A FATHER'S LOVE

My father peeked into my room, "I'm going to buy dinner. What do you want? Hokkien mee?"

I looked up from my laptop and considered for a while. Then I shook my head, "I want roasted meat rice with char siew. The one from the famous stall."

Off he went. He came back 30 min later. We started to eat our dinner together.

"The famous stall closed down already. I bought roasted meat from another place."

"Harrrrrr..." I made a face and took my first bite. I could already tell the difference. I looked over to my father's dinner. Suddenly his Hokkien mee looked so much more delectable. My chopsticks went over to his plate.

"I went rock climbing today," I told him. The noodles tasted sour. He hadn't properly mixed the lime.

"Mmm," he replied gruffly. He started mixing the noodles.

"I got baluku," I raised my knees to show him the glory of my battle wounds. "But it was very fun!"

"Hmph."

In between mouthfuls of my dinner, I continued to take his noodles.

"Have you rock climbed before?" I tried again.

No, he answered. And then silence once more.

I had finished most of my dinner by then. Only some rice was left. Seeing that the conversation was going nowhere and I had finished the nice portions of my dinner, I decided to take my leave.

"You don't want the rice?" My father asked.

"Don't want. Cause not nice."

Wordlessly, he took my packet over and pushed his noodles toward me.

"But papa, no more meat. I finished them all."

He shooed me with his free hand and scooped the rice into his mouth with his spoon using the other. I picked up my chopsticks and began to dig into the fried noodles once more.

My dad may be a man of few words but his love for me roars through his actions and is deafeningly loud. Thank you daddy, for always pulling my heartstrings in your own special way :')