He gave me a tired smile, but my reassurance never seemed to reach him.
My father was heartbroken every single time.Get Parenting Tips
“I don’t understand,” he’d whisper.
“They all seemed so happy.”
I hated watching him lose confidence.
Every rejection pulled him further back into the man he had become after Mom died.
He stopped singing again.
He checked his phone every few minutes.
He reread old
messages as if the answer might be hidden between the lines.
The fourth woman vanished after telling him she wanted him to meet her sister.People & Society
The fifth disappeared after making weekend plans with him.
After the sixth woman vanished, I could not ignore it anymore.
Something was not right.
Six women could lose interest.
That was possible. But six women would not all disappear in the same manner after promising another date.
I asked my father whether anything unusual had happened during those evenings.
He looked confused.
“No. Why?”
“Did you argue with them?”
“Of course not.”
“Did you say anything that could have frightened them?”
His face tightened.
“What kind of man do you think I am?”
“That is not what I meant.”
He turned away from me and began rinsing a clean mug in the sink. I knew I had hurt him.
“I just want to understand,” I
said.
“So do I.”
That night, I called my best friend, Rachel, and asked her for a favor.
