Patricide Epistle

II. The first time I had you killed I made you a hero of the Vietnam War. The third grade social studies textbook said young foreign boys hid grenades during corner games, seamstresses doubled as spies. Why wouldn't you have died on those streets, clutching my mother's photo with your thumb pressed cold against her belly, wishing you'd had a chance to propose, hoping for a girl? But that war ended before I was born. Next, I had a drunk driver end you. Said I visited him in prison to spit in his face. Forgave him for a speech during health class. In eighth grade, I made you die young of natural causes, so I could teach a grieving classmate the proper way to mourn.