My father’s nipples were like horses, grazing in a field of grass. Or, considering the circumstances, they were more like deer staring into the window of a MagLite factory. They really were quite awkward to look at, being so matted in hair. It’s almost as if he didn’t want anyone to see them, but couldn’t muster enough fur to finish the job. But I suppose everyone else is different, and my father is no exception
        The entire event was pretty awkward. Not only because I stumbled upon my father, whom I haven’t seen in years, but also because he was stark naked on the side of a busy highway. My mom and I were the last two people he’d expect to stop for him. Hell, I didn’t expect my mom to stop for him either, seeing as the stories she tells of him end up with her leaving the room in a fury, or car for that matter—regardless of speed. But she stopped, and quite abruptly, too, or it had to have been, because I found my glasses on the floor. Although losing my glasses didn’t matter very much, because it rendered my father in a nice relaxing blur that was easier on the eyes than his chest.
       She started driving again, this time slower, until we got close enough to him, so that if I wanted to, I could have rolled down my window and poked him with my finger. We rolled to stop as I positioned my glasses back onto my nose. The gravel under the car grumbled softly as the tires ceased their uninspiring rotations. My father had taken a few steps back as we pulled up, fearing for his naked feet. He slit his eyes against the sun’s reflection that was beaming off the car window like a kitten clinging to a shower curtain, trying to make out the faces on the inside.
       We stayed on the side of the road like that for some time. I don’t really know why. Maybe because my mom didn’t know what do to thus far, or maybe she didn’t expect to pull over for him, herself, and was recovering from some kind of trauma, like someone caught within the blast radius of an emotional grenade. She impulsively shot her fingers over to the door unlock button and the car clicked loudly with a mechanical whir. The driver door opened and the outside noise flooded in. The sound of passing cars and wind wasn’t quite deafening, but it was loud. Loud enough to mute the conversation my parents were having, rendering the movements of their mouths seemingly ineffectual, reminiscent of a silent film, had they been shot in black and white.
      Watching them talk like that; my father naked, and my mom searching for the right words, was nothing short of uncomfortable, and I could hear myself tapping a improvisational beat on the handle of the car door—watching them talk, the sound of traffic as their voices, creating a friction in the air that you could almost see, like heat lighting.
        Or was it lighting? I turned my head up to the sky and noticed that it was growing darker, and a light rain had begun to lay itself out on the pavement, spreading, slowly turning the roadside dirt into roadside mud. Flash. It was lightning. The boom followed soon afterwards, but judging by the delay, the storm was taking its time to get to wherever we were.

        The hail began to fall only a few minutes after we drove off, with my father sitting in front of me in the passenger seat, starring off into the scene rushing by beyond window. My parents weren’t saying a word to each other as we drove along, the windshield wipers swishing about, having their own kind of conversation, did that for them; left to right, right to left; a kind of dance with the rain itself. I wondered what kind of dance the rain would perform with a pair of windshield wipers, anyway, but my mind kept drifting back to a pun about rain dancing natives trying to beckon water down from the heavens. I wanted to explain the pun to my mom, being a great appreciator of terrible jokes, but I was afraid to break the silence, like it were some kind of intravenous dripping a magical fluid into the veins of a dying man, giving him life.
        The rumble of thunder yawned softly. The storm had already passed over, but the hailstones continued to fall. It was hypnotizing to watch, and I assumed that my father was focused on them too, for he hadn’t said a word after stepping into the car. He only looked out the window, like a child on a long road trip, trying to make sense out of the blur of green, brown, blue and white that rushed by. He cleared his throat as if about to speak, but only sighed, and returned his face to his palm.
        I haven’t seen my father since I was four—the fact struck me as though it were an important realization. I felt as if I should speak up suddenly, but like my father, I only sighed and lazily returned my gaze to the blur outside the window, and realized that the old saying holds true: father like son.