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I place my hands over his on the table. “Dad, what happened to you after she died?” I don’t mean for it to come out so harsh, but I have to know. I need to understand.
My father blinks. “I think I died along with your mother that day.” A tear escapes his eye and trails down his cheek. “I loved her so much, and I thought she didn’t love me anymore. It consumed me until it drove me mad.”
I squeeze his hand. “You had two children who needed you.”
For the first time since I’ve returned home, it feels like my father truly sees me. Not just as his child, but as an individual with dreams, fears, and aspirations of my own. In his gaze, I glimpse a flicker of understanding, a recognition of the person I've become and the journey that has shaped me. “Oh, Greer. I’m truly sorry,” he says, raising his hand to cup my cheek. “I couldn’t face you and Devereaux. I felt like you would see whatever it was your mother saw in me that made her want to escape.” He shakes his head. “That made her think the only way to flee was to kill herself.”
“She didn’t, though.” I stand to look at the pictures hanging on the wall. “She didn’t leave you, Dad.”
“I know that now, but it does something to a man when he believes the woman he loves doesn’t love him. It breaks a man harder than anything else.”
“How do you think it feels to believe a mother doesn’t love you? We were broken too, Dad,” I say, sitting back down and grabbing his hands again. “We had a mother who we thought didn’t love us enough to stick around, and a father who wanted nothing to do with us. We didn’t just lose a mother that day. We lost our father too.”
My father breaks down crying—sobbing—before my very eyes. “I’m so sorry, Greer. Will you ever be able to forgive me? I was hurting too badly. I was selfish.”
I stand from the table to grab a box of Kleenex on top of the hutch in the corner of the room. I hand him a tissue as I wrap an arm around him. “I know you were. We were too, but we were kids. We were allowed to be selfish. You were the adult.”
He stands from his chair, and we hug. “You’re right. I handled everything poorly. I should have been there for you two.” He swipes away his tears, and I shed a few of my own.
“Dad, she would want us to be close. She wouldn’t want you clipping articles out of a paper to find out how your kids are doing.”
“I figured you both hated me. I didn’t want to intrude on your lives.”
This makes me cry harder, knowing my father has been sitting here for years all alone.
“Why didn’t you reach out to us?”
He pulls out of the hug and his haunted eyes stare down at me. “Fear. Fear will make you believe the craziest of things. It makes you believe the world is out to get you.”
I hug him again. “Dad, nobody is out to get you. Especially not your children.”
“I wish the bastard who murdered your mother would have taken me instead. Your mom would have known how to handle it better. She would have been better than me.”
I rub my hands along my father’s arms. “I wish he would have never taken anyone, but you can’t change the past. No matter how hard you try. You just have to keep moving forward.”
He nods. “How did I get so lucky to have you for a daughter?”
A soft smile curves my lips, the warmth spreading through my chest like a comforting embrace. "I love you, Dad," I say, the words carrying the weight of years of unspoken sentiments and gratitude.
“I love you too,” he says, letting the words fall easily from his lips. “Do you want some coffee?” he asks as he hurries into the kitchen. “I want to hear all about you and Roman.”
“I’d love some,” I tell him, but then realize my father doesn’t know the truth about me and Roman. Only what he’s read in the papers.
The fauxmance.
I don’t know how to tell him the truth, but this meeting is a breakthrough with my father. This is the first time in years we’ve spoken so openly and freely. I can’t lie to him now.
“Roman and I aren’t really dating,” I tell him, my voice sounding flat to my own ears.
He sits back down at the dining room table and hands me a mug of coffee. “What do you mean?”
I breathe deeply as I resume my seat across from him, and let it out slowly before I explain everything to my father. He listens intently, asks a few questions, and smiles when I tell him about how we’ve been tricking the media with our charade.
“So, you don’t have feelings for him at all?”
“I love him.” The words free me. I feel lighter finally telling someone. Finally facing the truth.
“How does he feel?”
