The Homecoming
Eva
Just another ordinary Wednesday evening. I arrived home from my day's tasks, and scarfed down the deli salad and sandwich I grabbed on the way home. As I settled into my regular corner of the sofa, turned on the TV, and began watching the evening news, the phone rang. Reaching to the end table beside me, I picked up the handset and was delighted to hear the voice of my lovely, 24 year old daughter, Eva, on the other end.
"Hi, daddy. How are you? " she inquired. She was speaking in her little girl voice, and only called me daddy when she felt weak, vulnerable, or wanted something. Normally, it was just dad as she had grown older.
"Great, sweetie. How have you been?" I answered.
She has been gone, so to speak, for about 5 years. Well...not really gone. She moved in with her boyfriend, Jeff, during her second year of junior college. When he moved across state to enter the four year university, she followed him. After that, I would just see her a couple of times a year. We did, however, talk often on the phone. As far as I knew, until about 6 months ago, all was going fine. Then, she subtlety began dropping hints that their relationship was taking a turn for the worse. This was the first time we had talked in a couple of months.
"Daddy, I need a favor. Can I come back and be with you for a while?" Her voice was low and I could sense the pain inside her when she talked, "I really need to be somewhere right now where I know I am loved. Plus, I don't know of anyone better than you that can help me talk things through."
We had always been very close, even way before we lost her mother, Ava. She knew she could count on me to not be judgmental while we weighed the pros and cons to help her make her decisions.
"Of course you can, sweetie. Come home and we'll figure things out together. You haven't lost your house key have you?" I asked.
"No, I still have it. I knew I could count on you, but I had to ask anyway," she replied in her little girl voice again, "I'll see you Friday! Thanks for being there for me! I love you!" I could tell by her suddenly perky voice that she felt relieved and excited to come home.
Her car was parked in the driveway when I arrived home Friday evening. Coming in the front door, I could smell the delicious aroma of cooking. It was just a moment later that she came running up and jumped into my arms, planting a big wet kiss on my cheek as we hugged. It felt wonderful to hold her again since it had been almost six months since she had last visited.
I spun her around in my arms, marveling at the similarities to her mom. Her pure black hair was a bit shorter, stopping just below her shoulder blades and had a soft waviness to it...a compromise between my medium curls and her mom's severely straight locks. Peeking from beneath her medium length bangs, her honey-brown eyes were large and soul-piercing. She had inherited her lithe figure from Ava. Although slender at only 110 lbs. and 5 ft. 6 in. tall, she still had a very feminine, hourglass shape...a runway model body...not 'skinny-as-a-rail' like some of these current waifs seemed to be.
As I set her down from our embrace, I could see her pert nose wrinkle up. She stepped back and inspected my dirty hands and arms. "Go get washed up and come to dinner...It's ready," she insisted, pointing to the downstairs powder room. I headed to the bath by the front door as commanded and cleansed myself of my accumulated grime.
When I walked into the kitchen, I was greeted by the sight and smells of barbecued pork chops with green beans and a salad. I plopped down next to her into my normal chair at the dining table and began to dig into the delicious feast she had prepared for me. I love OPF...other people's food...that's what I call it when someone else does the cooking. I am a fairly good cook when I want to be, but usually don't bother because it takes too much time and effort. I have other things I prefer to spend my time doing.
We chatted about small, mundane things as we ate...'How was her trip back?'...fine. 'Where had the food come from?'...she had made a trip to the store after she arrived and found the extremely limited stock of edible stuff in my refrigerator. She had also purchased herself some wine and some beer for me which we drank while we ate, and afterwards while we cleaned up.
Even though it seemed outwardly like she was still my happy-go-lucky girl, I could tell she had a lot she wanted to talk about. There was a certain, unmistakable heaviness to her body posture as she moved. When I tried to broach the topic, she swore we would have a serious discussion after she took a bath and felt more relaxed. She stacked the last of the dishes in the dishwasher, announced she would be back shortly and headed upstairs to her room that was always there waiting for her visits home. I grabbed a fresh beer, headed into the family room, turned on the TV and slid into my corner of the sofa to watch the evening news.
It seemed like a very short time later when I heard her coming down the stairs, then rummaging in the kitchen just before she called out to me, "Look daddy...jammers!"
I turned to see her posing at the top of the steps leading down into the recessed family room. For a brief moment, I could have sworn she was her mother's ghost, the only noticeable difference would have been Eva's brown eyes as compared to her mom's light blue ones. She looked adorable, holding a wine bottle in one hand, a glass in the other and all dressed up in our traditional family night attire which consisted of a long-tailed, short-sleeved pajama top with a pair of boxer pajama bottoms.
She did a fancy twirl to show off her outfit...her hair forming a fan effect around her face as she spun. The memories came flooding back of the three of us in our identical outfits doing our family evening cuddles together watching a movie on TV. If only her mom could be here to see how our little girl had grown up. Ava had died from ovarian cancer after a bout with endometriosis when Eva was only 19. We both still missed her deeply.
"Where's your jammers?" she complained playfully with a pout. "You've got to get yours on, too!"
"Okay...a shower and my jammers. I'll be back, sweetie." I rose from the sofa and headed up to my room. Entering the master bathroom, I stripped off my clothes, throwing them in the hamper. After adjusting the pressure and temperature, I stepped into the shower and began to remove the day's filth. While I cleaned my body, my mind drifted back to when her mother and I had first met...
