A short note about my daughter.

I’ve been sober for 108 days. It’s the longest I’ve gone without a drink in over a decade. The road to recovery has not been easy, and I’m not going to lie and say it has. There have been plenty of times where I just wanted to give up, when my own mind betrayed me and all I wanted to do was drown my sorrow in a bottle of liquor. It takes a lot to want to end your own life. My name is Mark, and I’m an alcoholic. I’ve been a wreck since my daughter, Debbie, went missing. I was hardly a functioning member of society and my wife blamed me for our daughters disappearance. *yawn* I’m tired and need to get some rest. It’s been a long day of therapy and AA meetings. \------------------------------- I woke up to the sound of my wife screaming. I didn’t even need to open my eyes to know she was in the room. I could feel her. I opened my eyes and rubbed the sleep from my face. “Suzanne?” She was sitting on the bed crying and holding a piece of paper. I sat up and rubbed her back. “What is it? What’s wrong?” She didn’t respond. Instead, she just kept sobbing. I pulled her into a hug and held her. “Suzanne, please tell me what’s wrong.” She sniffled and held out her hand with the paper. I took it and examined it. It was a letter, written in crayon. *Dear Mommy and Daddy,* *I’m sorry* *I walked outside to look for the bunnies and got lost. A nice man let me come home.* *I won’t go outside anymore.* *I promise.* *I love you.* *Debbie* That’s when I noticed something off about the letter. It wasn’t the poorly spelled words or the grammatical errors that stuck out to me. It was something else. Something that made my heart drop and my blood run cold. Debbie wasn’t our daughters name. We had named her Alicia. Suzanne must have noticed the look on my face. “Mark, what’s wrong?” She asked. I handed her the letter. “Baby, I thought we named her Alicia?” She wiped away her tears and let out a chuckle. “Oh Mark, you’ve really lost it haven’t you?” I lowered my voice. “Suzanne, stop pretending our daughter’s name is Debbie. Now.” Suzanne looked at me strangely before speaking. “Mark, why are you saying these things?” I stood up and ripped the sheet off the bed. “Because I fucking know that’s not her name.” I said, raising my voice. Suzanne cried louder as I continued to search the room. We didn’t own any sheets with Mickey Mouse on them. Alicia had always hated Mickey Mouse. “Then why the fuck are there mickey mouse sheets on our bed?” Suzanne opened her mouth to speak, but before she could, I interrupted. “Where’s my daughter?” Suzanne let out a wail. “She’s dead Mark. Our daughter is dead.” I fell to my knees. “I know that.” I said, sobbing. “Then why do you keep asking where she is?” “I don’t know.” “Maybe it’s because you were the one who-” I covered my ears. I knew where she was going with this. “No, I don’t want to hear it.” She stopped talking. My breathing slowed and as I calmed myself, I noticed the room. It was empty. The walls had no pictures, there was no carpet under my feet. My queen sized bed with custom made comforter sat in the middle of the room. There was a dresser on the opposite side of the room, and a bathroom to my left. Our master bedroom had been renovated years ago, and this wasn’t how it was decorated. “Where am I?” Suzanne didn’t respond. I looked around the room and realized I wasn’t in my bedroom. I had no idea where I was. “Suzanne, where am I?” She still didn’t respond. I walked over to her and lowered myself onto the bed. I noticed she was still holding the letter from Debbie. “Suzanne, answer me.” I said, raising my voice again. Suzanne still didn’t say anything. I pulled on her arm. She was light, and fell over onto the floor. “SUZANNE!” I got off the bed and walked over to her. She was face down on the floor, her hair covering her face. I knelt down and pushed her hair out of her face. She didn’t have one. Instead of a face, she had just...nothing. I gasped and fell backward. I landed on my ass and scuttled across the floor, trying to get as far away from Suzanne as possible. I stood up and ran to the door. I opened it and closed it behind me, making sure it was shut. I took a deep breath and slowed my breathing. I was ok, everything was ok. I looked around and realized I had no idea where I was or how I got here. I looked down at my clothes. I was wearing a white shirt and blue jeans. I looked down at my hands, and realized they weren’t mine. My hands were big, and they had wrinkles. I was in my mid 30s, and I didn’t have any wrinkles on my hands. I walked down the hall. I didn’t know where I was going, I just had to get away from that faceless thing. As I walked, the walls became more decorated. I saw pictures hanging. I took a second to look at them as I continued to walk. The pictures were of me and my wife. At least, I thought it was us. I recognized my wife, but not myself. The pictures were of Suzanne and the man with the big hands. After a few minutes, I reached the end of the hallway. I opened the door and stepped outside. I looked around and realized I was in my backyard. Or at least, it looked like my backyard. There was a small garden in front of me, a deck behind me, and a fence surrounding the whole thing. Except...it didn’t look right. The garden always had just tomatoes and carrots. This one had almost every vegetable I could think of. The deck...the deck looked different too. It was made of wood instead of plastic, and there were two deck chairs with what looked like a table made of wood between them. There was a bottle of wine sitting on the table. Now that I mention it, the whole yard just looked like it was made of wood. The fence, the garden, the deck...it was all made out of this beautiful wooden material. Almost as if someone had hand carved every piece of it. “Did I do all of this?” I looked around the yard again, trying to remember doing all of this. We had recently redone the deck, but it was made of plastic. And I sure as hell didn’t plant all those vegetables. I walked over the the garden and ran my hand through the leaves of the plants. I had to have planted them. I just didn’t remember doing it. As I was running my hands through the leaves, I noticed something sticking out of the ground. I pulled on it, and it came out of the soil with little effort. It was a small knife. I turned it over in my hands. It was small, made of wood. I remembered Alicia using it to cut open her fruit. *Wait, Alicia was 6.* I looked at the knife again. It was small, but big enough. Big enough for a 6 year old. *But Alicia isn’t 6.* I looked around the yard, I had to have buried it. But Alicia wasn’t 6 anymore. She was a grown adult, and about to have a child of her own. That’s when I remembered. Alicia wasn’t my daughter. My daughter was named Debbie. I gasped for air. I was laying in my bed. I could feel it. My back was against the soft fabric of my comforter. I took a deep breath and opened my eyes. Suzanne was sitting next to me with a cup of coffee in her hand. “Good morning honey, how are you feeling?” I didn’t respond. I was too busy trying to catch my breath. Suzanne set the coffee on my bed side table. “I made your favorite this morning. I know you’ve been having a tough time lately.” I still didn’t respond. Suzanne got off the bed and walked over to the window. “You know, I’m getting really sick and tired of you calling our daughter the wrong name.” My breathing slowed as I realized Suzanne wasn’t faceless. My eyes narrowed. “Why are you calling her that?” Suzanne turned around. “I know you’ve been having a tough time, but you can’t just pretend our daughter’s name is something it’s not.” I laughed. “Debbie isn’t my daughter’s name.” Suzanne rolled her eyes. “Of course she is.” She said. “I know that’s not her name. Her name is Alicia.” Suzanne sighed. “Alicia is not our daughter’s name.” I shook my head. “I know that’s not her name.” Suzanne lowered her voice. “Listen to me carefully, because I’m only going to explain this once. Our daughters name is not Alicia. It is not Debbie. Our daughters name is not even real.

A short note about my daughter.

Comments (0) 0 👁️