Stepfather

Dear Stepfather,

Four years ago, if someone told me I would be calling you that, I would have laughed.

I remember when my mother first told me about you. You were not her first romantic interest, and I was certain you would not be the last. Her previous relationships ended before I could meet the man, and I was still in denial over my parents' separation and painfully long divorce process. I was unimpressed to learn you were a few years younger than my mother, and the first question I asked was if your relationship was physical or serious. Her eyes widened as she gawked at me for half a minute before saying it was serious. I nodded, fighting the urge to roll my eyes. You would leave soon enough, I assured myself, or she would leave you. Her feelings for you would fade, just like it did for my deadbeat dad and her previous lovers. There was no reason for me to care about you.

My eyes begged to be rolled whenever she mentioned you. This is temporary, I reassured myself, it will not last. Why am I allowing this rubbish to enter my mind? I had better things to ponder than someone I would never meet, nor wanted to.

Then my mother told me she was quitting smoking. I laughed in her face, coldly telling her I had no faith in her and that she would not last a week. My grandfather asked if I wanted to bet that she would last a month. I scoffed. This was not the first time she had attempted to quit smoking. The first time, she lasted for a week. The second time, she lasted for two months. I do not recall what prompted the intial attempt. The second, however, I recall as clear as day. She had entered my room as a commercial about the danger parents who smoked presented to their children appeared on the TV. I noticed a look of guilt and fear spread across her facial features as she watched it. I was so proud of her...until a friend we were visiting offered her a cigarette. Despite my pleas for her to say no, she accepted it and assured me it was just this once, but we all know what 'just this once' truly means. Her habit returned, and my faith in her died. My paternal grandmother told me her mother died at forty-one when she was a teenager because of her smoking habit, leaving her and her two young brothers, one of whom also lost his life to smoking, to be raised by their grandmother.

I wept, knowing my mother was willingly putting her life in danger without a qualm. My maternal grandmother has been fortunate to live a long life in spite of her smoking habit, but that did not guarantee my mother's fate. She could die. She would die.

Let her die, I decided as anger and pain filled my heart. Slowly, my love for her faded alongside my faith. She had chosen her fate. I had family who would take care of me if she perished. I did not care. I am horrified now by my past self's cruel thoughts, but what else was I to think? I was young and naive, and so very hurt and angry.

That is why I dismissed her when she revealed her intention to stop damaging her lungs. I had clearly not been enough for her to stop. Why was a man any different? Why had the tears and pleas of her daughter, her flesh and blood, not been sufficient motivation? What was it about a man she knew for nearly a year that convinced her to be better? You were nothing to her, I indignantly thought, while I was everything. I should have been enough.

Hatred filled me when I thought of you. I wanted to hurt you, both physically and emotionally. My relief over my mother's changes for the better overpowered my malice. I resented you so much I could not take joy in the good your involvement in my mother's life brought.

When I finally met you, I was determined to be as rude and cold as possible. You will recall how, without making eye contact, I icily stated it was none of your business after you inquired about an incident regarding my grades. My mother scolded me for my rudeness, but I could not care less. I wanted to hurt you, to make you feel unwelcome, to expel you from our lives.

I had wanted to spend some lost time with my mother, not you. I snapped at her when she revealed you would be accompanying us to the movie theater on one occasion. She reminded me of how she had to beg her coworker to switch shifts with her so she could have the weekend off, but I did not care. I cried myself to sleep that night, imagining you as a monster who would harm me like those bastards on the news. I did not want to admit you were a good person. I did not want to get to know you.

I praise you for not allowing the attitude of a selfish child to ruin you. You remained with my mother, and gave me the respect I refused to show you.

Grudgingly, I began to respect you. You made my mother happy, you inquired about her issues with her daughter and her mother out of genuine concern, and you never uttered an unkind word to or about me. Eventually, I admitted to her that I approved of your relationship. It was not perfection, but it was a start, one I am certain brought you relief.

As the years rolled on, I struggled to accept you as more than my mother's boyfriend. I could see the future you two were building together, and words could not describe the hapiness I felt when you proposed to her. I meant what I said about breaking your neck if you break her heart. It is not a threat, but a promise.

When you two started to speak of having children, I grew uncomfortable. My grief for an unborn sibling my mother lost back when she was still with my father had not faded. I did not want to risk enduring that grief again, or worse, lose my mother too. Even as I grew open to the idea and dreamt of my mother becoming pregnant, I continued to dismiss it. Until several months ago, when we discovered her pregnancy. By then, we had formed a truce of sorts to at least be friends if I could not consider you family. You understood my hesitation and did not push. I appreciated that.

Now I tell you that you are family. For years, you have stood beside my mother and I, offering love and support when it was needed most. You do not run and lie like my deadbeat father whom I love but do not respect. You are more of a man than he could ever be and though you are not a paternal figure in my life, I see you more as family than him. Blood means nothing. He has chosen to not support me and to lie to me. For that, I am not sure I can forgive him. But this is not about him. This is about you, and the two words that I owe to you.

Thank you. For being there for my mother. For enduring my immaturity and anger. And for becoming a part of my family.