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And there it is.
I shake my head. “I don’t think so.”
“Are you sure? Your face is very familiar.”
“He said he doesn’t know you, Kate,” my father says quickly, dismissing his wife, and for a brief moment I catch a glimpse of the man I once knew. But it’s there and gone in a flash before he’s smiling at her again, telling her that he’ll be inside in a few minutes to help with dinner.
“It was lovely to meet you,” she tells me, before disappearing back inside the house again.
I watch her go, standing tall, and then I turn to face my father, and as much as it fucking kills me to admit it, being this close to him causes my entire body to tense up the same way it did when I was a kid.
Memories clutter my brain like a bloody accident. The anger inside me builds, and I can feel tears stinging the back of my eyes, but I don’t dare let him see. I don’t want to do this, but I know I have to if I want him to give me the answers I need to close this chapter of my life once and for all.
“You’re married?”
He nods, but only barely. And for the first time, he looks somewhat ashamed.
“When?”
“About ten years ago.”
“And you had a baby together?”
“Kate always wanted children. She was still young enough, and as it turns out, so was I. I thought those days had passed, but Joel’s a great kid. I don’t regret it for a second.”
I recoil slightly at the way his words make me feel. Losing my shit right now isn’t going to get me what I want though, so I push through the horrible feelings, forcing myself to stay calm.
“Why are you here, Kael?”
“I wanted to see you.”
“Because?”
“Because… you’re my father.”
“And?”
I bark out a harsh laugh. Glancing back across the street I notice Sienna has switched to the driver’s side of the car, one hand resting on the steering wheel, her blue eyes glued on me, but the instant she sees me looking at her, she ducks her head as if she doesn’t want to be seen at all.
She looks like she’s hiding. I don’t blame her. I feel like hiding, too.
I slide my hand over my head and sigh. “All I want is for you to admit what you did was wrong.” I take a small step forward, making sure he’s really listening to me. “I know you and mom never planned on having me. You were young, I get that, but age is no excuse. And as I’ve recently come to learn, being a drunken alcoholic is no excuse for the disgusting way you treated us both. It doesn’t excuse the fact that I was terrified of you as a kid. It doesn’t excuse the fact that my mother was terrified of you. It doesn’t excuse the fact that you beat us, and you made our lives a living hell. It doesn’t excuse the fact that when things got tough, you left us behind without a second thought.”
“Christ’s sake, Kael—”
“No, you’re going to listen to me,” I say, stepping even closer. Anger flashes in his eyes as he stares back at me. “It doesn’t excuse the fact that when mom got sick, I was the one left to care for her all by myself. When she died, I was the one who planned her funeral. I was a teenager, just a fucking teenager, and I did it all by myself. And that’s the last thing she ever would have wanted, but we didn’t have much choice, did we, Dad?”
“Look, just—”
“She deserved more than you gave her. We both deserved more than you gave us.”
He blinks. Takes a deep breath, stewing over everything I just said to him. He’s quiet for a good ten seconds, solemn, but I’ve made the point I wanted to make, and I’m satisfied that this time he’s heard me loud and clear.
But then I think of more I want to say to him, and I don’t stop, and I don’t slow down. “I need you to apologize for what you did to me.”
My father holds his head in his hands, his shoulders shaking, and I think he might actually be laughing. “I don’t believe this.”
“You don’t believewhat?”
