My Son's Girlfriend Destroyed My Family novel · Chapter 17 of 24

Chapter 17: The Only Door

I walked down the gravel to the gate with my arms folded and Bernice three steps behind me.

Shelby sat in her white car with both hands on the wheel.

She rolled the window down before I reached her.

She was wearing yesterday's blouse, and her ponytail had been put up in a hurry.

"I'm not here to fight," she said.

"You can't be on my land."

"I know. I'm at the gate. The gate's on the road."

Bernice made a small noise behind me, because that was technically true.

"What do you want?" I said.

"Dad won't answer my calls."

"He's not here. I put him out an hour ago."

Something crossed her face, quick and bare.

I did not know what to call it, so I left it alone.

"The hospital's sent my name to the state board," Shelby said. "The sheriff has a deputy coming to take my statement on your complaint. My union man says to take a plea and keep my mouth shut. My mother is not speaking to me."

"I'm sorry about your mother."

"Don't be sorry. Be useful." She said it almost without heat. "I want what I was owed. A seat at a table. His name said out loud in a room where nobody flinches. One person who says they're glad I'm here."

"You want a family."

"I want the one I was cheated out of."

I looked at her for a long time.

She was twenty-six and she had a white streak like my son's, and she had lived her whole life waiting on a man who didn't come.

I had thought about her all night, and I had not once wanted to like her.

"I can't give you that," I said. "I don't have it to give. Alan gave you envelopes. I can't make up for what he didn't hand over."

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