by Ford, Mia
“Now look what you have done!” she snaps at her mother, glaring at her father as well. “You are so unaccepting that you have made my son cry. You can’t ever just be happy for me, can you? I’m leaving.”
“Me too!” Adam yells, grabbing his car keys. “Come on, Sian, let’s go. I will give you a ride home, Paisley.”
I think they forget that I’m around. In all of the chaos and the confusion, my presence has been pushed to the side. I push my back against the wall and let them slide passed me to get into the car. I should just go with them; I don’t know why I’m not. What the hell am I doing here, just standing? Waiting? Even as the door slams behind Adam so loudly that it shakes the walls of the building, I don’t move. It’s like I’m actually stuck here. In the silence, I can hear my ragged panting breaths forcing their way out of my lungs. My heartbeats pound off the wall, my bones hurt under the pressure of it, but I can’t seem to calm down.
Go! My brain screams at myself. This is weird, get the hell out of here.
“What was that about?” her mom cries out, emotion shaking in her voice. “Why is Paisley like this?”
Her dad spins before he answers, and he clocks me. “What the hell are you doing here?”
I hold my hands up in a surrendering gesture. “I’m sorry, I just want to talk to you…”
“Well, we don’t want to talk to you. No matter what issues we seem to have as a family, you always seem to be at the center of it. That isn’t a coincidence. You are trouble and always have been.”
I grit my teeth, refusing to get dragged into an argument about this. That’s exactly what he wants, for me to snap and yell, proving him right. He can have his opinion of me, that doesn’t mean I need to live up to it.
“I am sorry for the party all those years ago. I will admit that it was wrong. Trust me, if I had been given an option, I would have had a party at my own house, but that wasn’t possible at the orphanarium.”
“I’m surprised. That place dragged you lot up. You seemed to do whatever the hell you want.”
“Hmm, aside from having parents. I’m sure all of us would have given everything up for that.”
I don’t mean to be sarcastic, it isn’t how I want to behave, but no one’s ideal life is growing up without parents. The orphanarium was strict and unfeeling as well. It wasn’t the nicest place in the world to grow up. But of course, this man doesn’t have any sympathy for that. He doesn’t care. Only that my presence affects him.
“I don’t need to hear your sob story right now, Josiah. I am trying to wrap my head around the fact that you violated my daughter and got her pregnant while just screwing around. Why are you even still here?”
“I wasn’t ever just screwing around with Paisley. I have always loved her. I think that you should know that.”
“Pfft please, you haven’t ever loved anyone. You have always just screwed around. I know for sure that you haven’t exactly been single in the last three years, have you? Not waiting for her.”
“I didn’t know that I had a child then, or that she wanted me back. I thought that it was her choice to walk away from me and I had to respect that. But that doesn’t mean I ever stopped loving her. And now I have a real chance to be with her, to be a father to my son, to finally have a happy ever after.”
“Urgh, that is not going to happen. Paisley will not end up with a guy like you. She is going to end up with a decent man who actually is going to take care of her. Someone who understands the importance of family.”
“You think that I don’t understand the importance of family? I didn’t grow up with one, so I know it more. And that boy is my son, I deserve to get to know him, to prove that I can be a good person. I know that you might not trust me, but Paisley does. She thinks that I can do this, and you should too. I know that you might not like me, but you are going to have to accept me. For Paisley’s sake and Freddie’s too.”
They are silent, looking at one another curiously. I so desperately wish that I could see what is going through their heads, so I could know which way this is going to turn, but I can’t. I just have to remain here as patiently as I can to see if my impassioned speech has made any difference whatsoever.
Although I have to admit, my desire to leave is even stronger than before. It’s almost overwhelming.
“I just can’t see it.” Her mom shakes her head rapidly. “Josiah, I can’t see you being dependable. I can’t see you stepping up to the plate and being the man that our daughter deserves.”
“You don’t even know your daughter!” I can’t help blasting back. “You haven’t ever spent time getting to know her, so how would you know what is right for her? When she was young all you did was try to push her and Adam into a certain box that suited you. You didn’t ever get to know her. Then she went off to college and grew in to herself. You didn’t like it when she came back more herself. Then when she did one thing that you didn’t like, you sent her away like she was an embarrassment. Not to protect her, but for yourself.”
“We thought that she would be better off with her Aunt Lily, we didn’t do this to hurt her.”
“In the middle of nowhere. Where she couldn’t get hold of me. I know you took her phone from her.”
“And now I’m glad! It’s even better now that I know it was you. We were right to send her away.”
I can’t stop my blood from boiling. I’m so freaking angry I could scream. It really isn’t right for these people to judge me. They don’t know me, again just like their children they have never tried to get to know me.
“I would have been a good father, even back then. I wasn’t a silly teenager I was already a grown man. A man in love who would have done anything for the woman that I wanted to marry.”
“The woman that you didn’t even bother to look for? Please, that isn’t love. You can’t fool me.”
