A Loving Father

Author Leo asks his son Paul, "Still a junkie?" (0:24)

Leo's daughter Virginia learns that Leo has been killed. (0:34)

Leo asks his son Paul, "You want more money so you can shoot up?" (0:36)

Paul, desperately trying to reconnect with his father after an extended , recites an imagined dialogue between himself and Leo about his struggles with addiction as his father stares into space:
"I was wondering, are you still doing drugs?"
"No, I quit. You quit?"
"I don't believe it."
"It's true. Look at my eyes."
"Yes, indeed, your pupils are quite normal. That's wonderful news."
"Tell me, Dad, did you ever wonder why I started shooting up?"
"Actually, it never crossed my mind."
"D'you mind if we talk about?"
"Why yes, Paul. Let's talk about it... "
"Well, you see, Dad, when I was high, I wasn't scared." (0:48)

Paul's dialogue continues: "But the hard part is quitting. When you quit, you're nothing. Nothing. You shiver,... Nothing compared to the courage it takes to quit. Nothing. You go through a nightmare when you quit. Alone!" (0:51)

Virginia, asked to identify the body, realizes it is not that of her father. (1:08)

After Paul, as a child, tries to destroy his father's work by pouring ink on the pages, Leo beats him and tries to drown him in the tub. (1:12)

On the ferry to Stockholm a young woman, seeing Leo staring over the railing, asks him, "Are you going to jump?" (1:18)

Virginia's world has been turned upside down as her fused relationship with her father, probably partly contingent upon his distance from her brother coupled with Paul's role of black sheep, has dissolved. She jumps over the railing, but Paul jumps in after her and barely saves her from drowning. (1:27)

abstinence | addiction | Bereavement | closeness/distance | emotional cutoff | fusion/intersubjective fusion | heroin | Physical Abuse of Child | recovery | suicide