THIRTY-SIX
Zeus
Two questions run through my mind as John steps inside my house and looks around: Why is he here? Is Belle okay?
“You’ve made quite the home out of it,” he appraises as he stops in the middle of the living room.
“I try.” Be more of a home if it had Belle in it, but beggars can’t be choosers. “What brings you around?”
He sighs, hands on hips as he looks to the floor. “Look, mate. I don’t begrudge you for what you did in hitting me.” He lifts his chin to look me dead in the eye. “I acted like a jerk, and I got what I deserved.”
“I don’t think anyone else saw it that way.”
He huffs a bitter laugh. “Yeah.”
I gesture toward the seats, and he nods.
“Cerise wanted me to report it.”
“Of course she did.” I roll my eyes as I drop into the solo armchair.
“You know why?” John makes himself comfortable on the sofa. You’d almost think we’d never come to blows over his daughter.
Except, I’ll never forget. “I violate my parole conditions if I’m reported for assault again.”
He nods, eyes averted. “I can’t believe she wants you back in prison, mate.”
“What part is unbelievable?” I ask. “That she’d go to that extreme to get rid of me, or that she’s that much of a cold-hearted bitch?”
I expect protest, in the very least a lame warning about watching what I say. I get nothing. The way John’s mouth turns down as he nods tells me he understands. Finally.
“Why did you let her come back?” I ask. “She’s no good for Belle, and she’s taking you for a ride as well.”
He shrugs. “I don’t know. I guess I was sick and fucking tired of coming home from work to nothing.”
“You had something,” I point out. “A daughter who worshipped the ground you walked on.”
“Past tense?” he points out.
I tip my head to the side. “You’d have to ask her. All I know is that you lost more than a part of her respect when you let Cerise come back. You lost trust.”
“She talked to you a bit, huh?” His eyes narrow as he digs the fingers of his right hand into the arm of the sofa.
“Despite what you might have imagined, we did have more to our relationship than a few hot and heavy moments.”
He doesn’t take my dry humour well, a scowl pulling his face in. “Easy.”
“Why are you here, John? Really?”
He taps his fingers on the upholstery, watching them as he does. “Belle isn’t coping well with this split.”
He may as well have punched me in the face again. “A risk I took.”
“I guess I don’t understand why you did it.” He tilts his head to one side, eyes narrow as he studies me. “Why go to all that trouble to tell me what was going on if you were just going to end it anyway?”
“Because I wasn’t going to end it.” At least not consciously. “I wanted her for myself. I still want her for myself. But I guess that was the wake-up call I needed.”
“To see what?”
“That she deserves so much more.” I sigh, slamming my forearms down on the arms of the chair. “Fuck, mate. My life is all but over. I’m a deadbeat ex-con with nothing in his future but menial labour and weekends spent finding ways to pass the time. I don’t have career options, a life to build; this is it. But Belle….”
“She has all of that yet to come.”
“Exactly. Her staying with me? That would just hurt her, and I’m tired of hurting everyone.” I sigh, over thinking about it already, over the burden of who I am. “All I’ve done is hurt people, mate, and I’m tired of it. I’m tired of being the bad guy. I can only take so much.”
John drags a palm over his mouth and chin, hard eyes watching me as he thinks things over. He taps the tip of his thumb against his bottom lip, the intense scrutiny he has me under making me uncomfortable in my own house.
“If she came in here now,” he asks, “and announced that she’d give it all up for you: her dreams, her plans, her options… what would you do?”
“Same thing I did the first time she told me that, I guess.”
“Which is?”
“Remind her that she’s young and that her view on things will change.”
He nods with a low hum. “And what if they don’t?”
“Then I guess we reassess the situation when we know that for sure.” My pulse beats thick and heavy in my neck, agitation building the more he pushes me to analyse this with him.
I’ve been over every facet of this fucking situation a thousand times in the last few days. A hundred more in the weeks before. I’ve thought about it, changed my mind more than my fucking underwear, and always ended up at the same damn conclusion: this is how it had to end.
Early.
“As weird as it is for me to say it to you, J, I love your daughter. Belle….” I pause, crinkling my nose up while I search for the right fucking words. “I’ve never felt so comfortable with somebody before that they make me forget that I have company. Does that make sense?”
“She’s an extension of you,” he muses.
“Exactly.” I point a finger at him. “I don’t have to second-guess what she thinks about me.”
“About your history, you mean?”
I frown, unsure where he’s going with this.
“Mate, I’ve told you before and I’ll say it again. Most of us don’t give a fuck that you did time. Most of us would have done the same thing if the roles were reversed. Sefina was an amazing woman, one who didn’t deserve even an ounce of what that cunt dealt out to her.” He chuckles. “Shit, Z. If you’d told me what you were off to do that day, I probably would have joined you.”
“I know,” I say with a smile. “Which is why I didn’t tell you. You had Belle. You still have Belle to think about. I couldn’t take you from her.” I glance to the floor and frown. “I can’t take her from you now, either.”
The humour slides from his face as he leans forward in his seat. “I don’t like the idea of it all, but shit, you made her happy.” He shakes his head, eyes down as he clasps his hands where they hang between his knees. “I can’t do that. Not like you do.”
“Why do you have to make this even harder than it is?” I murmur. “Don’t kick a dying dog, mate.”
“All I’m going to say, is, I hope you understand you’re doing the right thing.”
“I’m not sure.” My mood bounces daily between staying the course in letting my dove fly free, and clipping her wings so that she has no choice but to stay caged with me.
I know which choice suits us both, but I also know which choice is the best for her.
“Hopefully in time she’ll understand that, too,” I murmur.
John shakes his head. “She won’t leave the house, mate.”
Fuck, baby girl. “Then we make her.”
Because the sooner she moves on, the sooner I will too.