thirty

Claude followed my progress like a father hen. Speaking of fathers, he often reminded me that on the list of objectives I still had to tick off was sorting out my relationship with my father.

I protested.

“Claude, it’s really not the time to ask me to do that. You can see I’m completely overwhelmed. I don’t have even a minute to myself.”

“On the contrary, there’s no better time, Camille. And besides, you know it’s been niggling at you for years, like a stone in your shoe. Why put up with the pain another day? You’ll be so relieved to have taken a step toward reconciliation. The new Camille doesn’t leave problems hanging, does she?”

“All right, all right . . . I’ll see if I can find a minute.”

I was annoyed that he was insisting I do this right now. But was he really insisting? Deep down inside, I knew he was right. I couldn’t let the situation drag on. I had to confront it. I had swept that particular problem under the carpet of my conscience, thinking it would, in the end, be forgotten. Some hope! Over all those years it had never stopped gnawing away at me. Guilt and resentment were all mixed up inside me and undermining my confidence. But how could I forgive the person who left my mother and me before I had even taken my first steps? He wasn’t a father; he was just a . . . a sperm donor.

I hadn’t seen my father in six years, ever since a terrible scene when I had tried to settle scores with him. On that occasion I really did try to mow him down with a Kalashnikov of reproaches. I had sprayed him with angry bullets without giving him the slightest chance to defend himself. I couldn’t have been more bitter if I had swallowed poison. I was determined to hurt him. A little girl’s anger can knock over tables and break chairs. All the negative feelings stored away for years had surfaced, erupting like a volcano. I wanted to make him pay for his absence. Why had he left my mother? Where had he been when I was frightened, when I was ill, when I needed a father?

Unfortunately, my settling of scores had blown up in my face like a grenade and resulted in an outcome I had not really wished for: a complete break.

Weeks, months, and years had gone by without my daring to take the first steps toward reconciliation. I was afraid of how he would react and, even worse, of being rejected once again. With hindsight, I had begun to understand more clearly why he had left home. I was an accident that happened to him when he was far too young. At twenty-three, he wasn’t mature enough to cope with a child, nor did he really want to. Nonetheless, he had helped my mother as far as he could afford to and came to see me from time to time. Those rare, precious moments had left a lasting impression on me, a memory like the sweet taste of cotton candy.

It took me a while to unearth my telephone address book, hidden under a pile of dusty papers stuffed at the back of a closet.

His number was in it.

I sat for several long minutes beside the telephone, heart beating fast, hands moist, mouth dry at the thought of not knowing what to say. Finally I plucked up my courage.

It rang several times before he picked up.

“Hello?”

Silence.

“Hello? Dad?”

Silence again . . .

“FORGIVENESS DOES NOT CHANGE the past, but it does enlarge the future,” Paul Boese said. How true! After my phone call to my father, I felt much lighter. It was as though I had cut the rope dragging a line of heavy barrels along in the wake of my boat, holding it back. At first our conversation was stilted, strangulated, struggling to emerge. Soon, though, we discovered the sincere, honest voice of our hearts, and our words somehow built a bridge between us. We agreed to have lunch together. We replaced the silences and question marks of our past history with a new dialogue.

I could scarcely believe it.