By George Dibble
“Before I went to college.”
“So, two years?”
“Yeah.”
“Hopefully it’s not awkward,” he says. “I hate being in uncomfortable places with people I don’t know. I just don’t know how to act or get away ’cause I’m the one you’re bringing, and I can’t just walk out.”
I stick my head out the window as the wind flings hair across my face. There’s familiarity in being exposed to this high speed and wispy disorientation. It reminds me of going on roller coasters with Dad. “It’ll be good. You’ll be fine,” I say as I lean back in the car and roll up the window. When I lived at home, Dad went to work and watched basketball, yelled at me and my sisters for cropped shorts or things like that. He raised his voice and really cornered us in our thoughts. Made us feel like we shouldn’t have any thoughts at all. Or any he didn’t advocate. And we’d cry so much and uncontrollably, mostly for ourselves; sometimes for him.
We only went a few times but every so often—every couple years or so—Dad would take us to Dollywood.
Mom would stay with the stroller, watching our brother, as Dad walked to the fastest roller coasters. We’d follow. Not because we liked the scary rides but because he did. These were where he laughed and held our hands during and wobbled out after, and bought us cheap expensive churros, smiling about the ride and talking about the next one. I’d convince myself that I cared and that I loved them and wished they were faster or that they had more loops or that the ride would break down and halt and that it would only be Dad who could pry us from those bars and stand above our heads and say, “Don’t worry, I got this. I got you,” as he’d lift us by our arms out of the clunky carts and hold us and carry us to the platform, where we’d cry and tell him how scared we were. He’d listen silently, his big hands on our heads. I’d smell his shirt, my face pressed against his shoulder. And we’d be huddled there for an hour or twice that or less than half, all of us together. Who were we crying for?
I’d tell him we were fine and it was alright; for everything.
But those roller coasters never broke. And we only went to Dollywood every few years or so.
“Dad’s kind of reserved. But you’ll be fine,” I say, watching him, watching the road; thinking, but of nothing new.
George Dibble is an American writer, ideating on large bodies of water.
Header image by Mariah Smith, Inscape “Metamorphosis” art contest winner (2025)
