Blackmailing The Untouched

The Calm Before The Storm

Dad is sitting at the table in the kitchen when I return. He's wearing his best pair of navy slacks and a grey button-up and white tie. I recognize his dress clothes and instantly chuckle. He's never been very good at shopping for clothes or matching them for that matter.

He looks so peaceful sipping at his cup of coffee. I almost don't believe the evidence that is stacked against him. I don't want to believe that he knowingly sent an innocent man to prison, and if I hadn't read all the information myself, I never would.

"Did you take care of that thing?" He senses my presence without looking up from the newspaper he's reading.

Nope. I've gotten myself in deeper.

"I guess so, for now." I nod and pull out the chair across from him.

I desperately want to ask him about the papers I have read. I want to put him on the spot just to see if he'll lie directly to my face, but I'm scared that he will, and even more scared that he won't. I can't bear to see the look on his face when he realizes that I know what he's done.

"Did that have anything to do with the school?" He asks as he finally sets the newspaper aside, and his judging eyes are on me.

I sigh, frustrated, "No."

His chair scratches against the floor as he sits up, giving me his undivided attention. "Sweetie, what aren't you telling me?" He tents his fingertips on top of the table.

"I really don't think you want to get into all this right now. You have a meeting at the station in a little bit, and frankly, this conversation is going to take a lot longer than just a little bit." I tell him without wavering or trying to change the subject. I figure it's time to put it all out there because once it is, we can finally start to deal with the fallout. I've decided to withdraw from College and that's a big adult decision, so I should just suck it up and be able to talk about my decision like the adult I'm trying so hard to be.

He takes a moment to digest, and then I see the wheels in his head begin to turn through his eyes. He glances down at the watch on his wrist, checking to see just how much time we have. "I guess that's fair." He settles with a nod, "But tomorrow morning, when I get off shift, we are hashing it all out. You are going to tell me what you've been hiding. All of it."

Well, maybe not all of it.

"If that's what you want." I shrug my shoulders. I thought I'd feel more nervous about the upcoming conversation about my life choices, and at first, I was, but now I'm just over it all, and I want it out in the open.

"Damn, I guess it's that time." He takes another glance down at his wrist and gets up and straightens his tie. "Wish me luck."

"I'm sure you don't need luck, Dad." I respond with a loving smile. "See you in the morning."

He gives me his normal kiss on the forehead, and a few seconds later, I hear him exit the house.

Upstairs in the bedroom, I am hit with a feeling of overwhelming sadness. This room is the last place that I saw Mom. I remember the day like it was yesterday, even though I was just a little girl. We were sitting on my bed, she was braiding my long, brown hair so delicately. I stared at the wall while she brushed away the tangles, only complaining when my hair was snagged.

"Honey, you have got to sit still." Mom said in the soft, sweet voice she had.

"But it hurts, Mommy." I cried in my little eleven- year old squeak. "I don't know why you always have to do my hair after bath time."

"Because a mother should braid her daughter's hair." She would say. There was a proudness in the way she spoke, almost like she couldn't think of anything else she'd rather do.

"Not always." I objected with a huff.

She finished the braid in a little over an hour, and when I got up and looked at myself in the mirror on the front of the closet door, I could see the structure of my face. The braid is pulled tightly at the crown of my head and traveled all the way down to the middle of my shoulders.

"It's wet, so your hair will be nice and curly tomorrow morning when I take it out." She said and came up from behind, placing her hands on my shoulders she smiled at me in the mirror. I could see the love beaming in her light brown eyes, her skin creasing just at the corner of her lips. "I thought it'd be a different school picture for this year."

I found her eyes in the mirror and smiled back.

Mom was beautiful. She had medium length bright blond hair that framed her face and lit up her eyes. She had dimples on each cheek and a tiny scar where her left eyebrow was. She wasn't old-fashioned, but she definitely had a classic feel about her. She was stuck in her ways, liked things the way she liked them, and was not about giving new things a try. She believed in chores and earning your keep. She believed that a loving household made the world go around. And she believed in fate. She got caught up in the romance in the world, and the idea that there was this bigger power that controlled who came into your life and when. She trusted that if two people were meant for one another, they'd find each other. She believed that everything happened for a reason, either good or bad.

I run my fingers through my hair, where Mom's last braid was eleven years ago. The braid that I'd unraveled that next morning. The one that she was supposed to take out. I didn't know why. I went to school and got my fourth grade picture taken with curls that day and was happy that it had worked and was so excited to show her when I got home. But Mom never saw that picture. She never saw the blue bow headband that I wore or the big smile on my face because I liked the way my hair looked curly.

I walk over to the large bay window and pull back the white lace curtains that are dancing with the slight breeze from outside and look out over the large hill that our house sits on. The sun is high in the sky; the big white fluffy clouds look like cotton candy. There are a few people on the sidewalks walking their dogs on leashes with headphones on their ears. It's midday, so most of the neighborhood has been abandoned for the work day.

Downstairs, the doorbell goes off, so I look out in front and notice that a red Subaru has just pulled up behind my Jeep.

Toby's here.

I close the curtains and head downstairs with a feeling in my gut that makes me nervous.