..::.. Chapter 22 - Father ..::..

Present

We have tea. The steam drifts to my nostrils, and I can breathe a little better.

It's so quiet, and Dad just waits. I think he knows it's coming. Just like I came in the middle of the night and knocked on his door. I think he's waited for years. Like a ticking bomb.

He opened. His eyes widened. He stepped aside to let me in with a suitcase.

The first thing he did was place the kettle on the stove. The second was ask, "Did you remember to turn off the furnace?"

I stared at him. He didn't insist when I didn't answer. What he did was reach into the cabinet and gets those tea leaves that aren't in paper pockets, cheaply made. Now he dips into dry leaves and scoops them into a small metal basket in the shape of a ball. He locks it in. It's the proper way to have exceptional tea, is what Sue said once.

All these new learnings, new environments; a new life he's adapted to. When Mom was still with us, he was not as aware of his surroundings. I think she did enough grounding for the both of them. He got to dream and do, while she stayed put … and suffered in her personal grief.

That memory of me and Mom arguing over Edward when I was young came to me as I watched a mother and daughter argue in a parking lot at the grocery store. The young girl insisted she wanted to date, the mother was in complete disagreement. I piled my things in my trunk and the memory came slowly; Mom's tears, our yelling, her sobs echoing from down the stairs. All because of me.

The windshield was blurred from my tears. I didn't move for a good hour. The engine running, the food already warming too much in the back. I sobbed, white knuckles on my steering wheel. I mourned the moment, wanting to turn back time. I wouldn't listen. She tried so hard to help me.

My poor mother.

Dad looks up at me from across the table. He gets ready to speak, but he stops. He closes his mouth.

I dare him with a look.

He doesn't dare, so, I ask, "Tell me again, I … forget. How did Mom die?"

He clears his throat, thinks it through. "I've told you this. It was an accident…"

My mug flies. The ceramic shatters, leaving tea trickling down the wall, the pieces splatter everywhere.

Dad closes his eyes.

"How. Did. Mom. Die?" I ask again.

"Bella …"

"Tell me!" I yell, leaning over the table.

He stares at his cup and his eyes glaze over. He swallows hard. His shoulders sag, and after years of this new life, I see a very different man before my eyes. He looks more like he used to. Worry in his eyes. The weight of everything on his shoulders. He takes a breath and lets it go.

Finally, he says, "They killed her, and they almost killed you. I'm sorry."

I cry.

The laments come without hesitance, and this, "You lied to me."

He's shredded. His eyes saddened. "No, Bella—"

"You lied to me!"

He stands and comes around the table. I withdraw, but my back finds a wall too quickly.

"Bella, please!"

"No! I am supposed to trust you! You're all I have!"

He grips my arms. I fight him. "You still have me. I'm right here!"

"You lied to me about a big part of my life."

"I had to! You were barely alive, Bella. I didn't have you for a year. I didn't have your mother. When you woke, and you didn't remember, it was like a fresh start. I was going to take you out of that mess for good!"

I shake my head. "How dare you?"

"How dare me?" he says angrily. He steps away. "You were the child. I was the adult! I did what I had to do for my daughter! The only family I had left. After raising you right, anything you needed, you go and you set off with that boy!"

I'm in shock.

"So, this is all my fault? Nothing about what happened was an effect of your decisions, your intentions? You befriended that family, borrowed their money. To do what? Show off? Impress Mom so she wouldn't leave you?"

He raises his hand. I can't help but flinch away. His palm open, ready to slam down on me, but he stops. I straighten where I stand and lock eyes with him. I dare him to try.

He takes it out on the table. It ricochets off the kitchen wall making a dent.

His back is turned. His hands on his hips. He's shaking.

"I know about that now; Mom and Jasper Cullen. But only because I remembered. You wouldn't have warned me about the man that ruined her life," I say. "But don't worry, you were her best choice, it's what she said to me. You never had to worry or try to fix what wasn't broken. She loved you anyway."

He cries. His head hangs.

"But you had to pick that house. You couldn't let it go, move on, free her from that past. You stayed. You made us all stay. So sue me for being a child and for learning to love a boy I grew to know as family. That's what we were, right? It's what you wanted. You let them into our lives, our house, still to this day, and they do what they like. What did you expect? You set that up. You paved the way. You left me fucked up and you left Mom dead."

He sniffs where he is. He wipes his eyes and lifts his gaze to the windows he faces.

"And you think I had a choice in all this?" he asks.

"Yes. I do." I snap.

"You make the life of a terrorized family man sound so easy." He turns and looks at me. "You don't know a damned thing. I did my best to give you the best. I had to make decisions that I'm ashamed to say, but I made them because I didn't have a choice."

I shake my head. "There's always a choice to make the people in your life safe."

He nods. He wipes his face. "You're right. That's exactly what I did. I needed to fix it. All the manipulation from that family, saving my shop from their grasp. Saving you from their grasp. I knew it the moment you woke up from that coma, and your eyes told me time had turned back—all you remembered was high school, not the violent last years of it. So, I took the chance. I threatened that boy from ever seeing you again. I made that choice for you." He points at my heart.

I slap his hand away.

"What happened?"

"You come here, three in the morning. I ask you the same."

I make a face. "There are guns hidden all over the house, a crazy man living next door, what do you think happened?"

He looks worried. "Are you hurt? Who hurt you? I'll kill whoever—"

I wave a hand. "Why did you send me to live there?" I yell.

He shrugs. "You were desperate to leave the city. How was I supposed to know someone was living in their house? It had been locked for years, Bella. So have the guns in the basement at home." He shakes his head. "It was part of an agreement I couldn't avoid. They leave stuff down there, and that was it. I kept it locked, just like the house."

I pull my hair at the crown. He doesn't know they took more than the basement. I tell him about all the hidden Glocks and rifles. He lands hard on a chair in disbelief.

He looks at me. "Bella, how did you find them? What crazy man?"

I sigh. My eyes drift closed. "I could wring your neck for being so damned clueless. Even after what happened to Mom, you still let them run your life." I melt into my seat, too. Both alike; Father and daughter in utter grief.

He stares.

He waits.

I sigh exasperatedly. "Last time I was here, we go to dinner with Sue. The Cullens walk in, sit in the back. You say, 'Hey, there are the Cullens. Hm, I wonder where Edward Jr. goes all the time? Where could he possibly hide for long periods at a time? What a mystery,'" I say sarcastically.

I glare.

He looks away when he gets it. He goes red.

"Small world, isn't it? It's what I thought when some hitmen came in the middle of the night to kill him. But Charlie is a good man, he lends his house to criminals to come in and do what they please. So, he did come in. And they shot up the furniture and the windows and almost killed me!

"Edward put a gun in my hand, pushed me out the door and told me to go find you because you have answers," I say waving a hand at him. "Clearly, you don't! But I didn't go far. You know why? Funny thing about PTSD, it's interrupted when you least expect it. I remembered everything that happened to Mom and all the secrets you kept from me.

"So, imagine my fucking surprise, Dad, when I remembered I was once in love with that crazy man next door. I had to kill two men that night!" I bellow. It echoes all through the house.

Tears blur my vision, red. I could kill him, too, that long face of his staring back. "You made me a killer." My voice breaks.

I stand and yank at my luggage aiming for the door.

"Bella, wait. Please." He cries.

I turn and swear this will be the last I see of him.

"Don't worry yourself sick. Have your life, your tea and relax. I'll fix this. I'll find who killed her and then I'll end it all for good, even if I'll die trying like Mom did. But at least she had the guts!"

I leave him reeling.

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