Oh my god.
I can’t believe he just said that.
That fucker.
“So what, he’s talking to a woman and that means he must have a mistress and more kids that no one knows about? Not everyone is as much of a dirty bastard as you.”
He flinches. “The girls ask about you.”
Pain blooms in my stomach.
My half-sisters.
I’d never met them, yet they were somehow a part of me.
I harden my heart.
“Tell them I’m dead,” I reply without emotion. “Because that’s what I am to you.”
He squeezes his eyes shut. “The issues I had with your mother have nothing to do with how I feel for you.”
Except they impact me on every level. He wasn’t the man I thought he was, the one I used to look up to. He was selfish. He wasn’t a good man. He was good at pretending. He was fake. He broke my fucking heart long before it should have been broken.
“If you ever loved me, please, just leave.”
“Clara, are you okay?” Tag asks, putting his hands on my waist. “Who the fuck are you?”
“I’m her father,” my dad replies stiffly. “Nice to see you’re done paying attention to other women and now focusing on my daughter.”
Tag goes still behind me. “I was talking to my daughter’s teacher. No other woman means shit to me besides Clara. You don’t know me. I, however, have heard more than enough about you. You’re upsetting her. If she wants to contact you, she will.”
He looks to me. “Do you want him gone, Sweetheart? Or do you want to talk to him?”
“Gone,” I reply with ease.
“You heard her,” Tag says, voice laced with steel.
My father puts his card on the table. “Call me, Clara. We need to talk. Alone.”
“Three seconds before I call security,” Tag growls.
My father leaves.
I lean against Tag, my eyes starting to water.
Why did he have to come here?
I just wanted him to leave me alone.
“That was Mrs. Yale, Bella’s teacher. I didn’t mean to ignore you, Clara. Fuck, I’m sorry.”
“She has big boobs,” I sniff.
Tag makes a strangled sound. “She does, but I didn’t look at them once. She was telling me about Bella’s role in a play they’re doing next week. She’s going to be an ice queen from some kid’s movie.”
“Have you ever slept with her?” I blurt out.
“My kid’s teacher? Jesus, is that what you think of me?” he asks, sounding offended.
I didn’t know what to think. I just wanted to go home and sleep.
“Come on,” he rumbles in my ear. “I’m taking you home. I’ll call someone to cover our shift.”
He carries me in his arms like a bride and takes me to his car.
I fall asleep as he organises someone else to come in and cover for us.
*****
The next morning, I decide I have to face my problems.
“Are you going to talk to him?” Tag asks as he butters some toast.
“I guess so. I don’t think he’ll go away otherwise,” I say, looking down into my cup of coffee. “I think I need to try and forgive him so I can move on with my life, but that doesn’t mean I want him in my life.”
Tag walks over and puts the toast down in front of me. “Do you want me to come with you?”
“Would you mind?” I ask in a small voice.
“Do you even have to ask that?”
My lip twitches. “I guess not. Thanks, Tag. I mean it.”
“You don’t have to thank me, Clara,” he says, bending down to kiss my head. “I’m jumping in the shower then going to drop Bella off. Let me know what you want to do.”
He leaves the room, and I look down at my phone. Do I want to see him? No. Do I want this to end? Yes. I press dial his number, remembering it from the top of my head. Once upon a time, it was a number I called every day.
“Clara?”
“If I meet you, will you leave me alone then?” I ask, getting straight to the point.
I hear him sigh. “I want to meet you so we can part on good terms. I want you back in my life.”
“Not happening.”
“Clara—”
“No.”
“I’m sorry okay?” he says, rushing the words out. “I’m sorry for what I did to you and your mother, but I love your sisters too, so I can’t exactly regret it.”
Wow. Okay then.
“Why don’t you just go and be a good father to them,” I say quietly. “Be there for them. I don’t need you anymore, Dad, and I don’t want you in my life. I’m sorry if that hurts you, and that isn’t why I’m doing it. I’m doing it for me because I just want to forget about everything.”
He’s silent for a few moments. “Will you come and visit us for holidays? Your mother didn’t do anything wrong, and you’re punishing her too.”
Now he cared about my mum’s feelings? How rich.
“Fine, I’ll come for Christmas,” I say, relenting. “If you leave.”
“Okay, I’ll leave,” he whispers.
I hang up. Guess I don’t have to go and see him after all, but I do have to see him on Christmas. I could be civil, for my mother’s sake, couldn’t I?
I could try, and it was a start. I couldn’t be okay with everything over night, but I could work on it, and I would.