Clara's Complicated Relationship with Her Distant, Perfectionist Father
Clara had always known how to hold her tongue around her father.
Daniel Whitmore was not a man who welcomed sentiment. He built his world on discipline, achievement, and unspoken expectations, and he had raised Clara to do the same. There were rules in their house—spoken and unspoken. Emotions were to be controlled. Weakness was to be hidden. And love, if it existed at all, was something proven through success, not tenderness.
Growing up, Clara had tried her best to meet his standards. She studied harder than anyone else, earned perfect grades, won every competition he pushed her toward. She learned early on that her father's approval came in nods of acknowledgment rather than words of praise. When she brought home a report card filled with straight A's, he would glance at it, nod once, and say, "Good. Keep it up."
Never I'm proud of you. Never You've done enough.
She told herself it didn't matter. That she didn't need his words to know she was enough. But deep down, a small part of her still wanted to hear them.
Her mother had been the bridge between them, the soft presence in an otherwise rigid household. When her mother passed away, Clara was only twelve, and suddenly, the small thread holding them together snapped.
Daniel buried himself in work, and Clara was left to navigate her grief alone. At an age when she needed comfort the most, all she received was silence.
By the time she was old enough to understand, the distance between them had grown too wide to cross. They rarely spoke about anything beyond practical matters. He never asked about her dreams or fears. He had a vision for her life, and she was expected to follow it. When she hesitated—when she expressed even the smallest doubt—his disappointment was palpable.
"You don't get anywhere by being indecisive, Clara," he would say. "You either commit or you don't."
So, she committed.
To law school. To the carefully mapped-out future he had laid before her. To being the daughter he expected her to be, even when it felt like a role she wasn't sure she fit into.
And yet, no matter how hard she tried, it was never enough.
Their conversations became measured exchanges, polite but distant. When they argued—which was rare but sharp—his words cut deep, and Clara found herself retreating, her emotions too raw to confront him directly.
Instead, she wrote.
Unsent letters, tucked away in journals and drawers, filled with the things she could never say to his face. Apologies. Pleas for understanding. Anger she didn't dare express. A desperate hope that maybe, one day, she would find the courage to tell him the truth.
But she never did.
And when he died, those words—like so many others—remained unread.
After an Argument, She Wrote Multiple Unsent Letters Trying to Reconcile but Never Found the Courage to Send Them
The last real conversation Clara had with her father had not been a conversation at all. It had been a battle—sharp words, unspoken resentments finally slipping through the cracks of her carefully controlled composure.
"You act like nothing I do is ever enough," she had said, her voice trembling with frustration.
Her father had barely looked up from his newspaper. "I don't expect perfection, Clara. I expect you to try harder."
The words had landed like a slap. She had spent her entire life trying. Trying to meet his impossible standards. Trying to prove that she was worth something beyond her achievements. Trying to be the daughter he wanted instead of the one she actually was.
And yet, in his eyes, it was never enough.
The argument had ended in silence—her father returning to his work, Clara storming out, slamming the door behind her.
That night, she had sat in her apartment, heart pounding, stomach twisted with guilt. She hated the way they spoke to each other—like two strangers forced into roles they no longer fit. The words she wanted to say refused to come out in person, so she turned to the only thing she knew: writing.
Letter #1 (Torn in half an hour later)
Dad,
I don't want to fight anymore. I know you mean well, but I don't think you understand how hard it is to always feel like a disappointment to you. I'm trying, but it never seems to be enough.
Maybe you don't see it, but sometimes I just wish… I just wish you'd tell me you're proud of me.
Letter #2 (Crumpled and thrown in the trash)
Dad,
I'm sorry for yelling today. I hate that we always end up like this. I hate that I don't know how to talk to you without feeling like a child trying to win your approval. Maybe it's too late to fix this. Maybe we're just too different. But I wish we weren't.
Letter #3 (Tucked into a drawer, unfinished)
Dad, do you ever wonder why we ended up this way?
I do.
I think about the way things used to be before Mom died, when you weren't so closed off. I remember the way you used to laugh, the way you used to lift me onto your shoulders and tell me I could reach the sky. I miss that version of you. I miss that version of us.
She had stared at that last letter for a long time, pen hovering over the page. There was so much more she wanted to say. But the weight of all their unspoken words made it impossible.
She never sent a single one.
She told herself there would be time. Time to fix things. Time to find the right words. Time to try again.
But time ran out.
And when the phone call came—the one that changed everything—all she had left were the words she had been too afraid to say.
***
Her Father Passed Away Before They Made Amends
The phone call came on an ordinary afternoon. Clara was at work, staring at her computer screen, trying to focus on an endless stream of emails when her phone buzzed.
Her father's lawyer.
The moment she heard his voice, something inside her went still.
"I'm sorry to inform you, Clara… your father passed away this morning."
The words didn't make sense at first. She sat frozen, gripping the edge of her desk, the sounds of the office fading into a dull hum around her.
Her father was gone.
Just like that.
No warning. No final conversation. No chance to say I'm sorry or I forgive you or I loved you, even when it didn't seem like it.
She barely remembered the rest of the conversation. There was talk of arrangements, of legal matters, of things that needed to be handled. But all she could think about were the words she had never said, the letters still sitting unread in a drawer.
She had thought there would be time.
Time to pick up the phone. Time to write one more letter—one she would actually send this time. Time to fix the years of silence and distance between them.
But time had run out.
She didn't cry at first. Not when she hung up the phone, not on the drive home, not even when she stood in the doorway of her empty apartment, staring at the drawer where her unsent letters remained.
It wasn't until she pulled them out—fingers trembling, eyes scanning over every unfinished sentence, every unspoken apology—that the weight of it all crashed down on her.
She sank onto the floor, gripping the pages like they were the only pieces of him she had left.
She had written to him so many times. And yet, he had never read a single word.
Now, he never would.