“Which is why I’m coming to you. Isabelle is getting a divorce.”
My father married two times after my mother. Isabelle Porter was the child of his third wife, the one that he’d doted on after I left, the one that he had no trouble shelling out thousands of dollars for her tuition to Harvard University, the one who’d started and abandoned several businesses and was currently on her fifth career as a lifestyle vlogger. “Again, why should this concern me?”
My father shifted in his seat. “She’s your sister.”
“That’s rich,” I scoffed. “She’s not my sister. I don’t know her. I had no idea she was even married.”
“She’s your sister,” he repeated.
“She’s your third ex-wife’s daughter. We never lived in the same house together. I don’t have her phone number. I wouldn’t be able to pick her out of a lineup.”Probably because of all the plastic surgery she’s had.
“She’smydaughter.”
I blinked. “What?”
“I am Isabelle’s father.”
Suddenly, the broken pieces of my childhood clicked together to form a picture I’d been too blind to see. “You cheated on Mom with Susan?”
“Yes, I had an affair.”
“Is that why she left you?”
He had the nerve to look ashamed. Averting his gaze, he nodded. “One of the reasons.”
“Yeah, well, there’s always the undeniable fact that you’re a narcissistic asshole.”
“Don’t talk to me like that,” he warned, his voice low.
But I wasn’t scared of him anymore. “Or what?” I challenged. “What are you going to do? Slap me?”
“Lower your voice,” he commanded softly.
“Don’t tell me what to do. You lost that right a long time ago.”
“I should’ve known this was futile. Imagine how I feel, coming to my daughter to ask for help.”
“I don’t care how you feel. You’re not my father.” I shrugged. “You and my mother abandoned me because you’re both selfish as fuck. And to make matters worse, both of you have the nerve to come tomeand ask me for help.”
“Demita Hope, you—”
“Don’t call me that,” I bit out between clenched teeth. “You can call me Ms. Strong.”
“I named you Demita Hope and that’s what I’ll call you.”
I snickered. “You know what. It doesn’t matter because I’ll never see you again after this.” I laughed. “It’s funny to me. I told Mom to fuck off last year, and now I get to tell you the same thing.” I laughed again. This time louder and more obnoxious. “This is good because I feel like a weight has been lifted.”
“Demita, calm down. You’re embarrassing yourself.”
“I’m not embarrassed.” I called the waiter over and ordered a shot of Tequila. “Just being myself.”
“I’ve told you time and again that you will respect me.”
The waiter returned seconds later with my shot, and I took it, slamming the glass down on the table. “I don’t owe you shit,Dad, not even respect. From the beginning, you made me feel like I was the reason Mother left, that I wasn’t good enough for her to stay. And you continued to do that until I ran away from you. Now, it makes sense why you never even bothered to fight the guardianship. Because you had plans. You wanted to move your whore and her daughter—yourdaughter—into the house.” The move was sudden, too. It seemed the minute the guardianship was finalized, he’d hurried to divorce his second wife so he could marry Susan.
“That’s not true,” he argued.
“I don’t know why I’m shocked. I was always dispensable to you, just yesterday’s trash. The reminder of your first failed marriage that you needed to put out on the street.” I didn’t realize I was crying until Duke appeared next to me, Kleenex in hand and a murderous look in his eyes. “Good thing I extricated myself from you before you could destroy me. Good thing I didn’t need you to become who I am today.” I stood, trying to hold myself together. But Duke’s hand… He placed it firmly on my back, offering his strong support. Then, I melted into him, sobbing into his chest for a moment until I pulled myself together. Turning back to my father, I said, “Fuck you. And tell Isabelle to choke on a dick and fight her own battle.”
