Ones Ignored

Chapter 6|"should feel relieved or offended you took back your lie?"

"Dad, I have to show you something", I say to my father after I finish off eating dinner. He looks at me and I reach down to pick up my backpack. I open it up and take out the paper from the folder I placed it in not too long ago. My dad watches me as I place the paper in front of him.

"What is it?", he asks me even as his eyes scan the paper. He wants me to explain just so I know what it actually is. I sit up in my seat and say,"It's an after school club."

"They make parents sign for that?", the word parents coming from my dad's mouth makes me a little sad. I didn't have parents— plural anyway. I had a parent. One. My mom is in California and after she had taken everything from us and rebuilt her family, a new family, I wasn't interested in her anymore. I love her, I do, but I wasn't interested in seeing her, because seeing her meant seeing them. The step siblings I had that were apparently more of a better choice for her than me. She had left me at the age of fourteen and hadn't made any effort of coming to see me.

She would buy me plane tickets to go and see her and I would be happy. I would be so ecstatic but then she would add Come see your family, and I would immediately deflate. She didn't want me to see her, she wanted me to see them. See the life that she built for herself at the expense of leaving me.

I'm sorry Ivy, but in order for me to make my dreams come true I have to leave you.

I remember the day she left. Remember it like the back of my hand. I was sitting on the couch when I saw her emerge with her suitcases and her sunglasses was drawn over her face. I wasn't sure if she didn't see me, but she made a beeline for the door. I wanted to run after her and tell her to not leave. But I only stared as her retreating figure left from my eyesight.

I guess that was where my need to keep people around came about. Now, I wanted to keep people because I wasn't able to keep my mom here.

"This club deals with open cases", I tell my dad, escaping from my mind. He turns to look at me and I say,"Cases that are never checked out from the police station. The ones who go ignored."

"Oh", my dad says and then asks,"You guys stealing these cases from local police station?"

I laugh, my dad had a dry humor but the way he sometimes said things out of the blue makes me laugh out loud. My laughter subsides and I say,"No, the person leading this club is a former agent. These are the case files he brought with him."

"Oh", my dad says and holds up the palm of his hand for a pen. I hand him one with cute strawberries on them and watch as he signs it. "Why the sudden interest in a club like this Ivy?"

"My teacher recommended me to do something like this for an assignment", I say in response. I don't tell him it was from the class I failed last year because he doesn't even know I failed a class in the first place. I didn't want to disappoint him so I hid my report card from him. When he asked about it, I told him I did good as always and he congratulated me. How could I tell my father I failed a class when we had a running joke on how naturally smart I was?

"Is this club going to be graphic?", my dad asks and I start to shake my head. I stop though when Jameson's voice rings through my mind: This club is very heavy. I was guessing we would be talking about more things in this club than I thought. More heavier topics.

I shrug instead,"Maybe." My dad gives me a long look before saying,"I'm proud of you, Ivory." My heart melts at his words and tears start to rise from the back of my eye. This sentence was said to the same girl who went to bed screaming at herself to become better. But my dad already thinks I was perfect and that makes it even worse. He didn't know the version of me who snaps at everything anyone says. The version of me who lets people get bullied when I could've had a say. When I could've stopped it.