Losing the Feeling of Feeling Unique

Slowly and somewhat reluctantly, Ryan knocked on the off-white door. After he did so, he turned to me, a look of fear in his eyes, “Please don’t expect too much, please.” He pleaded with me.

‘Okay, my expectations are very, very low.’ I laughed trying to lighten the mood as much as I could. I brought him into a hug, as I wrapped my arms around him, the door opened. He noticeably stiffened. ‘If you want to leave,’ I whispered into his ear, ‘let me know and we’ll go. Okay?’

He nodded in my direction before turning around and saying meekly, ‘Hey dad.’ Suddenly shyness engulfed me and I shrunk behind Ryan.

‘Ryan? Why are you here?’ he asked, obviously bemused.

‘I brought someone to meet you.’ He said almost regretfully.

‘Who-’ he began to say before I made myself seen, moving out from Ryan’s shadow.

‘Ruby?!’ he breathed.

‘Hi…dad.’ I waved meekly.

‘What are you doing here?’ he asked us, me more than Ryan.

‘Don’t you worry about that.’ Ryan snapped, causing me to look at him in a questioning manner, to which he just turned away.

Dad, just ignored Ryan’s sour tone and turned to me, offering a grin and open arms before saying, ‘Come here.’

I walked into his open arms, I wrapped my own around him and like a balloon of emotion, I burst. Tears sprung from my eyes and I couldn’t stop them. ‘I missed you so much,’ I said to him.

‘I missed you too hon, sorry I wasn’t there for you.’ He said very sincerely.

‘It’s fine Dad.’ I meant it; all of those years I’d spent without a father figure took its toll on me.

But never once did I have ill thought about the man who was standing with his arms wrapped around me. I think it was because I was longing for such a figure in my life, I would’ve been happy for anyone to take that spot, but my mother never seemed interested in dating other men.

‘Come inside.’ He ushered me in, I heard Ryan’s almost silent footsteps behind me.

In the few hours that we sat there, Dad and I filled each other in on every aspect of our lives, everything that the other had missed. It was bliss to finally feel like I was part of a whole family, a sense of normality was finding me and I liked it. I told him of how I met Ryan, how I
ended up going on tour with him and most importantly, my relationship with Jon - which surprisingly – he was very supportive of.

Throughout the whole chat, Ryan barely strung together a sentence, only speaking when directly spoken to and speaking as though one of us was holding a gun to his head.

‘Okay dad, we’ll come and see you before we leave tomorrow.’ I smiled at my father as Ryan and I walked towards the rented electric blue car.

The drive back to the venue was unusually tense, Ryan’s hostile behaviour towards our father made me wonder what he had done to Ryan to make him feel so badly towards him.

And I guessed it was quite bad because Ryan wasn’t a horrible person, he didn’t really hold grudges; it was really out of character for him.

‘Ry, what was up with you today?’ I asked, casually beating around the bush.

‘What do you mean ‘what was up with me today’?’ he snapped at me as we pulled into the venue car park.

‘That! That’s what I mean, you’re all tense and in a bad mood since we saw dad.’ I said calmly, hoping not to annoy him any further.

‘Don’t call him dad, he doesn’t deserve to be called dad.’ He muttered before reaching for the door handle, intent on exiting the vehicle.

‘Uh uh, no you don’t. Ryan, tell me, what has dad done to you?’

He squirmed uncomfortably in his seat, I didn’t realise that whatever had happened between them had such an effect on him.

‘I can’t, I just can’t talk about it, Ruby.’ He near enough whispered, before he opened the door and left mumbling a small ‘I’m sorry’ before leaving me in a stunned, slightly confused silence.

The rest of the evening there was an odd feeling between Ryan and I, aside from the show, the band had nothing planned. So, most of the time was spent lounging in the small space that was the bus.

I fell asleep uneasily in Jon’s arms, hoping whatever was going on between Ryan and I would pass. Despite this I was still excited to see my father once more before we left Vegas for the LA stop on the tour.

‘I’m not going Ruby, I won’t go.’ Ryan said calmly – although it wasn’t natural, it was so obviously forced.

‘Fine, Ryan. I’ll go on my own!’ I yelled at him, grabbing my favourite purple cardigan from the couch and heading for the door.

‘No, I’m not letting you go on your own. I’ll come with you, one sec,’ he said defeated, pulling on his brown leather shoes.

As we walked to the car, I tried to patch things up – I desperately wanted to, I hated the way things were between us.

‘I’m sorry Ryan, sorry about this whole thing with our dad.’

‘It’s okay Ruby, I’m sorry too, I guess it’s just a touchy subject for me.’

Those few simple words seemed to do it, on the way to dad’s we talked; everything was back to the way it was. And I was glad.

We pulled up in front of the now familiar house and got out. Immediately, Ryan’s posture changed and he crossed his arms simulating a defensive pose. I decided not to question it seeing as we just got back to talking properly.

I knocked on the door, once, twice and nobody answered. Dad’s car was in the drive so I guessed he was home, so I tried the door handle and the door opened right away.

‘Dad?’ I called into the house.

‘Ruby? Ryan? Is that you?’ his voice called, although it was gruff and hoarser than the previous day.

‘Yeah, it’s us.’ I called back, in the general direction his voice came from.

He staggered into our view and I heard Ryan say ‘Oh shit, he’s drunk.’

I swerved my head around to look at him and his eyes were filled with sheer terror, I’d never seen Ryan quite so scared before.

‘What the fuck are you doing here?!’ Dad slurred at us, his voice getting angrier.

‘You told us to come back today.’ I said, naively.

‘I told you to come back, no I didn’t!’ he screamed.

‘Yes you did.’ I squeaked.

He inched forward, closing the gap between us, ‘Did you just answer me back?’ he snarled.

I kept quiet, not wanting to enrage him.

‘Do not fucking ignore me!’ he yelled, venom dripping from each syllable he spoke.

‘Sorry,’ I murmured.

‘Don’t speak to her like that, you waste of fucking space!’ Ryan shouted at him, coming to my defence.

‘Why not? Big man, what are you going to do about it?’ he was nose to nose with Ryan, I was genuinely scared for his safety.

‘Because I fucking said so!’ he pushed me behind him and carried on staring at our father.

Dad pushed Ryan and I lunged in between them, but Ryan pushed me to the floor, to get me out of the way of the danger before he punched our father square in the jaw. He promptly dropped to the floor.

As I fell to the carpeted floor, my ankle twisted into some unnatural position causing me to scream out in pain. Ryan ran to my side and picked me up before carrying me out of the door and to the car.

I was hysterical. ‘I’m so sorry Ryan; I should have listened to you. I’m so sorry.’ I repeated.

‘Don’t worry Ruby; we have to get you to hospital to get this ankle checked out.’