could take me.
I expected them to drop me at the curb, but Dad insisted that they
walk with me through the airport. They waited while I checked my
bags, then followed me to the security gate. It was as if Dad wanted to
give me until the last second to change my mind. We walked in silence.
When we arrived at security I hugged them both and said goodbye. I
removed my shoes, laptop, camera, then I passed through the
checkpoint, reassembled my pack, and headed for the terminal.
It was only then that I glanced back and saw Dad, still standing at
the checkpoint, watching me walk away, his hands in his pockets, his
shoulders slumping, his mouth slackened. I waved and he stepped
forward, as if to follow, and I was reminded of the moment, years
before, when power lines had covered the station wagon, with Mother
inside it, and Dad had stood next to her, exposed.
He was still holding that posture when I turned the corner. That
image of my father will always stay with me: that look on his face, of
love and fear and loss. I knew why he was afraid. He’d let it slip my last
night on Buck’s Peak, the same night he’d said he wouldn’t come to see
me graduate.
“If you’re in America,” he’d whispered, “we can come for you.
Wherever you are. I’ve got a thousand gallons of fuel buried in the
field. I can fetch you when The End comes, bring you home, make you
safe. But if you cross the ocean...”