The melody to my songs

Chapter 24 : Olivia

Three days ago we celebrated Ishmael's 16th birthday, I can't believe its been three years. He spent the day out with Kevin and some other friends.

We planned a surprise dinner for him, James invited Kevin's parents and May and Harry over. It was a blast to be honest. I am happy that me and James are able to provide Ishmael a family. I can't believe he will be going off for further studies away from us.

*

I put on my blue floral dress and a jacket on. I go downstairs to find my boots and hear a The weekend song.

Just know that I would die for you
Baby, Iwould die for you, yeah
The distance and the time between us
It'll never change my mind

I see James ready in his black jeans and a black 'Walls' hoodie. Ishmael is out ready in a casual shirt and jeans and here we are, all ready to go.

Oh right, we were going to May's, she said that they had some news for us and also I wanted to ask her about my father.

Yeah my father, it's strange thinking about him. I never knew anything about him hell with it I haven't even seen a photograph of him.

The morning after Ishmael's birthday, the three of us sat and talked about how great the dinner was and asked Ish all about his day out. We opened presents, it was all fun until I found the truth.

Ishmael was saying something about how he can't believe, he doesn't have a single parent he could cling on to.
"Well neither do I, but I try to cut mom some slack."

"Oh, are you kidding me? Your father was so nice." Ishmael said.

James glanced at me and held my hand.
"What do you mean, you met him?" James asked.

"Umm... he died James, how can I meet him." Ishmael said hesitating.

I was shocked, I had no idea what he was talking about, what the actual fuck. My father died? What? What?

Ishmael tried to clarify things, "I don't know much, or you can say I don't remember much. You know how mom used to tell bedtime stories till the age of 5-6, well she told me stories about your dad. Their meetings, their lives and love. I don't remember the details but I do know that he was a great person Olive."

He looked at James and nodded at him as if he was permitting him to continue.

"When I was 9-10 I used to ask John to play hide and seek with me, I used to go and hide and he was supposed to find me. But he never did, I used to sit in the store room for hours and he wouldn't come.

I found him sitting in front of the tv watching a match or something. I would feel so proud that I was so good at game my own father couldn't find me. We played everyday, it got boring so I started going through the stuff in the store room. I found some pictures of you as a kid with your dad, pictures of you, him and mom - she looked so happy Olive and so did he.

I also found a long list of baby names, almost 60-70 names for both boy and girl. I asked mom about the list once and he told me and they didn't know whether you were a girl or a boy and didn't want to find out so they choose names for both genders.

John named me Ishmael because it was the only name he could come up with that wasn't in that list." He sighed and saw me crying.

I didn't even know when I started crying but this was too much. The man I thought left me on my birth turns out that he loved me and didn't leave me, he was there was some time and we were a family.

I don't know how to feel, how to act. The only thing I can come up with us knowing the whole truth, I wanna know. I will know in a few hours today.

My thoughts paused as James parked the car, he looked at me he was worried for me. But I gave him a false assuring nod and smiled. We walked through the door.

"Eyyyy, I loved your present !" Ishmael exclaimed.
"Haha, glad you did." May said hugging him.

"Where's Harry?" James asked her
"Oh, he isn't home. He had errands to run." She said with a smile.

"Umm.. May I wanna talk about something." I said my voice breaking.

James rubbed my back slightly and explained May all  Ishmael told us. He sent Ishmael to my old room, Ish grabbed his EarPods and made his way upstairs.