This Time Around(60)

We have unfinished business.

*****

When Reid calls me the next day with the news, I don’t even know what to think or how to feel. This man wasn’t a good person. In fact, prison was where he belonged, but now that he’s dead, I don’t feel any satisfaction. I guess dead or alive, there will always be a part of me that he’s destroyed.

“How did he die?” Sephie asks boldly, a blank look on her face.

“Someone stabbed him,” I mutter, looking down at my hands.

“Am I a bad person because I don’t feel anything?” Sephie asks, looking out the window.

Taiya puts her arm around her. “You don’t remember him, so no, it doesn’t make you a bad person.” Plus he was an asshole. Taiya is just too nice to bring that up right now. I wonder if Dad knew something was going to go down, that’s why he told us about Sephie. I don’t know if I’m trying to find good where there is none, but it’s the only reason I can think of. Either way, all is well in the world. Sephie is safe with us and my father is… well, gone. To hell I assume.

Taiya watches me carefully, as if waiting for me to react. However, I don’t think I have anything in me, other than a pang in my stomach, and a whole bunch of ‘what ifs.’ If only he could have been the father we needed, but he wasn’t. And this is the end of that chapter. Reid and Summer come over, and we all hang out, order in Chinese and watch bad movies. We’re just around each other, no words needed. We aren’t exactly mourning, more like getting closure from a bad situation that has been a part of our lives since the day we were born. Since the day our mother was killed. I look around at the faces around me, and feel thankful. I look into Taiya’s eyes and know this is exactly where I’m meant to be.

I’m one lucky son of a bitch.