They Never Loved Me. Now I Don't Remember Them. novel · Chapter 6 of 24

Chapter 6: Her Father

Devin and Pearl took stools at the counter, where they could see the booth without hearing it.

I slid in across from my father.

He moved his coat off the seat for me, and his hands were not steady.

"Lydia," he said. "I wasn't sure you'd come."

"Pearl said you wanted me alone."

"Your aunt is here, isn't she." He glanced past my shoulder. "Good. That's good. I'm glad somebody is with you."

"Why are you here, Dad?"

He turned his coffee cup a quarter turn on the saucer.

"Your mother thinks I'm at the hardware store," he said.

"Do you lie to her a lot?"

"No." He almost laughed. "That's the problem. I never lie to her. I just never say anything at all."

The waitress came by, and my father ordered pie he did not touch.

"Last night, at the table," I said when she was gone. "I looked at you. I asked you to look at me."

"I know."

"You didn't."

"I know, sweetheart."

"Why?"

He rubbed his forehead with the heel of his hand.

"Because if I'd looked at you, I would have stood up," he said. "And your mother would have said something very kind, in front of forty people, and I would have sat back down."

I had never heard him say so many words in a row.

"That's worse than not looking," I said.

"Yes. It is."

He reached into his jacket and slid a thick envelope across the table.

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