The Bottom Drawer

So I was the one that had to close up my dad's house.

He'd always been so strict.

So conservative.

We never really got along.

And I was happy when I moved out.

And went to college.

I think he was happy too.

He disapproved of the way I dressed, the way I acted, the friends I had.

It was hard to see past all that.

How conservative, how judgmental.

How boring he was.

To think about my dad in any other way.

To imagine that he had another life.

A secret life.

Until I walked into his room and opened his bottom drawer.

It was his collection of old magazines.

Men house magazines.

My dad looking at girly magazines.

I couldn't believe it.

The women were so beautiful.

So exotic and sexy.

They were the women I always dreamed of becoming.

Women that men, men like my dad, would lay awake at night and fetch.

I sure did.

My dad would have hated Jason.

He didn't look like a doctor or a lawyer or a cop.

But I didn't care.

Jason wasn't what he seemed.

But neither was my dad.