Unsaid Things by James D. Irwin

Father is lying on the hospital bed. He looks old. He’s never seemed so frail and fragile. Or maybe he has and I just never noticed because I always see him as Dad and Dad is Superman. Dad is always thirty-eight. Dad is always laughing in the garden and drinking beer and incinerating sausages on the barbecue.

The nurses tell me it’s just a matter of time. It’s oddly vague yet sickeningly specific. I don’t know why I'm here. I don’t want to watch Superman die. And he’s going to. That’s what the nurses meant but couldn't say. Today’s the day!

One of them said I should talk, because he might hear me. There’s no real way of knowing. But I don’t know what to say. I never do. Dad wasn't much for feelings and emotions. He never told me he loved me, not in words. Men don’t want to hear men say ‘I love you… Except queers, I think.



Actions meant more to him than words. Words are small he’d say. I know he cared about me. He’s shown it in a thousand little ways over the years. He was there for my first breath, which was unusual for the time and unusual for him. Mother hadn't insisted he be there either. And now we’re full circle, pretty much. He’s not in a hurry to go. He never was.

I'm just sitting here and watching him… watching his chest rise and fall in slight and shallow breaths. I feel like telling him I love him, but I hear his voice in my head telling me not to. Sometimes things are better left unsaid. He knows how I feel—



how I felt about him.



I stand and close his eyes like I've seen people do on TV and ring the bell and think how it’s too late to say it now anyway.

The nurse enters and asks if I need anything. She’s young and pretty and unfazed by my father’s lifeless body. She has a delicate face and porcelain skin and black, black hair. I think she’s probably the most beautiful woman I've ever seen. Her voice is sweet and caring and husky and dirty all at once. The whole scenario reminds me of a porn film I've seen. I start to get a hard-on.

And in my head my father’s voice shouts two stiffs in here nurse! I begin to laugh, almost out of control. I hate myself but I can’t stop. The nurse touches my arm and I'm back in the real world and ashamed and embarrassed and I wilt.



She’s asking again if I need anything, or if I need to say my goodbyes. I tell her no, but I take Dad’s hand as if we’re shaking. ‘ I'm going to miss you’ I say. The nurse smiles weakly.



Then I call him an old bastard and laugh at a joke only I can hear.