My mother grabs my hand, pulling me away, and I feel the way she’s trembling. But I can’t take my eyes off of Emerson, the anger and hatred dripping from his expression and the tone in his voice.
He looks unhinged as his brow furrows even more. “Watch your mouth, you piece of shit.”
“You make me sick,” my dad snaps.
“Both of you, stop!” I scream, coming toward them.
“Stay away from him, Charlie. Call the police,” my dad snarls, but Emerson shoves him back up against the wall.
“Please, stop,” I beg, wrapping a hand around Emerson’s arm. When he glances down at me, there’s a hint of softness in his eyes. And he seems to struggle with his next breath as he lets out a heavy sigh. Carefully, he pulls his hands away from my dad’s shirt and backs away. The moment is wrought with tension as the two men stare daggers at each other.
“Gwen, did you know this forty-year-old man has been doing…God knows what with our daughter?”
“Dad, please stop,” I beg, the humiliation washing over me again. A large hand rests against my back, and I lean into his comfort.
My mother scoffs. “Yes, Jimmy, I knew. He came to Sophie’s birthday party.”
There’s a brief moment of shock and confusion on my father’s face as he looks between her and him and me. I can see all of the things Emerson wants to say to my dad just hanging on his lips.
I feel like I can barely move. Like one wrong word or move and everything between them will explode.
“Why didn’t I know about this party?” my dad replies.
“Because you weren’t invited,” my mother snaps back in a clipped tone. I’ve never heard her talk to him like that, and I sort of love her for it. Go Mom.
“I think you should leave,” Emerson growls.
“Me? This is my house, asshole.”
“I don’t think your family wants you here right now while you’re acting like this,” Emerson says with a level tone. “So why don’t you leave and calm down. Come back when you can talk like a real man.”
Neither of the men move, and it feels like there’s a ticking time bomb between them.
“A real man?” my dad replies with a scoff. “You think you’re a real man? Manipulating young girls. I know all about your disgusting club, and my daughter deserves far better than you, you sick fuck.”
“Hey!” another voice yells from the fence line, and we all turn in unison to see Beau standing by the gate. My mouth hits the ground as I watch him march toward my father with a look of pure rage on his face. “Don’t talk to my dad like that.”
Emotion claws at my throat, like someone is sitting on my chest, and when I look at Emerson, I see the way his expression changes too. The anger fades and the shame beneath it shows through.
My dad, on the other hand, is laughing.
“Your dad?” he asks. “I’m sorry, but weren’t you dating my daughter first? You’re telling me you’re fine with him taking your girl? What kind of fucked-up family are you?”
“Yeah, well, at least my dad calls me and gives a shit about me and didn’t abandon me when I needed him most,” Beau replies, and my eyes widen in shock. I reach out a hand to calm him, because at the moment, he looks like he wants to punch a hole through my dad’s face. But the words coming out of his mouth make me pause. Is he…standing up for Emerson?
“Son,” Emerson says, reaching a hand out to calm Beau, “it’s fine.”
“No, it’s not,” Beau cuts back. “I’m not gonna stand here and let this ignorant prick treat Charlie like shit, treat you like shit, and act like he’s so much better than you.”
“You guys should just leave,” my dad snaps, and I look over at my mom. She sends me an apologetic look before turning to my dad.
“No, Jimmy. You should leave. Emerson was right. Come back when you’re calm and want to talk, but you’ve caused enough drama for the girls today.”
“I’m not leaving you with this pervert,” he argues, motioning to Emerson. Beau and I both react with an argument, but Emerson only holds his hand up to stop us.
Then, he looks right at my dad and takes a long, steadying breath.
“You know what, you’re right. I do own a club downtown, and I do take your daughter there, but I haven’t brainwashed her, or manipulated her, or hurt her in any way. And I’m not ashamed. You think you know what’s right for your daughters, but you have no idea. You just want them to live how you think they should live, and you’re so self-righteous, you’ve lost your family because of it.
“I may not be the best father in the world, but I’d choose my kid’s happiness over mine every time. And I know for a fact that you could never love Charlie as much as I do. Not if you could stand being away from her for a single day.”
I feel the air leave my lungs as those words leave his lips, my heart nearly exploding in my chest. I realize at this moment just how much I love him, how much I’ve changed since he started loving me, and how everything we’ve fought about until this moment is trivial. It becomes strikingly clear in this moment—Emerson means everything to me.
RULE #37: DON’T APOLOGIZE FOR SHIT YOU’RE NOT SORRY FOR.
Emerson
Beau and I were in the car together, a small miracle in itself, when we got a call from Sophie. Charlotte must have given her my number after I gave her the Anime Fest tickets for her birthday because she texted me a few days later to thank me for them. Thank God Beau and I were only a few minutes away. Her frightened sounding voice nearly had me crashing on the road as I sped toward her house. She said her dad showed up out of the blue and was yelling at Charlie, and that she was scared.
She was scared of her father, so she called me. It makes me hate that asshole even more when I think about it.
It’s nearly impossible to keep my words to this human piece of garbage civil, but that’s what Charlie and her mother and her sister deserve right now. So I tell him everything. We might as well lay it all on the line now.
I’m not ashamed of who I am or what I do.
And I love Charlie.
And…I don’t even have the guts to look at her face as the words come tumbling out of my mouth.
“Enough!”
It’s Sophie’s young voice that breaks the tension, just as her dad opens his mouth, ready to argue with me. We all stare at the feisty blue-haired teenager as she stomps out to the yard. I see so much of Charlie in her—fearless and reckless and smart as hell.
“Dad, Mom’s right. You should just leave. I was the one to call Emerson because you scared me when you showed up,” she says, staring at him with a look of fierceness in her eyes that makes my chest swell with pride.
Charlie’s head snaps up to stare at me in shock. “Sophie called you?”
I nod. When I look at her father, I notice that for the first time since I got here, he looks more remorseful than angry. His eyes are glued to Sophie, and his brows are pinched together. He looks seriously wrung out, but I recognize the emotion written in his features—a father’s guilt.
“Dad…” Charlie says, stealing his attention. When he finally looks toward her, his eyes moist and apologetic, she continues, “I’m not ashamed of who I’m dating or what I’m doing, and it may be hard for you to believe, but Emerson didn’t do anything wrong. I’m tired of everyone acting like they know what’s best for me. I’m twenty-one years old, and I’m not stupid or too young to know what I want.”
Her small hand finds mine, intertwining our fingers, and it takes everything in me not to gather her up in my arms and kiss her harder than I’ve ever kissed her before.
“You chose to leave, and you have no right to talk to me the way you did today. If you had been around the last year, maybe you’d see that I have never been happier than I was the last three months.”
I can’t help myself now. I pull her against me, resting her against my chest as I wrap my arms around her, kissing the top of her head.
“Gwen, you’re really going to allow this?” he asks, still putting up a fight, but Charlotte’s mother just lets out a heavy sigh.