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A bowl of rice
They hadn’t spoken un a while. It had been two months since he had come back home, she wasn’t there he left or when he came back. She was mad a and tried not to show it. So, it certainly was not a surprise that she didn’t want to answer her phone that mid-day when she saw her father was calling her. She doubted if she should answer with the pounding feeling that maybe the call would go bad. She slid the green on the phone screen.
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Hi dad!
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Hello Darling, how are you?
Already she was thinking how quickly she could get the call to end.
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I’m doing fine, how come your call?
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Oh… I just wanted to talk. How’s work?
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It’s great, I actually have a lot of it right now lot of deadlines, but I’m almost done for the day.
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Oh really, that’s great!
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Yup and what are you doing?
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Well I was making my self lunch. I haven’t eaten yet.
She looked at her watch it was 4pm. It troubled her whenever her father didn’t eat.
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And breakfast did you have breakfast?
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No darling nothing in the pantry.
She started getting anxious.
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Why haven’t you eaten yet!
There was a pause. She could feel the imminent pain buried in the silence.
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I was making myself a bowl of rice…
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…
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But I burnt it I’m trying to figure out what to do.
She started to tear up but tried to hide so she wouldn’t upset her father. She felt awful for not wanting to answer. Her father didn’t take much care of himself and hardly ate so the call caused her much distress. She couldn’t do anything but talk to him until she felt he and she were going to be alright.
All along the tears streamed down her face pouring harder because of the melancholic awareness that her father was alone and that she couldn’t be there. It was probably the first time she cried about the whole divorce and not divorce arrangement.
She ended the call and recollected about the bowl of rice. It wasn’t hard to make. She rarely burned them let alone her father who was an amazing cook. She thought about sending him more comforting word but couldn’t shake the sadness. All she could do was damn the stupid bowl of rice.
