My Father Is Better Than Me And I Regretted It So Much

My daughter sat to the left of me, staring at her phone. It was always like this on our visits and it was enough to make anyone want to pull their hair out. I stirred my coffee, watching her. When my dad used to watch me do anything, I would be embarrassed, but Sophie barely flinched. I stirred my coffee louder, only to have her sigh.

"Do you have to be so loud," she groaned.

"Yes. Now that I've got your attention, what are you doing?"

"Watching JoJo."

JoJo Siwa was one of the many loud, annoying, brightly-colored YouTube personalities that filled the head of my eleven-year-old daughter with parental disrespect and awful pranks. I feigned a smile (not that she could even see it) and sipped my coffee. Somehow, I'd managed to stir it so much that little bubbles of cream were now floating in the cup. Disappointed, I poured it out in the sink and poured myself some new coffee.

"So, what's going on at school?" I said, trying not to sound like a needy mother.

Sophie just sat there, giggling at some awful prank. I waited a little longer then asked again, a little louder.

"What's going on at school, Sophie?"

"Nothing."

"Anything happening with your friends?"

"Not really."

"Did your mother find a new bitch to screw?"

"That's not very nice."

"Ah, your mother's whores gets more words out of you than nothing and not really. How original."

"Mom, you're being weird."

"And you're being a zombie!"

Just then, my father trudged into the kitchen in his boxers. He held a newspaper in one hand, and his glasses in the other hand. Normally, I'd tell him to cover up in front of the idkay, but I knew she wasn't even going to flinch with JoJo dancing around on her phone screen. My dad sauntered in, smelled the coffee, grimaced, and plopped down at the table.

"Good morning, dad," I groaned.

"What's with you?" he grumbled. I could never tell if he was always a grouch or if that was just his Irish accent.

"Just talking to my daughter, the zombie."

Sophie averted her eyes from her seizure-inducing screen long enough to stick her tongue out at me. I flipped her off.

"Ay!" my dad yelled, whacking her on the head with his newspaper.

My daughter was so surprised that she dropped her phone.

"Don't make faces at your mum! And you," he said, brandishing his paper at me, "I taught you better than that."

Sophie picked up her phone again and tried to recompose herself, but my father smacked her phone out of her hand with his newspaper.

"You aren't getting out of hearing me, girlie," he said. "Now look, talk to your mum. She missed you. All she talks about is you. The woman is a wreck since that whore she went with found someone else."

"What is there to talk about?"

"I just hit you with the sports section, and you have nothing to talk about? These kids have hard heads."

Sophie sighed. "I'm going to my room."

"Well, leave that thing down here," he said, smacking her hand away from her phone. "We'll protect whatever brain cells you have left."

Sophie groaned and ran upstairs. My father smirked at me. He was always so much better at getting Sophie to talk to him, but I still regret him moving in with me to "teach me how it's done". Especially now that I have to pay for the New York Times.