Me: Text me when you get to town. We need to talk.
I hit send and then realize what a dick I sound like, but I can’t take it back.
Fuck. Can I do anything right?
All I have to do is tell her that she’s my choice. That I choose her.
It’s only been seven days, and I’m going fucking crazy without her. Seven days of waking up and repeating the steps without any color in my life.
I scrub a hand over my face as I stare at the screen and wait for a response. Any response. Something to let me know that she knows that her leaving was a mistake. Something to let me know she’ll be at the party tonight and that this—she and I—is somehow still on her mind. Is something she still wants.
Only, she doesn’t respond.
She doesn’t text back.
I end up sitting with my phone in my hand while Luke plays on the PS4, and I try to figure out how to fix something I broke.
How to prove to her that it won’t happen again.
“Dad! Someone’s at the door!”
“Who is it?” I ask as I jog down the stairs, less than thrilled at the high school and its never-ending fundraisers these days. We’ve already had two teenagers today selling mixed bags (whatever those are) and candy.
“Some old guy,” Luke says, and I stop in my tracks.
“That’s not nice.” The reprimand is instantaneous, but fear flickers through me just as quickly.
It’s the attention from the contest. He’s come back as a representative for Claire. He wants to see Luke.
“Dad? You okay?” Luke’s face is a mask of confusion as he stares at me.
“Yeah. I’m fine. I need you to go upstairs and play for a minute.”
“Dad?” Brown eyes narrow and question.
“Just do what I say,” I grit out and jab my finger to the stairs.
Feelings hurt, Luke eyes me again and trudges toward the stairs as every part of me wars against opening the door. It’s finally happening.
They finally came back for him.
My pulse rages in my ears.
Over my dead body.
Once Luke clears the landing so I can’t see him, I take a deep breath and steel myself for what I’ve always known I’d have to face someday, despite everyone telling me it would never happen.
Fuck you, Claire.
I yank open the door.
“What do you . . .” My words fade as I finish with a weak, “want?”
It isn’t Claire’s dad standing on my porch. Far fucking from it. It takes a second for that to register and then another for it to hit. The resemblance is there. He may have silver hair at his temples and a hulking figure that makes the porch seem tiny, but his eyes are brown and the same almond shape as Sidney’s.
Relief flickers momentarily and then falls flat as memories come back. Claire’s dad at the door. His threatening words. His condescending voice. The way he wouldn’t even look at his own goddamn grandson.
“Can I help you?”
Why are you here?
He’s going to ask me to leave Sidney alone.
He’s going to tell me to go to hell.
“Grayson Malone?”
His voice. Aristocracy lilts in his tone, and I square my shoulders.
“Can I help you?” I repeat. We stare at each other. Measure each other. Judge.
“Frank Thorton. Nice to meet you.”
I stare at the hand he extends and hear my father say, “Never look a gift horse in the mouth.” Yet, all I want to do is look. All I want to do is stare.
All I want to do is question.
Reluctantly, I shake his hand, leery and cautious as I wait for whatever shoe might drop.
“Likewise, Mr. Thorton,” I murmur.
“Call me Frank,” he says with a definitive nod.
The expensive suit is something Claire’s dad always wore, but the warm smile that slowly spreads across Frank’s face is anything but.
“Frank,” I say.
“I’m sure you’re curious as to my sudden appearance on your doorstep.”
“You could say that.” I should invite him in, but I hesitate.
“It seems to me you’ve made quite an impression on the readers of Modern Family . . . and on my daughter.”
Every part of me tenses as I wait for the words. She’s too good for you. You’re not the type of man we have picked out for her. And on and on. The Hoskins’ comments ring in my ears all this time later.
“I assure you it was unintentional.” I laugh, nerves suddenly running side by side with my caution. Is he going to tell me I can’t see his daughter? Is he going to warn me away from her just when I’ve realized I don’t want to live without her?
“May I ask you what your intentions are?” He shifts his feet, but his eyes hold mine.
“My intentions?” I sound like an idiot, but fuck if I don’t feel like I’ve been brought back to ten years ago. This time, though, I know just how brutal the fallout is. I know just how devastating the woman you love leaving is.
“Yes. How are you going to win the contest and end up with Sidney without it looking as if the contest was rigged?”
I stare at him for a beat, blinking and trying to work out what he’s saying. He has the look of a father who wants answers, not a businessman wondering about the integrity of his business, so I know where this conversation is headed.
“I already dropped out of the contest.”
“You what?” He’s a man used to being in the know, and that little tidbit just knocked him off his stride.
“Yes, sir. I dropped out of the contest earlier today.” I think of the shocked look on Rissa’s face when I told her and then the knowing grin that followed.
“Why’s that?”
“Because your daughter is more important to me than any prize I ever could win. That’s why.” The words are a challenge thrown out, daring him to question me and tell me I’m wrong.
His eyes harden. His lips purse. And then they slowly spread into a smile. “Is that so?”
“Yes, sir. That’s so.” I cross my arms and lean my back against the door, more than aware that I still haven’t invited him in. I’m ready for the fight. “If I stay in and win, then it taints the contest she worked so hard on. The last thing I want is questions about her dedication or accusations of a rigged contest to be angled her way. I made a deal with her that I’d participate to help make the contest a success. I fulfilled my end of the bargain, but now her success may be questioned if I stay in . . .”
“So, you’d give up the money and prizes?”
“It was never about the money or the prizes.” I take a step toward him. “Like I said, Sidney means more to me than that . . .”
He purses his lips again. “You are talking about my Sidney, right?” And when that smile breaks on his face, I feel like I can breathe for the first time. His laugh echoes around the porch as he cuffs the side of my shoulder while I stare, trying to absorb all of this. “Stubborn? Always right? Fiery temper?”
It takes me a second to believe that this is real. That Frank isn’t here to tell me I can’t see Sidney. That he is nothing like the Hoskins.
“That’s the one,” I murmur.
His laugh is a bit louder this time. “God help you. You’re going to need it.” Then he winks. “But she’s worth every argument and compromise you’ll have to make.”
I nod, hating the emotion in my throat. Hating that I never realized how much I needed this, but now that Frank is here and has expressed his approval, I know that I did.
“That she is,” I say, wondering how exactly I’m going to prove to her that I know that. How I’m going to prove to her I love her after letting her walk away. How I’m going to prove to her that I know she isn’t Claire and that I’ll never make that mistake again.
Because I won’t. This time spent without her and how goddamn horrible I’ve felt is enough of a reminder of what life without Sidney is like . . . and I don’t want to live like this.
I want her.
Plain. Simple. Complicated. Her.
“And how do you plan on making this work?” he asks in a way that should have my back up, but as a father, I recognize a parent only wanting the best for their child.
“We’ll figure it out,” I say. When I sent her the text this morning, I knew I was going to fight for her, but how much so just became so very apparent. “I know she needs her city, so we’ll have to make long distance work for the time being.”
“Do you think that will work?”
“It will have to. All I know is that my life is better with her in it . . . that much has become obvious since she left here . . . so making it work is the only option we have. It’s the only outcome I’ll accept.”
“That’s a big compromise, son.”
I shrug. “She’s worth the risk.”