(1)
The gale force winds howled from the northeast and blew the limbs of my Live Oak hard and repeatedly against the front of the house. A stack of Disney DVDs fell off of the entertainment center as a gust of maybe seventy smacked into our little salt box.
“Would you stop!?” Aspen yelled from the back room. “Why are you banging stuff?” she asked.
“I didn’t do it! Jeez! Would you just chill out. It was the wind.” I moaned and grunted as I picked up the videos. “It must be close to hurricane force out there.” I said.
“Yeah. More like hurricane force in here.” She joked smugly. “Hurricane daddy.” She said.
“Whatever, I have been good. You just need someone to bitch at.” I said back, maintaining the line.
“Should I get the girls up? Is this storm going to have tornadoes?” my wife asked me.
“Nah…they have a warning out, but I don’t see anything on the radar. Most of this is blowing out to sea anyway. Just another late afternoon pop-up thunderstorm, stronger than most of the hurricanes we get.” I said. I changed the channel to Phineas and Ferb as the kids ran into the living room.
“Da-a-a-a-a-a-ddy?” A little voice called out.
“Yes Emeline.” I called back. “What are you doing?”
“Are we going to have a tornado?” she asked. Mary Emeline ran into the room and jumped up onto the couch and into my lap.
“No honey. We’re not going to have a tornado.” I reassured her, kissed her on the head. “Your mama is just nervous, that’s all. But there’s nothing to be afraid of. You have us here.” I said.
“Daddy?” she asked.
“Yes baby?” I answered again. “What’s up.” I asked her. “Don’t you wanna watch Phineas?”
“Yeeaaaah.” She said. “But first I have to tell you something.”
“Okay. I’m listening.” I looked at her with my entire focus. It melted me, like always. “What do you wanna tell me?”
“Daddy?” she said. “What’s a tornado?” she spun around in my lap and found the cartoon on the set.
“Well, it’s just a really bad wind storm. It’s small though. But it is really fast and it destroys everything in it’s path.” I said. “But we don’t have them here all that often…so you don’t have anything to”
“Daddy?” she asked again. “Where do tornadoes live?”
“Well…they don’t really live anywhere.” I explained. “They come down from the sky when bad weather is happening.” I said, like a dunce.
On the screen a couple of young geniuses are building a beach with real sand, an ocean, waves, umbrellas and ‘Beach Blanket Bongout’ style fun seekers. Their sister Candace really wants to bust them for it, until she sees her dream boy on shining in the sun and sand.
Emeline is losing attention as she asks me another. “Daddy, are we going to have a hurricane?”
“Well sweetie, there’s nothing out there now…but ya never know.” I said. “The summer has a ways to go, and we could have a little blow…but no matter; if a bad storm bears down on us, we’ll go to Mama D’s house in Richmond.” Emeline’s head sunk into my chest as my fingers pulled her hair from the front of her face and put it behind her ears. Aspen walked through the room again, dressed for the masses.
“More like; you never know when hurricane daddy is going to hit.” She said under her breath so that only I would pick it up. “You can be nice when you want to but most of the time you’re just mean to me. Like last night.” She said.
“Please Aspen, not right now, not with her here. I mean damn.” I said, moped.
“I’m not about to get into it, but you need to see Judy.” She insisted. “I have to be at work in like twenty minutes…I’m so late, AGAIN!” she said as she headed for the door. “I love youuuuu! Be good girls for daddy.” She said and exited the home.
I leaned down to whisper towards my daughter’s head, “Are you hungry? Do you want me to make you some peanut butter crackers?” I said.
“Yes daddy.” She said. “Oh, and daddy?”
“Yes baby” I said getting up to fix her a snack.
“I have to tell you something.” She said.
“Yes baby.” I said again smiling. “What would you like to tell me?”
“Daddy, where do hurricanes live?” she asked innocently. “Are they bad?”
“No baby, they’re not like people, and they don’t live anywhere either. They are just big storms that come from the ocean.” I told her.
“Well then why did mommy say that daddy was a hurricane?” her little eyes looked over her shoulder in my direction, and she waited.
“I don’t know hon’. Mommy’s silly sometimes. Maybe she just means I talk too much. I’m full of wind, like a hurricane.” I said “Let me get up so I can make you a snack.”
“Daddy?” again.
“Yes hon’?” I answered her. I stood and started walking towards the kitchen.
“Do you like peanut butter?” Emeline asked me.
“Yep. I do. I used to eat it all the time.” I said. “When I was your age it’s about all I ate.”
“Daddy?” she asked again as I kept trying to inch away. “Maybe mommy called you a hurricane because when you get mad sometimes you break stuff.”
I tucked my head and walked into the kitchen. “I don’t know.” I said. “Sometimes mommy and daddy just say things. We don’t mean anything by it. I gotta make your snack. Watch Phineas.” I said.
My mind flashed back to 1978 as I stirred the peanut butter with a butter knife. I thought about sweating in the attic when I was eight, holding the blow-hose for the insulation we were scattering all over the ceiling joists. Mom and dad were at it about something, probably Jimmy Carter, or Iran. To me it sounded like a crack in the foundation of reality. It made me think of how my kids must feel when I go on like a raving asshole. They don’t deserve it, and I wondered: do I deserve them?
