“Me and your mom?” he repeated.
“Yeah. Can we?”
“Sure. We can do that. You want to talk outside?”
“Sure. That’s fine.”
“Alright.”
We walked through the house and headed to the backyard. We sat on the porch swing side by side and my dad exhaled.
“Have you spoken to your mother?”
“Yeah. I talked to her this morning but I wanted to talk to you.”
“Alright. Let’s hear it. What’s on your mind, honey?”
“Why’d you cheat on her?”
“What?”
“It’s not a trick question. I just want to know.”
“I was just unhappy and I loved your mother but I wasn’t in love with her. It seemed easier to cheat at that time while trying to physically keep our family together.”
“And you don’t think that’s selfish?”
“I know it was selfish but back then all I thought I had to do to be a good husband was take care of you guys. I never hit your mom. I never cursed at her. I didn’t control her spending or her friends or tell her she couldn’t achieve her dreams. We were good… partners in life but romantically we didn’t flow and the thought of not having her in my life at all made me afraid to let go. Was that selfish? Yes. But I thought the good would outweigh the bad.”
“And if I told you the man I was with cheated on me, would you tell me to stay?”
“I’d be a hypocrite if I didn’t, but I wouldn’t. And as long as your mother stayed with me, she wouldn’t either.”
I exhaled. “Do you think people can change?”
“Of course I do and I did. I mean, I don’t cheat anymore, Jiselle, and your mother is somewhere out there carefree, doingwhat makes her happy. Our marriage didn’t make it but we both changed for the better.” He threw an arm over the back of the swing and looked at the small yard. He exhaled. “What is this about, Jiselle?”
“I have an irrational fear that every man who isn’t a hundred percent up front with me about every little thing is going to do me like you did Mom.”
He pulled his eyes from the yard to look at me.
“Jiselle, I made mistakes and I understand you, your mother, and Rene being upset about those mistakes but I wouldn’t have gotten on one knee if I didn’t love your mother. I loved her and when I married her I did so thinking we’d spend the rest of our lives together but?—”
“But you still cheated on her after having two children.”
“That’s right but me falling short as a man and husband doesn’t mean every man will. And you’re not your mother, honey. I loved her. I still do, but we were two kids trying to navigate what we’d been taught and you and Rene weren’t taught that. You were taught better and you know better. Our story isn’t yours. We had Rene by the age you are now.”
“Yeah. I know.”
“So, what’s going on?”
“I was dating a man and I found out he omitted some stuff.”
“Life changing stuff?”
“Not necessarily.”
“Things you can’t work past?”