When I was nine years old, my brother told me he had seen the end of the world. We sat on the floor of my bedroom, huddled against the wall because the center of the room felt too exposed. He wasn’t crying- he stared, blankly, at the ceiling, and told me that this must be hell, that fire had come and taken Dad away because he didn’t go and take the crackers during church. That didn’t make any sense. I told him so. He started crying, then, and the anger that had bitten its way into my words melted away, and regret took its place. I couldn’t help but be angry at him. Dad wasn’t in hell, Dad took care of us, and I loved him, so he had to be good. He had to be. I clung to that hope, even as the ambulance pulled away, even as my grandparents made it their primary goal to pry Cole and I away from each other and out of the place we had decided was safe, even as the smoke faded away and we were left with no evidence that anything had happened, save a scratch on the tile where Dad had fallen. 

When I was nine years old, I found out I was lactose intolerant. Not a big deal, in the grand scheme of things, but it felt like a huge deal to a child who had never had any sort of trouble in his life, except for the usual torment the ‘weird kids’ are subjected to. My dad does all of the cooking, and he pivoted to cheeseless dinners without even thinking about it. It wasn’t a lot, but it meant everything to me that he understood. He would ask me to taste test new dinners, and vegan cheeses, back when those weren’t commonly available. He would search for ways to take care of me, to help me through this thing that at the time was the only hardship I had ever experienced. My grandparents made dinner the night of the fire. They dragged me, screaming and crying, to the kitchen, and plopped me down at the counter. My grandmother handed me a grilled cheese with a smile. “See,” she said, “doesn’t it feel better to be back to normal?” It had been an hour. I forced a smile, feeling utterly, desperately alone. My brother took the chance to move on with a smile, and his bravery made me crumble. I couldn’t get over it. No one here knows me. Dad can’t go to hell. I need him. 

When I was nine years old, I condemned myself to hell. I knelt on the floor of my bedroom, having put my brother to bed in the next room over, since our grandparents didn’t do it the way he liked. Being a good Catholic child, I forced myself through the Lord's prayer with wet eyes. I sobbed my prayers out with heaving breaths, my tears soaking into the shag carpet, and I whispered to God that if He sent Dad to heaven, I would go to hell in his place. Whether he was dead or alive, I had no idea, and I couldn’t help but believe that if I didn’t beg hard enough, my dad would be lost to me forever. I couldn’t take that. I needed him. Who knew if God would listen to me, but I had to try, didn’t I? My hands shook as I raised them to the sky.  I begged until my exhaustion overtook me and I fell fast asleep on my floor, still knelt in prayer. My grandmother had to drag me to school the next day. My home station teacher ended up letting me sleep during quiet reading, because my hands were shaking too hard to turn the pages. 

When I was nine years old, I cried in the Maine Medical Center gift shop. The neon lights burned my eyes and bored deep into my soul. My mom had led me down there, and left me with a crumpled twenty dollar bill, not wanting to leave my dad alone in his cold, sterile hospital room. So there I stood, in front of a display case full of alarmingly shiny cakes. I must’ve been frozen to the floor for a solid ten minutes before the lady behind the counter came over to check on me. With a shaking voice, I explained the situation, and she smiled with understanding. She helped me find the german chocolate cake- my dad’s favorite. We were going to make it for his birthday. He’d probably be spending his birthday in the hospital. I pushed my crumpled bill onto the counter and raced back into the elevator, practically bouncing from excitement. This was something I could do to help. When I had scrambled back into his room, (with a lot of help from very kind nurses), I presented him this piece of cake like it was an offering to the God I was beginning to lose faith in. My dad’s face peered out from between the bandages, eyes focusing on my presentation. He smiled in a way that made me want to cry. “You take it,” he whispered hoarsely. “It looks delicious, though, kiddo.” I ate that cake in tears on the edge of his bed while he slept. 

When I was sixteen years old, I sat on the edge of my very own hospital bed, exactly one floor down from where my father had sat seven years earlier. I stared at my own brain waves on the screen across from me. The glue on my head burned, and I wished I was anywhere else. I twisted my fall risk bracelet around and around my wrist. The cold from outside slipped in through the open window. I listened to my heart monitor beep slowly, on the verge of tears. The door in the corner of the room creaked open, and I whipped my head towards the door. My dad peaked his head in. “How’re you doing, kid?” I forced a smile. He joined me on the edge of my bed and put a small, cold box into my hands. I looked down. German chocolate cake. My tears brimmed over and I leaned into my dad’s shoulder. He reached over and took my hand. I handed it back to him. The big black letters on my chart read NPO. I smiled. “You take it. It looks delicious, though.”