*This is an excerpt from my short story, âFaultâ. This story was long-listed for PRISM Internationalâs Short-Fiction Contest in 2013.
âI was fifteen the summer my father showed me the fault. Standing at the ancient rock face he formed his strong hands into fists. Knuckles thrust upward like outcrops of exposed bedrock. I stuffed my own deep into my pockets. My father brought his fists together in explanation, knuckle to opposite groove, pressing and rocking, pressing and rocking before finally dropping his hands in release.
At first Iâd been happy to get to the Science Centre in Sudbury, anything to get out of the car and away from the silence that sat between us. Now, I just wanted to leave.
âKirk, do you understand how the fracture was caused?â
Embarrassed by his geology lesson, I looked down at my feet. He kept talking.
This was how it was with my father, a surveyor who often spent months at a time away in the field. When he returned to us, my mother and I would shift and move back in around him. Once my voice dropped and I held my own opinions his return stopped being so seamless. The lines defining his absence no longer like chalk that could be easily wiped or blended in. No matter how I moved I couldnât give him enough space.
Our release was to come later that fall. He stayed with a girlfriend heâd met up north. He treated this last departure from us the same as all of his returns â we were left to do the adjusting until things fit the way he wanted them to be.
I think of my son Gabe now when I think of my father. How Gabeâs body expanded and developed. How he pressed outward filling up his own space. Fist to fist. I didnât move out of his way.â