Don’t think about all the times he dragged you from bed to discuss the minutiae of your failing family, demanding that you made sense of his infidelities, your mother’s fury.

Don’t think about the lashings; the bruises that striped your legs, your arms, your back.

Don’t think about the way he made his want for suicide your fault, the way he described the days that would come after, always broken, always jagged, always digging into your skin, like a reminder that this was always your responsibility, your failure.

Don’t think about the way you cried. No, don’t.

Don’t.

Don’t.

Don’t.

“You made him our problem in life,” says your auntie, smugness anchoring in the harbour of her throat. “Now that he’s dead, he’s yours.”

She ends the call before you can vivisect her willingness to accept your claim, her insouciance, her delicate pleasure, or ask if they’d perhaps hired someone to tether your father to you. You press your head against the payphone, the black plastic cool and slightly sticky. Outside the booth, your father is exposed vein and naked muscle, palms flat against the glass.

You call again. It’s been two weeks. You don’t remember the last time you’ve slept in more than gasps. The last time you spoke to your best friend, he told you to see a therapist, to sort yourself out, own up to the destruction you’d caused instead of blaming it on a dead man.

(You paid for the damages. You did not pay for an hour on a stranger’s couch, escorted by your father’s spectre.)

“Ask your mother,” your auntie purrs, picking up the phone after the sixth ring. She hangs up, even as your father begins to moan.

Don’t think about the way your mother stroked your hair as she stared at the wall, eyes full of drowning, voice full of hurt. Think instead about her promise to always protect you, her she-wolf grin as she stood guard over you.

Don’t think about the way she sang under her breath, plaintive as a child. Don’t think about what your father might have done. Don’t think about why she almost drowned you, and how you’re dragging his ghost to her door, years after she tore herself free.

Think instead about release.

“When a parent dies, his sins go onto their children.”

“That’s not fair, mom. I—” You tighten your grip around the mug. Your father is sitting beside your mother, invisible, no longer human, just muscle and meat. “It’s not my fault.”

“But it is your burden,” your mother continues, serene. Too serene, you think, savage, as you jealously process how soft she’s become, how voluptuously restful. “You’re his flesh and blood.”

“I didn’t ask to be.”

“I know. But that doesn’t change anything.”