Hide & Seek

Under 150 words

At the park, as a boy, I watched children run and hide.  Their fathers put hands over eyes and counted.  My dad never went to the park.  I never questioned where he was or who he was, until I was 13.  I eavesdropped on his calls.  I understood almost nothing.  I also wondered what he looked like naked.  Like me?  My stuff was changing.  I peeked through the bathroom door one evening, when he was in the shower.  His stuff was much larger than mine, and my mother was was washing it, vigorously.  He saw me, so I ran.  I slid my thin body between the water heater and the basement wall, just before I heard his feet stomping, loudly above me, and I finally knew what it was like to be a little boy, playing hide and seek with his father.