Blue 2

Chapter Four

What the actual hell is happening? I rub at my eyes again, willing away this scene playing in front of my eyes. But when I pull my white-knuckled hands away from my wide eyes, they are still making out on the kitchen counter. I'm so speechless, I don't even make a sound as I watch Lyra widen her legs and my dad's hands trail down her sides.

Somewhere between gawking and trying to find the right words, I make a gasp that finally makes them aware of my presence. Aunt Lyra's eyes pop open and she shoves my dad back a few inches. He starts to question her, putting his hands on her bare thighs, but she whispers to him and he whips around. His blue eyes go wide and his stubbly cheeks flush bright red. He's embarrassed. Well, join the club.

"Lily! Um..." Lyra says, her voice high with hysteria as her shaky fingers close up her button-down blouse. Dad tries to pull her black skirt up her thighs but stops when I gasp obnoxiously loud. He isn't seriously touching her after what I just walked in on, is he? Flushing even harder, he steps away from her and avoids my wide eyes.

"I know this is not what you were expecting, but—" Dad starts to say. I hold my hands up and shake my head, silencing them. I need to gather my thoughts and connect them to my mouth. What I really need to do is sit down, I feel like I'm going to pass out. But I can't move my legs, I can't even get my mouth to work. I just keep looking back and forth between them, trying to piece together a puzzle I didn't even know existed.

"What did I just...?" I say, grabbing the first words that come to my jumbled brain. "You two are..." I try again, but it isn't right. I just cannot make sense of any of this. I turn around and push my face into my trembling hands. I can't even look at them right now.

I thought I would come home to them watching The Devil Wears Prada—Lyra's favorite movie—and waiting for me with a bowl of popcorn and fuzzy socks. Not them making out on the counter, seconds away from having sex! The thought makes me throw up a little in my mouth, and I have to inhale and exhale deeply to avoid puking on the kitchen floor.

"Butterfly, this isn't what you think it is..." Dad has the nerve to say.

Anger displaces my shock as I quickly turn around. He's picking his red plaid shirt off the floor while she's looking around like she's planning to flee the country. I repeat his words in my head on a loop, dissecting them. The more I think about it, the more upset I get.

"This is exactly what I think it is: my aunt and dad are having an affair!" I snap, disregarding Lyra's glossy eyes. "She is married, has been for almost twenty years. Twenty... This looks like this has been going on for a while, let me ask: how long, exactly?" I seethe at my dad.

He opens his mouth, then closes it, quietly answering my question.

"Oh my god." Tears form in my eyes despite the rage boiling in my stomach. "You two have been going around uncle Henry's back for twenty years and mom's, too. Is that the reason you left? Because you two are disgustingly selfish people?" My voice raises, surprising myself and them. I have never yelled at either of them or been even a little furious with them in my entire life. But I didn't know they were lying to me my whole life.

"Hey! You can't talk to us like that." Dad's voice is firm and sends a chill down my back, but only because he's never looked at me this way, like I have no right to call out their messed-up antics. Like I'm not his daughter, whom he's raised with the person that could be the reason why my mom left us in the first place.

"I can talk to you however I want!" I yell, and he flinches back. "You two have been going around doing this—" I gesture to their haphazardly placed clothes. "—for twenty years, or more! Lying for eighteen, almost nineteen years to me." I pause, realization hitting me hard. "You were cheating on mom, weren't you?" I sob. Lyra opens her mouth, tears streaming down her beautiful face. I take a step backward and look at dad, ignoring her hurt expression.