Today's writing

Lying to my father is like breathing. It’s just that easy. I learned long ago that you had to deceive the man if you were going to get by with him in control. Simple, really: just take the right thing to say and twist it to the inverse. I’ve never even thought to wish it were different. It’s just the way I’ve always known it to be. 

“Well, that’s the thing. The job isn’t even available until July. It’s –"

The look in his eyes tells me I don’t need to say another word. I’ve completely lost his interest. The only thing he wants to know is that I’m not going to go to him with my hand out. In a sense, I can’t blame him. I’m coming up hard on 30 years old. I still go to him for help. It’s not all that often and when I do I’m appropriately miserable at myself, but the point is that I should be able to stand independently. I don’t feel that way because he tells me to. I feel it because I don’t want to rely on him. Honestly, I don’t want to rely on anyone. But he’s the last person in the solar system I’d want to rely on. 

He can be an evil, ugly man. He has a mind like a steel cage and he shoves every bit of potential material in there for use at a later date. There is nothing my father can’t remember, nothing that he won’t press into my face, yell into my ears, beat over my head to make a point. And that point is always and forever: 

YOU. ARE. WORTH. NOTHING. 

So why bother? Why meet him here? Why sit with him in this cheap pile of crap known as a restaurant and choke down mediocre pizza? Why come to London in the first place? 

Hope. That nasty little four-letter word. 

He’s a deceptive little fucker, Hope. Leads you down a pretty garden path only to kick you squarely, flatly, in the ass.