Cathy, being an only child, had a very close relationship with both her mother and her father. From an early age, because she had no siblings, she would spend copious amounts of time with them both, and her father especially. As she was a very "active" child, a doctor suggested that she be given a job, as a way of deploying her extra energy in a more positive direction. This job at McClure's Drugs allowed for her relationship with her father to really flourish. She would spend hours working in her father's store. This relationship is evident and can be seen as Cathy reflects on her past life after her move to Buffalo. "The problem was that I hadn't had real friends in the past, other than the occasional boy on my street with whom I would play outside. I had never had a friend to my house because I was never there. I had worked since I was four years old, and my closest friends were the employees in the drugstore, mostly Roy, the driver, and my father," she said. Cathy compares her relationship with her father to that of a "well-oiled machine". They would share "the same concerns about the store and how to make things run smoothly." After having stabbed a bully with a compass, Cathy was sent to see "Dr. Small". What he told her predicts exactly the outcome of her and her father's relationship. Cathy reports that the doctor said, "I was far too close to my father and Roy and needed to have female friends, or I would not be ‘socialized’ correctly. If I didn't have girlfriends at a young age, as a teenager I would grow too far away from ‘normal female concerns.’" Dr. Small, of course, was correct. As Cathy’s mother repeats years later, "Remember when Dr. Small said that all that time with your dad and not with other little girls would come home to roost when you were a teenager?" She paused. "Well, welcome to the chicken coop."
Cathy's relationship with her father began drifting away really as soon as they moved out of Lewiston. She had become a teenager and like most teenagers, wanted less and less to do with her father. Although she wants to gain independence, we can still see how much her father means to her. This can be clearly demonstrated through one example which is repeated multiple times throughout the book. Cathy always brings up the way her father spoke to her after she went to see "Donny Burns" after a mass. Her father's words were, "Girls that chase boys come to a bad end. You looked like the kind of girl I don't want for my daughter." These words forever resonate with her as she is quite reluctant to have anything to do with males for a very long time. This is because her father rarely used a harsh tone with her. The only other time that her father really reprimanded her was on the one occasion that she had a fight with her mother. Her father told her, "if you ever make your mother cry and have to go to bed like that again, you'll have more scars to worry about than acne." However, it is easy to see her father's unconditional love for her as he gives her two dimes so that "if she ever gets in over her head" she could call him, "no questions asked, ever." Her father holds true to his word when he drives to pick her up from the "Idle Hour, about an hour out of town in Lakeview", in order for her to avoid driving home with "dead-drunk drivers". Cathy never really begins to feel remorse for how she treated her father in her teen years until she realized that something was not quite right with him. She realized this when she asked her father why he had a vial of various pills. When he responded, "I just love all the different colours when the sunshine hits the vial," Cathy declares that her "father had lost his mind."
Cathy hires Dr. Zukas to look at her father and he determines that her father has a brain tumour which is what had been affecting his behaviour. After her father is diagnosed with this condition, Cathy's relationship with her father changes. She has to look after him, as her mother in the beginning cannot face having to deal with the tragedy. We see how much Cathy truly values her father's words and his opinion of her as she visits him one time when he was hospitalized for "Cheyne-Stokes". He cannot recognize Cathy in her adulthood, so he talks about his daughter to Cathy as though he was talking to a stranger. She asks him, "So tell me about your daughter." Her father responds after saying she was bossy that, "She was a real pip." Cathy really takes this to heart as she spends lots of time and energy into looking up the meaning of the word, "pip" and trying to uncover what her father had meant.
Cathy and her mother always had a good relationship, however, it did not become really close until after her father had become ill. Cathy did not disclose to her mother most of the bad things that happened in her life. For instance, Cathy never told her mother why she had not made the cheer-leading team as she, "knew that her mother would suffer more than her from the acne comments, and she didn't want her to feel sad." Although she had various disagreements with her father, Cathy only had one fight with her mother. On the ride home from seeing the acne specialist, Cathy tells her mother, "In the future, don't tell me what I see in the mirror is not true when it is true. That's how they make crazy people. Next time, just be honest." Later on, as her mother drives away after having dropped Cathy off at Ohio U., Cathy reflects on how she will miss her mother. "As my mother drove away, I realized that I was losing my best friend. I'd had no sisters or brothers, and she had functioned as both. We both had the Irish penchant for black humour and for teasing the one funny thread from a tangle of tragedy. I hoped she would be able to handle being at home alone with my father and not miss me as much as I would miss her." I think this passage best exemplifies her true relationship with her mother, as it shows what her life would lack without her mother's presence. In conclusion, I would describe Cathy's relationship with both her mother and father as very close, however each relationship was special in its own way. Cathy's relationship with her father was altered through his illness, and her relationship with her mother was strengthened through having to deal with the complications and everyday stresses caused by her father's illness. They bonded over using the words or phrases that her father would deploy for everyday things such as, "big skate" for car. The demise of her father helped Cathy to uncover the true importance that both her parents held in her life.
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