Page 35 of Please, Forgive Me
DIEGO BITTENCOURT
I drove straight to my parents’ house without even thinking.
It was like my body knew where I needed to be before my mind caught up.
It had been a while since my last visit, and despite the chaos at work, I knew I had to see my father. Since the stroke, he’d been confined to a bed, unable to move or speak.
As soon as I parked in the driveway, I took a deep breath, bracing myself for the moment that always got to me. My mother opened the door almost the instant I rang the bell.
“Son!” she said with a smile, her eyes lighting up the way they always did when I showed up unannounced.
My mother was a strong woman. No matter what life had thrown at her, she kept her back straight. But there was a gentleness about her that never failed to calm me, even on my hardest days.
“Mom.” I stepped forward to kiss her cheek. “How are things here?”
She gave me that look only a mother can give—the one that says she knows there’s more going on than you’re ready to admit.
“The same as always,” she sighed softly. “Your father’s in the bedroom, resting. Do you want to see him?”
I nodded, but before heading down the hall we sat for a few minutes in the living room, catching up. She asked about Arthur, as always, wanting to know every detail—his last test at school, what he’d had for breakfast.
I answered as best I could, trying to sound more relaxed than I felt. But my mind kept drifting back to everything with Maria Gabriela, and it was hard to focus on anything else.
After a few minutes, I got up and walked the familiar hallway to my father’s room.
The steady beep of the heart monitor greeted me first, a low, rhythmic sound marking the time of a life now bound to medical routines. The air held that faint, unmistakable scent of antiseptic and overcleaned surfaces.
His bed was an adjustable hospital bed, rails on either side to keep him from moving or falling at night.
Beside it, the ventilator hummed, pushing air into his lungs with mechanical regularity. Oxygen tubes snaked up to his face, a thin lifeline connecting him to the world I knew but that now felt so distant.
In one corner, an infusion pump delivered medication at set intervals, its motor soft but present with every cycle—a reminder that even his comfort was machine-controlled. Another device stood ready to feed nutrients directly into his stomach through a tube. Each piece of equipment was a lifeline and a prison, tying him to the bed, the room, his condition.
Digital monitors lined the walls, recording every heartbeat, every breath. Numbers flashed on screens I barely understood but that the nurses read carefully each time they came in.
Everything in that room reminded me my father was no longer the man I once knew. He now depended on machines to keep going, each one both sustaining him and marking the growing distance between who he’d been and what remained.
I hated that room. But it was the only place where my father still existed.
I stood beside the bed, watching the slow rise and fall of his chest in sync with the ventilator’s hum. Talking to him in that space full of machines was like speaking to someone just out of reach. Still, I always spoke.
“Hey, Dad,” I said softly, knowing he couldn’t answer but believing he heard me anyway.
I paused, my eyes falling to his hands resting motionless on the white sheet, then went on. Some days I stayed silent. Other days, like today, I needed to talk.
“Arthur’s doing great,” I began, a small smile tugging at my lips. “He’s growing so fast, you know? Every day he’s more like you—smart, stubborn, curious. He makes me think of how you were with us when we were kids. Always so present, even with all the work.”
I thought I saw the faintest flicker in his eyes, like he was trying to follow. Even without words, I felt like he understood.
“And the company… well, you know how it is. Always busy, always a challenge.” I smiled, but the fatigue leaked through my voice. “But it’s under control, like always. Alexandre and I are on top of everything. Amacel’s doing well, growing more every day. I wish you could see it—wish you could be there with us.”
There was a heaviness in the words, a longing for how things had been before the stroke, before everything changed. I wanted him there with me, like he always had been.
“Ah, Dad…” I sighed, and for a moment, Maria Gabriela’s face flashed through my mind. It was impossible to avoid. Even here, in this room, with my father lying still in front of me, she was always there.
“There’s something else,” I said, glancing away for a second. “Maria Gabriela. You know, my secretary.” I smiled faintly, but there was more beneath it. “She’s… indispensable to me. In the company, of course. But not just there.” Saying it out loud—even to my father, who couldn’t respond—felt like an important step. “I can’t let her go. She wants to leave, but I’ll make sure she stays. She belongs to the company, Dad. And in some way… she belongs to me. I don’t know how to explain it. But I’m not letting her go that easily. I’ll do whatever it takes to keep her. With me.”
I knew my father would’ve told me to fight for what mattered. And as much as I tried to ignore it, Maria Gabriela had become important to me in a way I was still trying to understand.