I roll my eyes. “We’re back here again? I thought we already covered that. I stayed away and tried to move on because I thought that is what Paisley wanted. I didn’t want to do anything to hurt her. I loved her, I’m serious, she is the love of my life and if I had known for one second that she wanted me I wouldn’t have stopped. I would have done everything within my power to get her back.” I sigh loudly, the frustration is absolutely destroying me. “You don’t get it and I am starting to see that you never will, so I guess me here speaking to you is pointless.”
I stalk toward the front door, shaking my head with sadness. There is a reason I stayed here and that was to try and bridge the gap between us, to try and achieve what Adam and Paisley couldn’t because of the family bond getting in the way. I thought that a bit of rationality would help but it hasn’t. There’s no rationality here.
“I’m sorry things have turned out this way,” I say just before I pop open the door. “I want us to all get along as a family for Freddie’s sake, but it seems that Paisley is right. You care more about your reputation than your own children. Your grandchild too. It’s a real shame. Things could have been so much better.”
I pop the door open and take one step outside, but before I make it a hand curls around my arm. The touch is so unexpected that it actually makes me jump. I spin and see Paisley’s mother staring at me.
“Are we bad people?” she asks quietly, her voice thick with emotion. If I look hard enough I’m pretty sure that I can see tears forming slowly behind her eyes. “Is that what you came here to tell us?”
“I haven’t come here to tell you anything…” I try to stop her from reading between the lines.
“But that is all you have said. That we don’t know Paisley or Adam either.”
“I’m just saying…” No, I can’t back track now. I did say that. “That you could know them better. I’m sure they both don’t feel good enough for you because you have tried to fit them into a box.”
“We just wanted to do our best. We just wanted to be good parents, to raise our children right.”
“I’m sure… I’m sure that my parents would have been the
same if they were around.”
I don’t know if that’s true at all. I’m sure they would have done what they thought was right though. Even if it was completely crazy. I suppose this is something I cannot argue with. Even if I really want to.
“Does Paisley hate us? Is she going to keep Freddie away from us now? Are we going to lose Adam and Sian as well? I don’t want that to happen, I never wanted that to happen… I missed Paisley so much when she was gone.” She shakes her head, the tears finally streaming down her face. “It was one of the hardest times of my life. I wanted her back all the time. I wanted to go and see her, I wanted… well, I didn’t want this.”
God her words actually touch me. I feel myself getting a little choked up. I never realized that she actually cared about her child like this. It’s weird to see so much emotion coming from her. I don’t know what to do.
“Then maybe you should tell Paisley this,” I offer. “I don’t think she knows how you feel at all.”
“She knows that I love her, that we both do,” she weeps. “She knows that, doesn’t she?”
“I really don’t think that she does, I’m sure she needs to hear it from you.”
Her mom collapses into my chest, weeping harder by the moment. I slide back inside and close the door behind me. I’m not going to be going anywhere any time soon. I hold her awkwardly in a hug while she cries against me, peering over her head at her husband who appears as bewildered as I am about this show of emotion.
I furrow my eyebrows together, and stare at him, trying to gauge his feelings too. Is he still angry or is his heart cracking too? Am I getting through to him at all? I really can’t tell at all. He’s so closed off.
“I…” he starts. I brace myself, waiting for an onslaught, but instead, he just walks off.
“I think you should follow your husband,” I try. “I don’t know how he’s feeling.”
“He walked off?” She looks to where I’m pointing. “That means you have really gotten to him. When he walks off like that it means he needs to think. He’s probably got a lot to go through.”
“Right, I see.” A sense of awkwardness over comes me. “So, I should probably go…”
“No, wait! You can’t leave yet. I need you to tell me what to do.”
“Erm… what do you mean? I don’t know what you should do…”
“You told me to talk to Paisley. What do I say to her? How do I make this right?”
Oh God, this is not where I need to be right now. I should run away before I get too deeply involved, but Paisley’s mom has her fingers deeply into my skin for me to rush off.
“Just tell her what you told me. Show her emotion. She hasn’t ever seen that from you before. She needs to know that you love her and accept her. Her decisions as well. Starting with me might be a good one.”
She looks at me with a question in her eyes. “You know, I could think that you are just saying that to be selfish, but I’m not convinced that you are. I actually think that you just care about Paisley.”
I melt just a little. “Of course, it’s because I care about Paisley. I love her. I always have.”
“Then… what we did wasn’t the right thing.” Her hand clutches to her chest. “We sent her away and kept you away from your son. We left her struggling on her own to raise her son. I know that Aunt Lily was good, but she wasn’t us, was she? Paisley needed her family; her parents and we weren’t there for her.”
Shit, this is going the wrong way as well. She is going too far in the wrong direction in to guilt which I don’t think is healthy either. “You can make this right, there is still time. In fact, this is the perfect time. You need to call her, to talk to her, and to sort it out before this spirals out of control.”
“Yes, you’re right.” She sniffs and wipes her nose. “I need to do it right now. We as a family have spent too long not talking to one another. I need to find a way to get my words out at last.”
She loosens her grip on me, finally letting me free. I step back but don’t quite fall out the front door just yet, however desperate I am to go and speak to Paisley. Now I really need to see how she is doing.
