My father peered ahead towards the moonlit backroad, his hands firm on the beaten leather of the steering wheel. He raised one to scratch the dark stubble on his cheek, then to brush the stray hairs out of his line of sight, before finally locking it back in place at the two o’clock position. I didn’t know our destination to offer directions, so I made myself busy by squeaking my red galoshes together. Then, I jingled the metal clasps of my denim overalls. It created a silly rhythm of sorts. This continued until I saw my father silently scratch his face for an extended duration, which I took as a sign to quiet my noise. Our drive went on for another twenty minutes, the silence occasionally broken by a bump in the road to jostle the truck or a cough to clear a throat. We rolled to a stop in…
