I remember...*

You coming into my room, every single night to pull up my covers. You thought I was asleep when I grabbed onto your fingers, but I wasn't. I just wanted you to know that I wanted you to stay. I guess some part of me knew you'd be leaving soon.

You are my princess, my pumpkin, my most beautiful little girl. Daddy loves you so much. I'll see you in Dreamland and I'll see you in the morning.

Every night, every night, this is what you said to me.

You had this sparkle in your blue, blue eyes when you laughed. We would roll on the floor in the living room, wrestling, for fun. I remember those few judo classes I took, that you came to, you wore your old decorated robes, and I felt a spark of connection with you. God, I wish I had gotten to know more of that. How cool would it have been to know you as a person, not just as a child? I've tried through the books of yours I've found in the attic, classics, spy novels, but it will never be the same. You are just gone, and I was too young to understand what I was going to be missing.

I don't know if I ever really cried for you. All of the "nevers" choke me up, of course. Never going to be at my high school graduation. Never going to make chocolate chip pancakes and go to Monster Mini Golf on a Saturday again. Never going to use your Marines ka-bar on the first boy that breaks my heart. Never saw me being captain. You never saw me as who I am today.
But if I don't think about any of those, I'm fine. It's been almost four years.

You were the kindest, most generous, most loving alcoholic this world has ever seen.

See I remember the flaws too. I remember being at a restaurant in Massachusetts and we were supposed to be on vacation, but all of the sudden we weren't. I remember Sarah and I crawling into your spot in bed next to mom, the three of us cuddling together, hoping against hope you'd be okay. I remember the hills that rolled up to the rehab place- it was beautiful there, but mom only ever took Sarah and I once. I think I remember the bracelet on your wrist and a haunted look that I now recognize as shame flitting through your eyes.

I remember years after, when you were supposed to be okay, and mom and Sarah were out for the weekend, I remember finding you downstairs where I knew mom hid her mini bottles of wine, and something about you just didn't seem right. C'mon, let's go upstairs, I said, sat you on the green couch. I think I texted mom, but maybe I didn't. Regardless, she knew. She got mad, but I think she was just sad inside.

There was that New Year's party a few months before you left us all, when you were slow again, slurring, insistent on driving home and everyone there thought you'd had a sip of someone's glass.  But I can't help but wonder, and not without a little guilt, if that was just you dying. If we all were watching you die, and didn't know.

The night before you left on your trip to the city, I decided that I was going to convince you to go to the doctor no matter what. You didn't like going to the doctor's much- you were strong, could carry your brothers on your back, the way they'd taught you in the military- but you were also a lawyer. Surely with words, I could convince you to listen.

And then you died on a train coming back to meet us.

I love you, you texted. Once, twice.

When they checked your liver after you were dead, they told mom that you hadn't started drinking again. That you hadn't since rehab those many years ago.

I love you too, Daddy. I love you too.