My Unknown Father

He drove up unannounced.

My sister and I came out to say hello.

"Let's drive until we hit snow!" he bellowed. At 6 foot four he looked like a cross between Abraham Lincoln and Dick Van Dyke.

I don't remember my mother and step-father reassuring us when we left. We never heard anything good about him. My mother was suing him for child support. We climbed into his old powder blue Buick with no heat and a loud muffler. His wife wore sunglasses that squeezed her hair-sprayed hairdo which weirded me out. She was dressed to the nines; lipsticked, pancaked, and stockinged. 

My sister and I huddled under the quilt in the back seat. I was sure this was a plan to ditch me. My sister hated me too. We drove for hours and couldn't hear a thing beyond the roar of the muffler. We eventually did hit snow. And stopped at a scenic overlook.

"Come on out and see the view," he said in his radio voice. His voice appeared in commercials for Sacramento tomato juice and Kotex tampons and whatever else needed advertising. 

I refused to move. "Come pick me up, I can't get my boots on," I said. I assumed he would toss me over the cliff to my death. Might as well get it over with.