Nila felt tears trickling down her face and she quickly wiped them away. She tried to steady her breath. She remembered how her father used to take her to amusement parks and the zoo. How he bought her ice cream and toys, and would have endless patience during her tantrums. How she would silently cry every night because maybe her mother was wrong; maybe her father would come back for her. But he never did.
“I didn’t need you,” she continued. “I had Amma.”
Her mother would never be her father. But that wasn’t a bad thing. Nila and her brother didn’t need ice cream and amusement parks— they needed stability. They needed a parent who wouldn’t leave when things got tough and come back years later acting like nothing had happened.
“But I didn’t really have her, either,” Nila said, “because she was too busy picking up where you left off.”
Having a house was nice. Having three meals a day was nice. Nila knew many kids didn’t have what she had, which was why she felt guilty even bringing up the fact that for some reason it wasn’t enough. She had a family, a mother who loved her and a brother who cared for her deeply. And yet she couldn’t brush off the feeling of unbelievable loneliness.
She would try to convince herself that she was loved, that she was wanted. But all she felt like was a burden. She thought her existence was a mistake. Her parents would’ve been better off without her. If she killed herself then the problem would be gone. Whether it was her parents’ fighting, their monetary prob-lems, or her incredible loneliness— the problem would be gone. For her at least.
She felt something hit her leg. She looked down and saw the necklace. The clasp has come undone again. She didn’t know why she had bothered trying to fix it; it would always, inevitably, break again. She pushed it onto the floor of the car. She muttered, “Stupid cheap necklace.”
“Sorry,” her father said. “I am stupid.”
Nila steadied her breathing. “Do you regret having kids?”
“No.” Her father sounded genuine. “I always wanted kids. I wanted more kids. I love my kids.”
“Then why?” she asked, “Why did you leave?”
“Because I was selfish,” he said. “I don’t know what I was thinking. I couldn’t stay with your Amma. We were fighting so much, and I got tired.”
“I…”
“I wasn’t thinking,” he said. “I never knew divorce was option. People back home don’t get divorce; we stay unhappy until we die. No one would understand, but I needed to go.”
“I get it,” Nila said slowly. “Thinking you don’t have any other options. I wish… I wish I had done things differently, too.”
“I want another chance. To be your dad, without being a husband.”