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The entire time we spoke to each other, my father and I looked out the window and not at each other. We rarely looked at each other directly.
"I know it's been hard for you," he continued. "You inherited a lot of baggage, but you have to step out of it."
"Like you did?" I asked and turned to see his reaction.
For a moment his lips trembled and I thought he was going to be angry, but then his face softened and he nodded.
"Yes," he said. "I was selfish, but you do selfish things to survive sometimes. What I owe you, I can't even begin to pay back. Your grandparents stepped up to the plate on my behalf, pinched hit. They've done a better job than I could have. That's for sure, but they're ,,both very worried about you, as I said, and it's time I stepped in, too."
"To do what?"
"Help you in any way I can, Alice."
"Any way?"
"I'll do whatever I can," he said, which I knew meant whatever Rachel permitted. "I mean, I want to give you advice, guidance, be a sounding board. I hope it's not too little too late, but . . . well, you see what I'm trying to say, don't you?"
I turned away and looked out the window again. I did, but I wasn't sure that what he was offering was anywhere nearly enough.
"Dad's right," he continued. "You have to let go of the darkness, Alice."
"You want to help me do that?"
"Yes. Very much," he said. "If I can."
"Okay," I said and slowly turned to look at him, blue eyes to blue eyes. "If you really mean
that, then tell me everything," I said.
"Everything?"
"Tell me exactly who she was and tell me what happened up here."
3 Take a Chance
. Of course, I expected my father to shake his head, mumble some excuses and flee the attic, but instead, he walked back to the small settee my grandfather had put up here and sat. I didn't move from the window.
"When I see you standing there by that window, Alice, with the afternoon light playing around you like that, you really do remind me of her. There is a remarkable resemblance. I used to think that was lucky for me. No one would look at you and think there's Jesse Stein's daughter. I could continue to pretend I wasn't responsible. I was very immature then."
"I'm about the same age she was when she was up here, right?"
"Yes, but of course, I knew her before all that. The truth is, and your aunt Zipporah doesn't even know the true extent of this to this day, I had seen your mother secretly a few times before she was up here. I knew how close your aunt and your mother were, and I thought your aunt would be quite upset about it."
"Then you didn't think she was crazy all the time or else you wouldn't have been seeing her, right?"
"No, I didn't think that," he said and smiled. "She was pretty unusual, unpredictable, however. You'd never know what she would do or say. She could change moods in an instant and loved doing and saying things that had shock value. I had never met another girl like her and haven't since. She was like a wild mare you wanted to corral but never could. She couldn't stand any sort of confinement, whether it was physical or mental or emotional, which was why I'm sure she hated being up here."
He laughed.
"Why is that funny?"
"That isn't, but she once told me she'd never fall in love because falling in love turned you into a slave, took away your independence. She said she'd rather fall in and out of love continuously, even with the same person, which is what I think she did with me."
"Why did you want to help her? Why did you keep her secretly up here after you learned what she had done?"
He looked away, and he was quiet so long, I thought that was that. He had told me as much as he ever would or could. I gazed out the window, then looked at him again.
"It was selfish," he finally said.
