a garment bag.
I asked what he planned to do with it.
He thought for a moment.
“Wear it again.”
“When?”
“Something important. Somewhere I need to remember that I’m allowed to walk in like I belong.”
I smiled.
“Dad would like that.”
Eric nodded.
“I know.”
A week later, I discovered eight small sketchbooks on a high shelf in Dad’s bedroom.
They were filled with decades of drawings.
Some were engineering sketches.
But most were us.
Eric laughing at eight.
Me sitting on the steps at eleven, trying not to cry after Mom left.
Eric at sixteen, studying something outside the frame.
Both of us at Christmas.
Dozens and dozens of moments from our childhood and adulthood.
Dad had been watching.
Remembering.
Keeping us.
Inside the first sketchbook, he had written one sentence:
The things I couldn’t say, I drew. :chatgpt-content-reference{index=”5″}
I sat on his bedroom floor
