Total pages in book: 79
Estimated words: 70607 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 353(@200wpm)___ 282(@250wpm)___ 235(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 70607 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 353(@200wpm)___ 282(@250wpm)___ 235(@300wpm)
"For someone who just closed the deal of a lifetime," he starts to say, looking around. "You look like shit." I don't know why, but I laugh at how he didn't mince words.
I look over at him and lean against the bar. "It's been a crazy four days." I blame it on the work that we just did. For the past four days, we've been in a conference room going over numbers, fourteen hours a day, but in the back of my head still lingered the last conversation I had with Shelby.
"I'm not supposed to bring this up." It's my father's turn to laugh now. "And your mother will kill me if she finds out I'm even discussing this without her." I shake my head, knowing she probably gave him strict conversation topics. I called them on the way to the airport last week. I didn't give them much information, just that Sheila and I were no more. It was also six o’clock, so they were both sleeping, but I did get an in-detail text from my mother two days later when she got the whole story. I have yet to answer her back, and I know that she is giving me until this weekend before she pounces on me. "But well."
"But well, you have questions," I say to him. "I can only imagine." I put my hands on the bar, waiting for the questions to start.
"Not so many questions because your mother has all of them, and if she finds out that I got the answers before her, it'll be the end of the world." My father is the one who never asks a question. Ever. He is the quiet one, and whatever you tell him stays with him. He will never tell you what he knows. He will never gossip about it. My mother, on the other hand, wants to know everything. And I mean, everything, and then she'll call her cousins or sister and talk about it for hours. "I just want to know you're okay," he says, looking around. "Even though you barely got any sleep this week. Do you look like shit because of Sheila?"
"Actually, it's not the reason," I admit and take a sip of the scotch to think about what else I should say. "I don't think I loved her." He doesn't say anything. He just waits for me to continue my thoughts. "Like, if I think about it really hard. Maybe I thought I did. Maybe it's because I was caught up in the moment." I don't know what else to say.
"Well, if you are sitting here and she's not the reason you look like that." He points at me. "Then I'm going to go out on a limb and say you didn't love her. Maybe you thought you did. Maybe you just got wrapped up in the whole love thing because you thought that it was the next step."
I hang my head now. "She fucked Joseph." I tell him something that I didn't put in the text, but after being away for a week, I have no idea what he’s heard or not. "Imagine finding that out the day of his wedding." I shake my head. "She fucked my best friend. She's probably still fucking him, who knows. Who cares?"
"I heard," he says, shaking his head, and I don't know why I'm surprised.
"Who told you?" I shrug. "I mean, not that it matters."
"She did," he says, and it's my turn to be shocked. "She called us two days after you left. She was sobbing and looking for you." I laugh, grabbing my glass of scotch and finishing it. "Said she did a terrible thing, and all she wants is to talk to you."
"What did you tell her?" I ask him, and he puts his head down.
"I wanted to hang up on her," my father admits, "but your mother, well, she did not take that well and told her to fuck off and go find Jesus." I laugh because my mother isn't religious at all. "I wish that I could say that is all." I wait for him, and he laughs. "But then your mother had time to digest, and well, that didn't go well at all. She called her back and asked her how she could do such a thing and not only that, but how she thought she could call her and she would help find you. That ended with a go fuck yourself."
"Oh my," I say, shaking my head. "Well, that was." I laugh. "I haven't spoken to her since."
"How is Shelby taking it?" he asks, and just her name makes my stomach do flips, and I'm afraid to say anything when it comes to her, so I just shrug. "Your mother called her mother when she found out." My father finishes his scotch. "Let's just say I had to calm the whole 'let's destroy them' talk."