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Just then, the front door of the house swings open and a young boy who looks to be about eight years old comes barreling out. His entire face lights up when he sees my father standing by the front steps.
“Daddy!” he squeals. “Daddy, guess what?”
My heart shatters. Cracks. Breaks.
Breathe.
Fuck, Kael. Breathe, man.
I hear Sienna inhale sharply, so I do the same, and then I exhale, and in that slight pause in time, I hear the kid across the street exclaim excitedly, “I shot a three-pointer. Mommy got it on video. I want to show you. Come on, watch me.”
The man I recognize as my father mumbles a few more words into his phone that I can’t make out, and then he hangs up, shoving the phone into his back pocket.
“You did not!” he laughs, right as the little boy jumps into his arms so hard and fast that he almost drops the bag of groceries. He stumbles backward, still laughing and then wraps his free arm around the kid so they don’t fall over. The little boy’s legs fly out beneath him, swinging back and forth like a pendulum.
“I did, Dad. I really did!”
“That’s awesome,” he says, with a broad smile on his face that genuinely mirrors his words. “I’m so proud of you. Let me take the groceries inside first, and then I’ll come out and you can show me.”
I feel heat build in my eyes, so I grab my sunglasses and put them on. This is a fucking train wreck, and yet I can’t look away.
The door to the house opens again, and my father looks up at the same time I do. A slender woman with a blonde pixie cut walks out onto the front porch and then down the front stairs, wiping her hands on a dishtowel.
She’s younger than my father, and she’s pretty in a very natural sort of way.
“Hey, my love,” she says. She kisses my father’s cheek, and he melts into her touch, sliding his hand around her slim waist to hold her firmly against him. They look like a couple who are completely in love with one another.
My palms begin to sweat.
I glance across at Sienna. Her hands are knotted together tightly in her lap. “Do you want to leave?”
“Not yet.”
She sighs. “I don’t think this is a good idea, Kael. It’s too much, too soon. I think we should just go.”
I know she’s right. Of course, she’s right. But as hard as I try, I can’t drag my eyes away from the scene that’s playing out in front of me. I think I’m going to throw up because not once in my entire life did my father hug me or my mother the way he’s hugging the kid and this woman right now.
I’m out of the car and walking across the street before Sienna even has the chance to tell me I’m making a huge mistake. Huge. Massive.
Nail, meet coffin.
“Kael, wait…”
I can hear the desperation in Sienna’s voice calling after me, but I don’t let it slow me down. I need to see for myself. I need to know what happened to my father after he left me and my mom, and I need to make sure he knows what his leaving did to us.
I just need to talk to him.
And more than that, I need to know that he’s not doing what he did to me to any other kid. I need to know for sure he’s not the evil monster he used to be.
My father is still several feet away when I step up onto the sidewalk. He’s got one arm around the woman’s waist, and he’s smiling down at her, whispering into her ear, making her smile and giggle. Something my mother never did.
She cowered and flinched.
The little boy is running across the yard again, bouncing a basketball in his hands, and my father doesn’t even see me coming.
But the woman looks up at me as I approach.
“Can I help you?” Her eyes flick briefly in the direction of the little boy, but it only lasts a second at most, and then her eyes are back on the tall stranger walking across her front yard.
