Missing the father who was, and who would have been.

By ROBERT MAYS III
news@columbiamissourian.com

The words are missing nuance now. The left side of his mouth sags because of where the tumor is entrenched. The drooping mouth makes some words harder to say than others. Most of his words now have the same tone, and that tone is one of exhaustion. The chemotherapy saps most of his energy. The doctors have said that he can stop taking it if he wants to. It won’t help anymore. But every night when my mother asks, he reaches out his one functional hand, demanding the cluster of pills. He needs us to know he fought.

By evening the fatigue takes him over. It becomes difficult to understand him. As if I needed a reason to listen more closely.

I miss his smile. It was never picturesque. He rarely flashed his teeth. His lips simply curved upward, altering his countenance just enough to signal a change. The teeth would be too great a concession to a world that had tricked him into this feeling before. He didn’t trust contentment, nor did he dwell on disappointment. He knew that the good things in life could just as quickly be taken away.

It’s not that he smiles less frequently now. In fact, he smiles more than I would expect of a dying man. But that’s what makes it hard. Each smile comes with a reminder — when the right side of his mouth moves upward, and the left side refuses to join. The left side’s stubbornness is a taunt. Even when there is reason to be happy there will always be something missing.

I miss ignorance.

I don’t remember much about that night. It was June 10, just last summer. A friend of mine had just left, a friend I spend a lot of time talking to about the past. My mom called my two brothers and me into the living room. The tumor had been removed a little more than a week before. She was impressively assembled, not stumbling a bit through the words that it had taken her three days to understand. I don’t remember them exactly. “Brain cancer” and “terminal” lay claim to memory.

My youngest brother was just 16. He sat expressionless. No more than a tear or two moved down his face.

My middle brother was angry, his crying violent. He required the most consoling. He hadn’t been a man for long enough. Losing our father meant losing a newfound friend.

I tried so hard not to cry. The universe did not deserve to win. Like this? My dad? No f-ing chance.

My battle didn’t last long. Love overcame resentment. I went up to my room, and I cried. I cried and I missed. I missed mornings at Soldier Field. I missed fishing. I missed the things that I didn’t even have. I missed weddings. I missed taking the kids to see Grandpa. I missed the life I had, and I missed the life I wanted.

I emerged from my room an hour or so later and met my mom walking up the stairs.

“Now you have something to prove to the world,” she said.

I have always been one of those people who digs in when someone told me I couldn’t do something or didn’t deserve something. But this was something different. This was something bigger. And Mom knew it. But I just shook my head.

“It was never about that,” I managed. “It was about proving something to him.”

It still is. There’s just less time. Less time to show him that after he’s gone, I’ll be everything he taught me to be.

EDITOR'S NOTE: Robert L. Mays Jr., 53, died at his home in Barrington, Ill.,
the evening of Thursday, May 7. His wife and three sons were at his side.

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