Tom’s forehead shifted while his expressionless gaze remained unchanged. Stephen reached down to pull back the barrier to begin the long path of failure. Tom, moving faster than Stephen had seen in years, reached down with his capable arm and firmly grabbed the wooden barrier, keeping a strong grip on it.
“It’s alright, Dad.” Stephen reassured his father in a calm and resolved voice. There was a wave of comfort beginning to settle into Stephen’s mind. He knew he was done and while his mind hated him for it, his body could not have been more agreeable.
“I’m done here. My body’s a wreck and I can’t go any further. I have to stop.” Riddled with guilt and beginning to feel the cool tingles of numbness leaving his body, Stephen lifted the railing off the ground and began sliding it back so he could push past.
The railing slid up and back about six inches when Tom’s teeth clenched. Instead of letting go, Tom leaned forward and shifted strength into his arm with a forceful downward thrust. The barricade was ripped out of Stephen’s hands and crashed into the asphalt with all the force and emotional rejection of someone slamming a solid wooden door shut on an intruder.
“Dad? What are you doing? I told you I’m done here. I need to get you home.” His body sent a brief shiver over his skin as if to warn him that he didn’t have the energy to argue with his father at that moment. Stephen again attempted to lift the barrier but Tom’s one-handed grip on the railing was immovable, its strength revitalized by the pure willpower of a frail but unbroken man. His eyes locked onto Stephen’s with a stern and commanding parental glare. Stephen, justified in his decision to stop, avoided eye contact and gently placed his hand back on the railing.
“It’s okay. This was a bad idea. It was always a bad idea.” Deciding against the confrontation, Stephen instead moved to the right of the barrier and began pushing the adjoining guardrail aside to create a new exit from the course. “I can’t do this,” he said with a depressed confidence. “I’m busted up pretty bad. I think I probably injured something and I’m going to stop. It’s just a race and it’s time to go, Dad. We need to get you home.”
Tom peered into the brokenness of Stephen’s eyes and released his grasp on the guardrail. In a combined movement of frailty and power, Tom raised his arm up, firmly clenched his hand and slammed his fist into Stephen’s chest. The impact of the aged and disabled man’s punch was surprising to Stephen’s body but his mind went blank with shock. Unable to verbalize his befuddlement over the fact that his father had just struck him, Stephen stood in stunned silence, fixated on the feeble man’s eyes.
The punch woke his body and Stephen began to have feelings return. His stiff back began to groan. His inner thighs blazed from the miles he had spent unconscious of the persistent chaffing. The heavy beating of his heart echoed and gave his head the feeling of being compressed. Reverberations from his core pulsated and forcefully pumped blood vessels, awakening strained tendons and overworked muscles throughout each fiber of his body. The heightened sense caused each nerve to heat up as if they were the unified voice of a thousand infernos erupting from within. Tom’s punch had knocked Stephen back into the harsh reality of his moment, a cataclysmic shattering of the escape which had quickly becoming Stephen’s false salvation.
Tom’s hand was still raised before Stephen. As the fist began to move again, Stephen braced for another punch. Instead, Tom’s jaw tightened and his mouth slowly opened as he pulled in a deep breath. A finger extended from Tom’s hand and slowly drifted into Stephen’s chest.
Exhausted and despondent, Stephen stared at his father’s extended finger lingering at him. The palm of his father’s hand opened and moved to rest onto his chest. Tom leaned his head forward and forced his jaw into his own chest before raising it and revealing an overly exaggerated open mouth. Not since a previous lifetime had Stephen heard his father make a sound beyond grunts of discomfort but in that moment of Tom’s grip, a purposeful noise began to erupt, “Ah-nnn…g!”
His mouth opened and closed several times as Tom fought to coordinate the sounds. He turned his head from side to side as if to gain momentum and topple the words from his lips, all the while he kept his palm on Stephen’s chest.
“Dad, what is it? Are you okay?” Stephen rested his hand on Tom’s shoulder and felt his own body shiver with concern. Closely watching Tom’s movements, Stephen knew he would be in a challenging position to assist his father if another stroke was upon him.
“Shhhh… aaahhh!” Tom’s voice became forceful and louder.
Tilting his head as if to hear his father better, Stephen observed his father with a hopeful disbelief as Tom repeated, “Shhhh… oooo… gggg!”
Tom was clearly trying to say something. Stephen’s observation shifted from concern to curiosity in a realization that his father was not just communicating, but instructing.
“Sssshhh… oooo… nnnggg!” his voice raised as Tom’s finger extended again into Stephen’s chest and steadily began to jab. Tom paused and surveyed his son.
Stephen found himself unable to speak as he maintained his bearing into the deep richness of his father’s eyes. To Stephen, the debilitating stroke had taken away the greatest man he had ever known. Tom had been athletic and his physical prowess could be counted on, but he was also a steadfast guide who could be trusted to stand behind his family, his friends and that which he believed. Tom had always been compassionate to others and remained a tenacious debater who had walked with the non-arrogant confidence of a man secure in knowing who he was and what he stood for. Even as Stephen became a man, Tom seemed to stand so tall to him. But in a losing battle with his body, Stephen had watched Tom whither into a clumsy shell while a brilliant mind drifted into a distant shadow of the man he once was. As hard as it was for Tom to deal with the debilitating results of his stroke, the loss of his father’s capabilities had been a crushing and confusing blow for Stephen. Tom’s new state represented the loss of Stephen’s closest friend, confidant and greatest role model. The loss was something Stephen had failed to realize and as a result, he failed to mourn or overcome. As Tom eventually resolved himself to the new windows he would be forced to view the world through, Stephen had dealt with his own pain and fear by resenting his father’s disability and letting frustration brew to his new burden.
Now Stephen looked back at Tom and drifted deeper into his father’s purposeful stare. As he did, Stephen became aware that every ounce of the man his father used to be, continued to live on from behind Tom’s glazed pupils. He was surprised to see that the confidence, the wisdom, the tenacity, the determination, the compassion; it was all there staring back at Stephen. And it was determined to tell him something.