“Good-Bye son.”

Would those be his last words?

It was just another normal day. Elementary school was fun. Friends were awesome to be around. Texas weather was bi-polar as always. Piles and piles worth of homework buried me each time I opened my backpack, or so I don’t thought at that point. Nothing really out of the normal. Everything was normal, until I opened the front door and saw multiple bags greet me.
“Hey dad. Whose bags are these? Did grandma come back from Vietnam today?”
“No son. Don’t worry about them right now. Just...just go and do your homework or something,” said my father wiping his red face.
I did as my father said. I went on with my day doing my homework, taking a shower, eating dinner, and getting ready for the next day. Everything went back to the way it was. The next thing I know, I see my father come out with more bags. I didn’t understand what he was going to do with those bags.I thought he was cleaning out his closet, but why did he put them into duffel bags and luggages? Why put it in the front of the door? At this point, I was just filled with questions like my chubby cousin was filled on Thanksgiving Day.
“DAD! What are these bags for? Are we taking some kind of family vacation?”
“NO! We aren’t… Let me put it this way. It’s more like a vacation for myself… but I don’t know when I’m going to come back.”
“WHAT?! What does that even mean?
“Son! Its not easy explaining this… but I’m leaving. Your mom and I are having a lot of problems. We are deciding to go our separate ways,” said my father choking on his words.
After whiping a couple of tears off of his face he said, “I want you to be brave. I want you to be a good, okay? I need you to be a man now. I want you to be the man of the house now. Last and foremost, I want you to become a better man than I am in the future.” What a huge burden for a 6th grader.
I was just in shock. I didn’t know whether I should cry or scream at the top of my lungs. He gave me the most horrible news I have ever heard. I couldn’t comprehend what was going on at the time and no matter how hard or how long I try thinking about this, I still could not understand why. Why he just abruptly left me and my family like that.
The time came when he prepared to leave. He was just as heartbroken as I was, but maybe a little bit more. He got up from his chair, where he was putting on his socks and shoes, and stood in front of me. He quietly placed his hands on my shoulders and said, “You are going to be a great kid one day. I already know you are going to be someone great. You’re my son and you will always be my son. I just hope that I will be there to see you become a better man than I am. I also hope that we can, one day, see each other in the future when your mother and I have worked our problems out.” said my dad trying to not look at me in the face.
He got up, and took one last look at me and said his final goodbye. I thought that I was having a  terrible nightmare. What a horrible nightmare that was going on. It had to be a nightmare. It just had to be. I was trying to convince myself that it was just a bad dream, until I heard his Hummer roar in the driveway. I looked outside through the window blinds and I saw his car slowly disappear in the distance. I then knew that it wasn’t a dream and no matter how bad I wanted it to be just a horrible dream, I could not escape from reality.
Coming home from school and hearing those words is the last thing a 6th grader would want to hear. “Why?” questioned the child as tears rolled down his face on his birthday one month later. “Why?!” asked the child four years later sobbing and still hoping for an answer. “Why did he leave? Why didn’t I stop him?” He loves his dad, but where was he so that the child could say those words to his face? Where?

“Why?” As the tears pours down while he sleeps.

“I LOVE YOU. But why?”