"Sorry I'm Late."

This is one of those occasions.
I have been away from the blog for so long that when I come back I don't know what to say by way of apology.
Like I stood you up on a second date.
Or I told you that I was 'just going for cigarettes'.
So that I could abandon yourself and your mother.
And your little sister.
But she'll be too young to ever remember me.
And one night at the dinner table, while you're all eating the velcro out of your shoes, little Betsie will speak up and say:
"What was daddy like? When are we going to see daddy?"
And your mother will scream, "He was a bum! That's what he'll always be!
Don't you ever mention him!"
Then she grabs Betsie by the shoulders, looks into her eyes.
"Don't you never marry a man who smokes, Betsie.
He'll only leave you."
And Betsie will get real quiet and doe-eyed.
Your mother will storm out of the room and begin drinking mouthwash.
While sobbing in the bathroom.
And you'll say to Betsie, "It's okay Betsie.
Just eat your shoe, okay?"
But that night something will have changed inside of you.
What was once dormant has now stirred.
And you have decided: You're going to find me and kill me.
For allowing you to live like this. All of you.
Three years you spend on the road.
Going from gas station to gas station.
Asking, "Do you sell cigarettes?"
After the greasy attendants nod, you always show them a photo and say:
"Have you sold cigarettes to this man?"
And they inevitably shake their head.
Because the photo is a clipping from the newspaper.
And the man in the photograph is Brian Tobin.
Because your mother once told you as a child that your dad was away because he was an important politician.
And she showed you this picture.
But I am not Brian Tobin.
And I never will be.
After the third winter you surrender your trek.
Through menacing forests and placid swamps you trudge home.
You find your mother bedridden with dysentery.
While letters suffocate the coffee tin your family uses as a mailbox.
All hand-written warnings from Betsie's teachers:
Betsie never completes her homework, they say.
And you crumple to your knees and you curse my name.
"I'll never be like you, Brian!
I hate you, I hate you, I hate you!"
Your lamentations and the pounding of your fists on the sheet metal flooring of your shack will echo about the desolate room.
Then I walk in through the door.
Now what am I supposed to say in a situation like that?
Whatever it is, that's what I'm saying to all of you now.