I used to think being a grown-up meant knowing how to fix everything, you know? Like, you pay your bills, you got a roof, you’re good. But lately, it feels more like I'm just… a really elaborate switchboard operator. My dad, he’s in the house back in Ohio, a whole state away, and I’m here hustling two jobs – the early shift at the diner, then straight to stocking shelves at the big box store until eleven, sometimes midnight. Six days a week. It’s enough to keep the lights on here, and send a little something for the utilities back home, but it’s never enough to actually *be* there. The phone, man, it rings and rings. My father, he just… wilts, like one of those plants you forget to water for too long. He needs someone to help him remember his meds, make sure he doesn’t try to cook on the stove and forget it’s on, again. The last time, I swear, the smell of burnt toast hung in the air like a ghost for two days, even through the phone line. I spend my lunch break, sometimes my whole dinner break, on hold with these home health agencies. "Yes, he's 78. Yes, he needs help with his ADLs. No, he doesn't have Medicaid *yet*, we're waiting on the paperwork. Yes, I'm calling from Arizona." Each call is a tiny chip off my soul, honestly. They ask for a schedule, 8 AM to 4 PM, Tuesday, Thursday, Friday. And I give it to them, like I’m ordering a pizza. But then there’s always an issue. "Our aide called in sick." "We don't have anyone available that day." "There was a mix-up with the scheduling software." And then my phone starts blowing up, because my dad, he just calls every number he knows when he gets confused or scared. His voice, when it comes through, is like a thin, dry string, stretched to its breaking point. He doesn't yell, he just… asks. "Where are you, honey?" Like I'm just around the corner, maybe grabbed some milk. I remember when I was a kid, he’d fix anything. Our old Chevy Nova, the leaky faucet, even my broken doll. He just had this way of making things whole again. Now, it feels like I’m watching him fall apart in slow motion from a thousand miles away, and all I can do is punch numbers into a phone. Two jobs, two phones, one dad falling through the cracks of a system that just… shrugs. Sometimes, in the quiet of my apartment after a double shift, the weight of it all sits on my chest like a cinder block. I should feel something sharper, I think. More anger, more sadness. But it's just this dull, heavy ache. Like my emotions are just too tired to bother showing up for work anymore either. I just scroll through photos of him from when I was little, the ones where he's laughing, holding me up to the sky. And I wonder if he remembers those days, too, or if they’ve all just dissolved into the static of his present.