Luis.
I looked at Dad.
“Seven years.”
“I know.”
“Did you ever write back?”
“No.”
“Why?”
He gave me a tired smile.
“I believe we have already established that your father can be an idiot.”
Mom patted his shoulder.
“Progress.”
We laughed.
Even Dad.
That was how Luis entered our family.
Not through a dramatic revelation.
Through an unanswered Christmas card.
Inez found a current address the next day.
Same city.
Different street.
Dad refused to call.
“I need to write.”
Nobody argued.
He sat at his old workbench for nearly two hours with a sheet of stationery.
At one point, he asked me how to spell “unnecessarily.”
I told him.
Then I crossed it out.
“What?”
“Don’t write like a lawyer.”
“I’m not.”
“You wrote unnecessarily.”
“That is a normal word.”
“Not for apologizing to your brother.”
He gave me an irritated look.
“What would you write?”
