I knew too well that I couldn't go over to that house, my house. Not now at least. After that argument at Frank's a few hours ago I had to stay cooped up in that damn hotel all day long. I wanted severely to apologize to every innocent person who had to see that display. I wanted now, only to ask Amanda why the hell she didn't tell me or Tracey. How can you be so nonchalant about fucking some other guy and having a kid behind it? And it was that kind of question that was going to keep me in, today and maybe for a few more days. If I went outside, I knew that I was going to do something illegal and some one would end up hurt or worse. I didn't want that and the LSPD really didn't want that. They had their hands full with the cold case of the UD robbery. That, at least, gave me some time to hack into a certain son's computer. I knew that since I wouldn't need a computer I'd do all of the hard work on my phone. It was easy enough for me with the numbered instructions Lester had provided. In fact it was way too easy. I followed each direction to the letter taking special care to cover my tracks.

Lester also showed me how to get an audio/video feed while I retrieved all of the information. Amazingly, that was harder than copying all of the information from a computer. I followed the instructions for hacking in to the computers camera. The image that came across my phone's screen was clear. I had forgotten the specifications of the webcam that I got him last Christmas, but it must have been HD judging by the picture. I didn't give it much of a look as I grabbed my headphones to plug into the phone. There was no need for me to play whatever was going on out loud. I knew that there was no one to listen or snoop. That little paranoid part of me insisted that I made the audio that came through for my ears only. I followed that voice and inserted the headphones into the jack on the bottom by the speakers.

Now I actually took the time, looked at the miniature screen of my device, and found that his room was a dark as ever save the television. Jimmy was sitting in his room as usual, his pale skin being illuminated by the nonsense on the TV. His fire red hair, like my father's, only blended with the shadows that adorned the back of the room. He had the headphones and microphone on, and he was playing Righteous Slaughter. It was a boring display, with the exception of the periodical vulgarity to his competitor.

There was a knock on his door. Unexpectedly, he turned off, or at least paused the game that enraptured him so much. He shouted for whomever to come in. A swaying blonde ponytail came running into the room. The owner of the ponytail, my daughter, plopped on the bed. She had her head in her hands. Jimmy shifted his position in the bed and wrapped his arms around her. They were now both facing me, or rather the camera. He took the headgear off. His hair was in a mess from where it was being displaced.

"She still won't say anything," Tracey managed to get out between sobs.

"I don't know what to say. I knew Mom and Dad did some bad shit back in the day, but this is big." For the first time, in a long time I heard the voice of a mature young man, and not that of a whiny spoilt brat. I was proud of him for consoling his distraught sister so well.

"It's more than big. My whole life is a lie. That was the only man I knew as a father." Her voice sounded like that of a frail woman in grief.

"Michael's still your father. He might have been a shitty influence and have a bad temper, but he's still your dad. He's still our dad." He was trying to reason with her.

"He didn't say it." She was right I didn't say it. I feel like an asshole for not saying it. I hope that she doesn't think that I love her any less. There was no way that the little girl who used sit in my lap for me to read her favorite story and dance that wobbly dance to the theme of her television show that came on at three o'clock on the dot.

"I know, but with pop, you can't fault him. He has this way of not being able to show any affection. I-" She interrupted him.

"But, that's just it. She was always affectionate with me. I was his little princess. I always knew that he loved me. He always hugged me no matter how bad I was. Now I don't know if he could ever hug me again. Even before you got there, I knew there was something different about the way he hugged me. I… I discounted it at first; now I realize that it, his hug I mean, was stiff and distant. His mind was someplace else. Now we know. He was thinking about what that damned piece of paper said. He didn't even want to try and keep his news to himself."

"Tracey, you know I've been thinking about it. For a while, I was thinking that he only did this for the sake of argument. But if that was all it was for, you know, to shut mom up, he would have pulled that out first. I'm not saying that it was the best timing or anything but, I think his world is crumbling too. I mean this must be killing him too. You know, the sleepless nights worrying. Now he knows that he'd been lied to." James' voice was sincere. From somewhere within himself he pulled out his inner 'decent human being'. You know, the one that could relate and have healthy relationships. Well, I ain't the one to talk about anything like that. I created, sustained, and tolerated the way we were. I was a derelict with interacting with normal society and now my son was too. Tracey was the way she was because she overcompensated for the faults I had with people in general. I never, we never -Amanda and me never ever- showed what a family should look like. I snapped out of my thoughts and put my focus back on the conversation.

"She lied," Tracey said, voice still shaky, "She kept this secret from us, from me, from dad, from all of us."

"I am not excusing this at all. But we all have secrets. We all have thing that we don't want people to know. There is no one who ever lived who didn't have something, one thing that they didn't want everybody to know. For some people it's something small and to the world it would be unimportant. For others, it's about identity. It's about who they are and what they are." It was strange; something in his voice had changed.

"Mom will pay for this one day." It was a statement of fact from Trace.

"Here, here."

"I'm not saying that I'm going to do anything. I mean, it's like karma. Doesn't all of that stuff that come back to you." Her voice was lower than usual, but was no longer quivering. Her eyes were red and puffy, but were not producing tears.

"It does." He was patting her back.

"I think I saw a new side of you today little bro."

I logged off of the feed of Jimmy's room, feeling acutely guilty. I shouldn't have spied on them. I shouldn't be spying on Jimmy now. I looked down at the program that was copying all of the information. It had just reached one-hundred percent. I looked at it as a popup window appeared in the app. 'Do you want to save and view data?' it what it asked. I wrestled with the yes or no. I was one tap away from all of the information I could have on my son. I figured that I'd done enough destroying for the day. I glanced at it one more time. I tapped 'No' and watched the app on my phone delete all of the information it copied. If my son was telling the truth about that when he was drunk, he'd tell me in his own time. At least, for the first time in my life, time was NOT of the essence. Nope, it's not.