I want my dad back

[AC1]

My dad died unexpectedly when I was 17. I am 20. It still takes a toll.

My dad spent most of my life in prison for circumstances I absolutely do not blame him for and never will- he was struggling with addiction, and helped someone steal in order to fun said addiction. What he needed was not punishment, but help- but this is neither here nor there. He came back when I was a young teenager, only to be brought back in due to a complete misunderstanding (he missed a court date... because he'd moved and the summons got sent to the wrong house). While he was there, he got a terrible illness that claimed his life, and I had no idea about any of it until the day he died.

He loved me. This, I have never doubted. He had my name and birth date tattooed on his chest, and I once heard a story that he was afraid when I had to get shots as a baby because he was afraid I'd hate him (never mind that I was too young to remember at the time). He supported me the best he could despite being separated from my mother even before his imprisonment, and sent me letter after letter in prison that I never got because of my mother (but that is, again, neither here nor there). He was the fun dad, and I needed the fun dad with the childhood I had. He loved me, even though I was a mentally ill, uncontrollable dynamo of a person who regularly skipped school and got in trouble. When he became my primary caretaker after my mother abandoned me and he got out of prison, he did everything to support me despite every odd stacked against both of us.

When he died, the initial grief was subtle and insidious. After the shock came... normalcy, or so it felt. I didn't cry after the first night I knew of his death, but my sensory issues grew more severe, my anger more explosive, and...

I wasn't there in his last moments, you know. My Nana and Papa, who I lived with alongside him for what was meant to be a short time, were the only ones allowed in his hospital room on account of COVID being rampant at the time. They say it's a blessing since the state he was in wasn't how he would have wanted me to remember him, but I don't care. I just want to have been by his side when he needed me most.

I found a song today. Well, I'd found it a while back, but it wasn't to my usual taste, so I only listened to it today. It's called Child of the Stars by Fish in a Birdcage. I didn't make the connection at first, but now, listening to it, really listening to it... It feels like my dad. It brought all those feelings of grief back full-force, and I just....

I just want my dad back. He'll never watch me get married. He'll never get to meet his grandchildren. He was only in his 40s. To the end, every odd was stacked against him, and there was nothing I could do. I just want my dad to hold me again. I want things to have been different. I don't feel like an adult so much as a poor, vulnerable orphan, and I just want my dad.