A Timeless Place

Chapter 54

"You departed from my sight
and entered my thoughts,
traveled from my eyes
to my heart."

- Al-Abbas Ibn Al-Afhanf

Breakthroughs and Break-ins

After dropping Eli home, I eagerly headed home with the party planning folder in my lap. There was no point in sleeping when school would start in only a few hours so I might as well study the contents of the folder to plan the amount of work to be done.

I creaked the front door open and quietly snuck through the house. My toes had nearly reached the bottom stair when the light in the living room turned on. I jumped, spinning around to face whoever had broken in.

"Dad?" I exclaimed in surprise at the figure seated on the couch. There was a light blanket sprawled on the couch. Had he been sleeping here?

"Is everything okay?" my eyebrows knitted together at the sight of him. "Why are you still awake?"

"I could ask you the same question, missy," his voice grew stern as he stood up to look at me. My heart quickened its pace. I was so absorbed in the whole burglary escapade that I forgot dad had come home to an empty house from the restaurant. "I came home and you weren't here! Where have you been?"

"I was at Eli's," I lied.

"Until this late hour?" dad crossed his arms at me.

I opened my mouth to say something- anything to justify myself but dad spoke again before I could.

"Cath, I saw how you reacted with Laurina today. I thought you agreed to give her another chance. Instead you're acting out again."

"Again?" I raised an eyebrow at him.

"You did the exact same thing after your mother died," dad grew sterner. "You would run off and come home in the middle of the night and no one would know where you'd gone!"

I fell aback at the sternness in his voice. He was back for only a few days and he was already ordering me around and reprimanding me! If he was going to take the path of an assertive father in compensating for his years of absence, then I would surely have a thing or two to say!

"I agreed to dinner, not a life-changing decision," I stood my ground stubbornly.

"Look," dad sighed, running a hand through his hair. The light fell upon the tired wrinkles on his face, ageing him more than he deserved. "I know I haven't been the best role model. But I don't want to teach you that it's okay to walk out when you don't like how things are. It wasn't right when I did it. And it's not right for you to do it. If you don't like Laurina, you stay and work it out. Got it?"

My heart skipped a beat and my anger faltered. So this was what he thought it was about? That I was acting out by doing exactly what he had been doing for the past few years- walking out. As though this was all some petty revenge scheme.

"Dad, I didn't leave because of you and Laurina," I told him gently. "It was something else."

He sighed and sat down on the couch, indicating for me to sit next to him, "Then talk to me about it."

I sat down and gulped guilty. I knew I was only avoiding the topic of Laurina by simply exchanging one problem for another. But for now, I could only handle with one problem at a time.

"When I went outside for some fresh air, I ran into Wes," I explained.

"And?" dad didn't see the problem.