“Okay, okay.” I held my hands up. The attitude was something new, but I didn’t mind. Not if she was talking to me. “Guess it could’ve been one of the tree limbs knocking against the roof. Might need to go out tomorrow and take a look.”
Harper shrugged and silently trudged back to her room. I turned just in time to see her close the door. She’d been quiet since we left the grocery store. More reserved. During lunch,she’d hardly said two words to me. Just sat and ate her sandwich quietly like I wasn’t even there.
She’s ashamed of you.
You’re never here.
She wishes she was with her mom.
She doesn’t love you.
Vicious words and cruel taunts filled my head as they always did when we had a day like this. I struggled with fatherhood more than I ever wanted to admit. Struggled to connect with any role other than protector and provider in the most basic sense. When Sarah was here, she could do all the fun shit with Harper that I swore I didn’t have time for. Now, I was kicking myself in the fucking balls thinking about all the opportunities I’d missed to figure out what else she needed to live the life she deserved.
At the end of the day, I just wanted to be a good dad. I wanted my daughter to be happy and healthy and full of love. If she ended up in therapy fifteen years from now, I didn’t want it to be because I was a piece of shit who never showed affection. I loved that girl with everything I had. Every broken, shattered piece of me.
She was the only reason I was still breathing. My sole purpose.
Heading back to the bathroom, I quickly changed my clothes and combed back my hair before tucking it beneath a hat. I was just gonna sweat my ass off anyway. Plus, it wasn’t like Frank’s was a fancy establishment. Hell, a man came in once wearing nothing but a hospital gown.
Walking over to Harper’s door, I knocked gently. “I’m headed out, sugar. Sawyer will be over in a bit.”
“’Kay, Dad.”
I rested my forehead against the wood and closed my eyes. Atwo-word response was better than none. I should be grateful I got that much. “Love you. I’ll see you in the morning.”
I waited for a response, but nothing came. Silence greeted me like a slap in the face. With a sigh, I turned and made my way to the door. The last thing I wanted to do was go look over a bunch of rowdy drunks, but I didn’t have another option. I put my entire savings on the line to buy Frank’s. Letting it go wasn’t an option.
I’d just have to add this day to the pile of other shit days and move the fuck on.
Opening the door, I nearly faceplanted as my feet got tangled up in something on the first step. I turned and stared at the obstacle, cursing under my breath when I realized what it was.
Paper bags overflowing with groceries sat upright at the doorstep. There was a folded card on top, but I didn’t need to read it to know who they were from. Still, curiosity got the fucking best of me. I snatched it up, scanning the neat cursive lines.
Duke,
Dinner’s on me. Hope this is everything you guys needed.
- Liv
P.S. The Fruity Pebbles are for Harper
OLIVIA
Beinghome came with a whole list of challenges I’d never anticipated. I was used to strict schedules and deadlines in my professional life, but everything changed the moment I boarded a plane and stepped foot in Pinecrest. There was an unpredictability here I wasn’t used to. Change was everywhere I looked.
Buttercup Bakery, home of my family’s favorite lemon cupcakes, had closed last year, and in its place was a fucking Starbucks. And the floral shop, Forget-Me-Not, had a ‘For Sale’ sign on the front door. Main Street was once filled with local favorites, some that had been around since my grandpa was a boy, but nearly half of them had either been turned into something else or closed entirely.
It nearly broke my heart strolling through town with Charlie yesterday—seeing all the hard work people had put in for years, decades even, gone in the blink of an eye. Those small businesses were what made a town like Pinecrest the gem it was. Everyone knew one another, helped their neighbors as though they were family. Property developers from big cities alwayshovered like vultures, but businesses had fought them back with pride. Now, the empty buildings might as well have been dead carcasses on the side of the road, ripe for the picking.
While I’d been able to somewhat salvage the rest of our day together, my daughter was still distant. We talked and laughed and goofed around, but her smile didn’t reach her eyes. She didn’t open up about school or friends. Anytime I got a morsel of information, it was because I literally pried it out of her.
It was all made worse by telling her exactly why I was back in town. Somehow, I managed to keep my tears at bay as I told her that John was sick. She voiced all the things I couldn’t. How it wasn’t fair and that she didn’t understand why he wouldn’t fight harder. I held her in my arms as her tears soaked through my sweater, doing my best to soothe every painful, horrible sob ripping from her chest. At least, in that moment, I felt like I could do one thing right. I could comfort my daughter and let her fall apart knowing she was in a safe space.
But as her tears subsided, she told me she wanted to go to bed early instead of watching her favorite movie, and that hollow feeling in my chest felt deeper. Disappointed as I was, I didn’t have any fight left in me. So, I just tucked her in, giving her forehead a quick kiss, before trudging outside, pouring a tall glass of wine and allowing myself to cry.
I couldn’t remember the last time I’d let my tears fall like this. It might have been the night I found out I was pregnant with Charlie, scared shitless that Grady wouldn’t be happy about our little surprise. Maybe it went further back. Maybe it was the night a police cruiser pulled up in front of my school instead of my dad. The way I instantly knew something was wrong.
Was it bad that I couldn’t remember?