When Alan woke up the next morning, he could hear Tracy moving around in the kitchen. With a smile he thought back to yesterday night, for the first time he felt he had a true connection with his daughter. They had never been close before, Alan had been too focused on work. After yesterday though, he wanted to make an effort and get to know his daughter better.
After having a shower and a shave Alan joined Tracy in the kitchen. He was dressed in casual clothing, the same jeans as yesterday but this time with a blue polo shirt.
Tracy had made breakfast scrambled eggs, bacon, toast, coffee for Alan and freshly squeezed orange juice for Tracy.
"There was a reason I came here, other than to find out if you were ok." She said after they had taken a seat at the table. "You know that I've been trying to sort out my life and I think I finally have."
She put a piece of paper in front of him.
Nervously he picked it up and started to read it out loud "Congratulations Ms. Banks you have been excepted to the School of Veterinary Medicine University of Nottingham-" Alan looked up at his daughter in surprise, Tracy was beaming back at him he had never seen her so happy. "Wow... congratulations Tracy."
"Isn't it great!?"
"Yeah, it's amazing." Alan smiled. He was delighted. He had been worried when Tracy dropped out of Uni and moved to Leeds to work behind a bar. By the looks of it though he needn't have worried. She really had been doing some soul searching to find her true calling. She deserved a lot more credit than he had been giving her.
"So what made you decide you wanted to become a vet?"
"I've been doing a lot of volunteer work for an animal shelter. You wouldn't believe how some people treat their pets!" Alan could believe it, he saw on a daily basis how humans treat humans so why should it be any different for animals. "I would usually drive the animals to the nearby vet and watch how they'd help the poor thing. And that's when it clicked, if I could do this for the rest of my life, how amazing would that be!"
"That's great Trace. I'm really happy for you." And he meant it.
Alan didn't go to work that day. Tracy was more important. He had ignored her long enough. Alan had phoned Ken and told him what was going on and proudly told him Tracy was going to become a vet. Ken had told the whole team and Alan could hear the cheering in the background.
Father and daughter spend the day together. They played boardgames and talked a lot, she beat him at Scrabble and they talked more about what had been going on with Alan recently.
"Have you told your mother?" He asked as they were eating dinner. Alan had cooked this time. Roast chicken, roast potatoes and vegetables. Tracy's favourite.
"No" She mumbled and chased the potatoes round with her fork.
"Why? Surely she needs to know."
"She doesn't care."
"What do you mean? Of course she does."
"No Dad, she doesn't. I haven't spoken to her since moving back to Leeds." She said. Alan couldn't believe it, Sandra had always made sure to point out, that she was the only one who cared about their children.
"Have you tied calling her?"
"Sure. I tried to get in touch after that mess with Jaff, but she was too busy." She sneered.
Alan dropped the subject and they enjoyed the rest of their dinner.
"Have you talked to your brother recently?" Alan asked as they were once again on the sofas, with a cup of tea and the Scrabble board all ready set up to play.
"Yeah, talked to him last week, he's on tour in Scandinavia." Brian was in a band called The Blue Lamps. Recently they had become quite well known in Sweden after some of their songs had been used in a TV program. "Hang on, he asked me to give you something. Don't look at my tiles!" She hurried up the stairs and came back down again in a flash. She gave him a CD. "Their new record. It will be released next month."
Alan smiled he was immensely proud of Brian. After dropping out of his architect courses he had followed his dream and made music his profession.
"Does mum know?"
"Yeah right..." Sandra had thrown a fit when Brian left University to follow his dream, they hadn't spoken a word ever since. Alan tried to make Sandra see reason, but she always had to be right and apparently playing keyboard in a band was not a proper profession.
"Is he ok? I haven't spoken to him in a while."
"Yeah. Open the booklet, take a look at the acknowledments." Tracy smiled and looked at her letters getting her first word ready.
The acknowledments were on the last page of the booklet. It looked like each member of the band had put a few words of thank you together. When he reached Brian's name it said:
This is for my Dad, who told me to follow my heart
Alan looked at Tracy, she was still looking at her tiles, but there was a grin on her face.
Later that evening after Tracy had gone to bed, Alan was alone and could finally contemplate everything that had happened yesterday and today.
He still couldn't believe Brian had dedicated the new album to him. He had told Brian to follow his heart. It was just after he had told Alan, that he was dropping out of University to be a musician. He remembered sitting on the sofa with a beer in his hand and telling Brian, that if he felt in his heart that he was doing the right thing, then he couldn't be prouder. And Brian had followed his advice. Alan's very proud of his son. He stood up and put the album in the CD player.
This was the first time he listened to music without having the feeling that he needed a drink. It was a great feeling.
The next morning Tracy left early, she had to get home to get ready for work. Alan had to promise her, that he would speak to her every week. Just before she left she gave him the business card of the animal shelter she volunteers for, saying that they had plenty of pets, who needed a home.