“What about your husband?” I ask just before I go. “Will he be okay about all of this?”
“Oh, he will.” She smiles at me. The first genuine smile that I have ever gotten from her – one that I hope is the first of many. “You don’t worry about him; I will sort it out. You have done your part now.”
“Right, okay… thank you. I will leave now; let you get on with it.”
“Thank you, Josiah. Goodbye,”
“Yeah, right. Bye.”
I gulp in lots of air as I get outside, reality seeping back into my life at last, and I race to the car to get away. I hope this is the start of something new. This family is fractured and damaged, there are many years of damage to sort, but I’m sure that they could all do it if they work hard enough and together.
I hope Paisley isn’t too pissed off at me, I think I did the right thing but I’m not too sure. I might have interfered a step too far. I guess I will only find out when I get there…
32
Paisley
“Where is Josiah?” I ask Adam, now a little scared. “I didn’t even think about him as we left, I was so keen to get out of there I completely forgot that he was the one who drove me and Freddie over.”
Adam peers out the window again and shrugs one shoulder. “I don’t know, I’m sure he will be here soon. Unless Dad took the opportunity to do what he’s always wanted to and killed him.” When he sees the scared look in my eyes he laughs. “Look, I wouldn’t worry about it. He will be here in a moment.”
“I don’t know, it’s been ages. It’s getting a bit weird now, I’m going to call him again…”
But as I reach out for my cell phone it bursts to life. A hot relief washes over me, thank goodness he’s calling me. Now I don’t have to seem like the crazy woman who can’t cope without her man for a moment.
“Oh.” My eyes fix on the name and my heart stops beating. “It’s Mom.”
Adam’s eyes fix on me, his gaze fiery with terror. “It is? Are you for real?”
“You think she’s calling to argue some more? Or to tell me that Dad has killed Josiah?”
“Okay, that started as a joke but now I’m worried.” Adam nods. “Answer it.”
I lift it to my ear with a shaky hand, expecting the absolute worst. “He… hello?”
“Oh, Paisley, I wasn’t expecting you to answer the phone.” She sounds like she’s crying. I don’t know what the hell to think about that one! “Can you talk? I have some stuff that I need to say to you.”
I sink into the couch and glance at Adam and Sian. Sian again makes an escape with Freddie in tow up to his room, so they can play for a while. Adam sits beside me trying to listen in.
“Sure, Mom, I can talk. What’s going on? Have things…” How do I phrase this? “Calmed down now?”
“I realize now that I have been wrong.” Her voice cracks. “For years, I have been wrong.”
“Erm… right.” What the hell is this? Where is all the yelling? “About what exactly?”
“About you and your brother. About my whole approach to parenting actually.”
Me and Adam look at each other, this is crazy. Where did the sudden turn around come from? My mother never does a complete oneeighty when it comes to her hard opinions.
“I see. Parenting… what do you mean? I’m not sure that I’m following exactly.”
“Josiah stayed behind, and he talked to me.” Holy shit! That’s where he is. I don’t think I like the sound of that at all. “He made me see that me and your father tried to mold you in to what we wanted rather than getting to actually know you. We didn’t ever let you be who you are… and I’m really sorry about that.”
“I… I don’t know what to say.” I literally have no words. This is the biggest shock of all. This is pretty much what I wanted my parents to understand but I couldn’t make them see it.
How the hell did Josiah do it?
“We never should have sent you away as well, that was so wrong of us. I know that it’s hard for you to understand, but we really did think that we were doing our best for you. We thought that we were getting you away from bad influences and the horrible man who wouldn’t step up to be a parent.”
“But you didn’t ever give me a chance to tell you who it was.”
“Now that isn’t fair,” Mom replies softly. “Your father asked you lots of times; you didn’t want to tell us…”
“While yelling at me. I wasn’t going to tell him like that, was I? I was scared, I had only just found out myself.”
“Hmm, yeah I suppose you are right. It was wrong. Just another mistake on our behalf. We seem to be racking up quite a lot of those, don’t we?” She lets out a little weird laugh. “Another thing to be sorry for. I don’t know if you are ever going to be able to forgive us, are you? Has too much happened?”
I look at Adam and he looks at me. We’re both completely stunned by this. Somehow, in just a few moments, Josiah has managed to achieve what we were never able to. My mother is actually apologizing to me.
“And… what does Dad think about all of this?” I need to know. “Has he said anything?”
“Not much, yet. But you know what it’s like. He is coming around. There is nothing to worry about.”
That doesn’t sound like he’s particularly said anything positive or negative, but that hardly surprises me. He will take his time, but he will follow Mom’s lead. He will forgive me eventually.
“I see… well, I don’t see why this can’t be the start of us getting our family back on track. I mean, it makes sense, everything is changing so our family could too. If that’s what you want, Mom?”
“It is. It really is.” Her emotion makes me get emotional too. Tears roll down my cheeks as I listen to her talk. “All I want is for us to start rebuilding. To do things right this time around. For Freddie’s sake.”