I slammed the bright red foam-covered bat against the column in the middle of the room and yelled, the blows punctuating my words. “Why wouldn’t he ever write?” WHUMP! “Or call?” WHUMP! “Doesn’t he Even… F***ing… Care?” WHUMP! WHUMP!! WHUMP!!!

I screamed through tears that made the corners of my eyes itch. This was “Marathon” – two full days of group therapy, and it was day two on a Sunday afternoon in December. In the room: Jerry, the therapist, and eight or nine other teenagers, some a year or two younger than me, a few a couple of years older. I was fourteen. And I had had it with not knowing or hearing from my natural father.

Two years earlier, when John Russell officially adopted my brother Scott and me, the family court had offered Bob Jaycox an opportunity to contest the adoption, but he hadn’t even bothered to reply. No “yes,” no “no,” no nothing.

“No reply!” I yelled, throat scratchy. “What the f***?”

“Why don’t you just call him, Brian?” a redheaded girl suggested. “Ask him yourself.”

I said nothing.

“Do you think you might be able to do that, Brian?” Jerry asked, stroking his neatly trimmed beard.

“I’ve been thinking about it for a while.”

“Is the idea of calling him scary?” Jerry probed.

“A little,” I admitted.

“Call him!” the chorus chanted. “Do it!”

“Well I guess I couldn’t feel more hurt or rejected than I already do, so why shouldn’t I?”

One boy, a lump of a kid wearing baggy pants, chimed in, “Why bother? He’s just gonna disappoint you all over again I bet.”

Jerry gently chided the boy’s negativity. He scooched his folding metal chair a few inches toward me and said, “Don’t pressure yourself, Brian. Take your time. Just give it some thought.”

That night it was all I thought about.

–Brian Russell,
Meeting Dad (2010)
Accents Publishing

Brian Russell spent more than 20 years working in the theater as a director and producer of plays, musicals, and operas before shifting his focus toward writing. He was artistic director of Chicago’s American Theater Company from 1997-2002, where he directed more than a dozen shows. In 2007, he graduated with honors with a BGS from Roosevelt University, where his short story, “Rutherford” won the first Annual Keenan-Kara Writing Award. In May 2010, he will graduate from Spalding University’s brief residency MFA in Writing Program. His prose, poetry, and critiques have recently been published at public-republic.net and at thereviewreview.net.