“When was the last time you saw him?”
She bites her lip, perplexed. “Um . . . that would have been . . . last year at your dad’s funeral.”
TWENTY-TWO
My dad’s funeral?” I repeat.
“I mean, we didn’t really talk,” she says, shrugging. “You hugged me . . . but you were pretty busy running around, making sure everything was okay. Being your usual organized self.”
I repeat the words to myself. Dad’s funeral.
Dad is dead. Dead.
I’m too numb to move. To do anything but sit here, white-knuckling my smoothie until my fingertips dent the cup. It doesn’t feel real. How can it? Dad is dead, I don’t know what happened, and I can’t ask Kassie without her thinking I’ve lost my mind.
She gives me a pained expression. “I’m sorry. I know it’s probably still really hard.”
“I wasn’t close with him anyway.” The words don’t feel good coming out, but it’s the truth. Especially since I’ve lost the last thirteen years.
“I know. But you loved him.”
As I fight to keep the tears at bay, my mind pivots to our phone call at the party rental store. Pacing around the hot parking lot as Dad invited me to spend the summer with him and his pregnant girlfriend out of nowhere. I think about how mad I was that he didn’t show up to our party last night. How mad I was when I saw he wasn’t on the wedding seating chart. About all the times he wasn’t there when he should have been. And now I have nowhere to target that anger. Because Dad is dead.
So instead, I just sob. Uncontrollably.
Kassie kneels next to me, wrapping her arms around me tight. She doesn’t say anything. She just lets me cry. It’s like all the pent-up anger has boiled up inside me, and now it’s overflowing like lava, splattering in salty tears off my knees. And while I know my anger and disappointment are valid, those feelings now feel unfair. Unjust. I guess it’s hard to be mad at a dead guy.
“I’m sorry,” I mutter, blowing my nose into a napkin. “I’m a total mess right now.”
“Oh my god. Don’t be sorry.”
“I know comforting some grieving rando on the sidewalk isn’t exactly how you saw your day going.”
“You’re not a rando, Char.” She leans forward and places her hand on my leg, which I can’t stop bouncing out of anxiety. Yet another thing about my thirty-year-old self that hasn’t changed. “I’m always here for you if you really need me. Okay?”
“Promise?”
She extends her pinkie, and for a fraction of a second, I see nine-year-old Kassie with a purple streak in her hair the summer we met. “Promise.”
Christopher “Chris” Wu passed away suddenly on March 19, 2036, at 56 years of age. He was a loving and devoted husband, father, son, coworker, and friend.
He was born to Michael and Lisa on September 20, 1979. After graduating college, Christopher chased his dreams by attending Columbia Business School, which paved the way for a successful career in finance.
Christopher leaves behind three children, Charlotte （29）， Marianne （11）， and Lily （8）， and a loving wife, Alexandra.
I read Dad’s obituary at least fifty times on the train ride home, and spent the rest of the time stalking Alexandra’s social media. Sure enough, there are a few photos of Dad, Alexandra, and my sisters. They’re posing for a photo among fall foliage and they look like a quintessential family from a catalog. You’d never guess he had another daughter.
The older girl, Marianne, closely resembles Dad, while the younger one looks more like Alexandra. I keep scrolling through photos, expecting to feel anger and resentment toward them, but I don’t.
I conduct a quick scan of my older texts from Alexandra, stumbling upon one from six months ago.
Alexandra: Hi Charlotte. Sorry to bother you, but I wanted to let you know that I was going through your father’s old stuff and found a couple boxes I thought you might want. I know he’d want you to have them. You’re more than welcome to come by anytime to go through some of it. I know the girls would really like to see you.
I’m overwhelmed with the need to speak to her. I need to find out what happened—like, did Dad and I talk? Do I have any relationship with Alexandra or my sisters? But part of me is scared. Scared to see how perfect his new life was. And what if I don’t like the truth about our relationship?
The easy solution would be to ask Nori, the only person who won’t think I’m a lunatic. But I never confided in Nori about stuff with my dad before. It’s not that I don’t trust her, or that she’s not sympathetic. Quite the opposite. She’s one of the most trustworthy, empathetic humans on the planet. It’s the fact that her family is perfect. Her parents have a storybook romance; they met in Korea when her dad was on exchange.