Page 139 of Shamed
My dad is standing by the window with his back to me, but he spins around at the sound of an intruder. New wrinkles line his face, and the gray streaks in his hair have multiplied since Ilast saw him. He looks tired and weathered, but still like my father, wearing a starch white dress shirt and dark gray slacks.
Emotions flood my chest and fill my eyes with tears at the sight of him.
I feel like all I’ve done lately is cry, but I don’t attempt to keep it inside.
The mug in his hand drops to the ground, shattering and spilling the contents onto the floor. Dad ignores it, staring at me with his mouth parted like I’m a ghost. I guess, in a way, I am.
As if snapping from a trance, he rushes across the room, grasping me tightly in his arms. “Jennifer.”
It was hard to know what to expect from someone who never really showed affection or love in any typical fashion.
This . . . this right here, is what I needed today.
“Dad.” I wrap my arms around him in return, and hold on just as fiercely as he is, wetting his shirt with my tears.
Foryearsthis has been all I wanted from him. Not money, not things.Love.
His gray eyes are glossy when he pulls back, grasping my biceps as if I might slip away from his fingers. “Jennifer,” he repeats, running his eyes over my face, my hair, and body. “Is it really you?”
I huff a watery laugh. “It’s me.”
Disbelief still lingers in his eyes. “I never thought I’d see you again.” After pulling me in for another quick hug, he directs me to sit in one of the chairs at his desk. Then, instead of sitting on the opposite side in his custom-made chair, as I would have expected, he perches on the one closest to me. “Where have you been? What have you been doing?”
Other questions sit behind his lips, but he closes his mouth, waiting for me to answer those ones first.
I’m not used to this version of my father, and it takes me a moment to recalibrate.
The difference in his personality is almost startling. A shock to the system when you’ve become accustomed to a certain temperature your whole life.
I like it, though.
Fidgeting with my fingers, I prepare myself to tell him the truth.
Well, most of it.
Anything about what happened the night I told Mase will be kept to myself for now, along with what I’ve been doing for work.
As for the rest . . .
“I’ve been living here in the city, I just stayed in areas you wouldn’t go.”
His responding sigh is at least the same as it used to be. “I should have listened to you when you said you didn’t want towork for me. After you disappeared, I blamed myself, and I knew I was too hard on you. I should have—”
“No, Dad. That’s not why I disappeared.” I separate my fidgeting hands, forcing them to relax on my thighs. “It was because of Dylan.”
“Dylan?” An unsettled expression covers his face. “I didn’t realize the two of you were involved.”
The breakfast in my stomach immediately tumbles around. “We weren’t. Not like that, at least.”
He stares at me, expectant, wondering what the hell I’m talking about.
I can do this.
And so, I tell him.
I tell him about the night it happened, my interactions with Dylan afterward, when I found out the truth, and the threats he made against Dad and the company.
I spent years avoiding discussing anything to do withthat night, but the more I’ve talked about it over the last couple of months, the easier it has gotten.
