Chapter 25 Daddy’s Home （Margot）
DADDY’S HOME (MARGOT)
Weeks Later
If I keep holding my breath, I’m going to pass out.
Here, right now, in my parents’ extravagant living room, before we accomplish anything.
Right in front of Hattie and Ethan, who flew down to be with us today. Right in front of Ares, too, Gramps’ adorably ancient basset hound who now lives with the happy couple. He sprawls at our feet, somewhere between napping and giving us the saddest puppy dog eyes.
They’re on one side and Kane sits on my other side, holding my hand. Not caring that I’m gripping his palm so hard it would be bone-crushing with a man who doesn’t have tiger paws for hands.
God.
Waiting, that’s the hardest part.
At least Hattie looks happy today. Her hair’s pulled up in a messy bun and she has the widest grin on her face. Probably because they’ve been spending plenty of time hitting the New York bookstores to find more inspiration for her shop.
She’s an easy girl and she loves to rattle off her bookish finds.
All it takes is books and a doting husband.
“I honestly didn’t see it taking off as well as it did,” Hattie says, her shoulder leaning against Ethan’s in silent support. His hand rests on her thigh.
I try not to smile.
I’ve never seen my big brother act the way he does with her.
She’s softened the first-class asshat, turning him back into the boy I remembered, before he became a teenage dickhead sideswiped by tragedy.
But those days are behind him, and his eyes flick to mine, then to Kane, cold and assessing.
It’s the first time they’ve met.
Not under ideal circumstances, either.
“But get this, I got Gwen Lynn and M.E. Court coming in to do a mother-daughter signing next week! Two famous authors,” Hattie chatters.
I love her, and I don’t mind her book freakout today. It helps things feel less awkward.
“That’s going to be a big signing, Hat-girl. Are you sure you’ll have the space?”
“Oh, man, I hope! You wouldn’t believe how far some people will travel to get their books signed,” Hattie says.
“Not just fans, but other authors and influencers.” She sighs, stars dancing in her eyes.
“Gwen was so cool on the phone. Her latest hero is based on her hubby, Miller, that hardass whistleblower from that weird organ harvesting thing? He’s got the daddy vibe down, a lot like your—”
Kane stares at her.
“Um, never mind.” Blushing, Hattie beams at me knowingly.
“I wish real estate moved on TikTok half as easily as books,” Ethan grumbles. It’s the first time he’s said more than three words since we got here.
“I keep telling you guys to up your social media game,” Hattie says pointedly. “People love pretty places almost as much as they do books. You need to send your Reels to fewer rich dudes and more to their ladies.”
I laugh and shake my head.
It’s too adorable, watching my best friend lay on the business advice for my billionaire brother. They make a good pair.
I can see the amusement flashing behind his stern eyes.
“But he’ll figure it out. Blackthorn Holdings is killing it lately, like Leo never left. Right, hubby?”
“Yes, even if my wife might wind up more famous than I am,” Ethan says, dropping a kiss on the tip of her nose. “Never change, Pages. Don’t give me a chance to keep up.”
When Hattie stops batting her eyes, Ethan gives me a guarded look.
We both remember why we’re here.
Hattie and Kane know what this is and what it means, but they can’t feel it like we do.
Only Ethan and I can sense the hundred-ton boulder on our backs.
Kane’s shoulder nudges mine gently.
I grip his hand in both of mine.
My hold tightens when we hear footsteps.
Mom’s clicking heels and Dad’s heavier shuffle coming closer.
It’s so unbearably formal, but that’s the only way my parents do it.
The door opens and Mom walks into the room, followed by Dad.
She quickly flings herself into the chair across from us, with Dad forming up by her side with his hands folded behind his back.
Of the two, it’s Dad who smiles.
Mom is too careful with her face. Sometimes, I wonder how much she really can smile with the endless treatments she’d had to cheat aging.
But when she looks at us, everything she needs to say is in her eyes.
She read the journal.
I handed it over last night along with Grams’ painting and said we’d be here to talk—if there was anything she wants to talk about.
That’s why we’re here for this big family reunion.
To see if there’s anything she wants to say.
To find out if this family can even try to bury its bitter, ugly past.
“Well? Let’s hear it,” Mom says.
“Did you read it?” I ask.
She nods, then shakes her head. “Not all of it, of course. But enough. God knows, I was up half the night with it.” Oddly, she isn’t wearing much makeup today.
She rubs her eyes in a tired, soul-weary way I haven’t seen since childhood.
Ethan looks at me, practically vibrating with tension. Hattie puts a calming hand on his shoulder.
“And?” he asks.
Mom looks between us both.
“What I can’t fathom,” she says, her hands gripping the sides of the chair, “is why that ridiculous, tight-lipped old idiot had to send Margot on a wild goose chase looking for his feelings instead of sharing them while he still could.”
“Mom, that’s not fair. You sent back every letter he tried to give you,” I start, but she holds up a hand.
“But,” she says, “I never imagined him being so… honest, either. Or so eaten up with guilt.” She looks at Dad, who watches her with a soft, worried expression.
“You don’t know the half of it,” Ethan growls, grabbing the small box by his feet and thrusting it at her. “Take a good, long look. He worked his ass off, trying to rebuild the baby shoes your mother made. If you read the journal, you know they lost the originals in the fire.”
Mom takes the box with a sigh and unfolds the loose cardboard on top. She looks down.
For the longest second, her face is completely unreadable.
Dad’s face goes white and he lays his hands on her shoulders.
Look, I still get mad at the way they treated us as kids.
The way we never felt like a priority, but there’s no doubt that they adore each other in their own weird way.
Learning Gramps forced them apart when they were young and Mom defied him and went back to Dad and he accepted the baby she’d conceived with another man in a reckless fling tells me how much love is sacrifice.
Loving Kane taught me the rest.
“All that guilt, all those years,” she hisses to herself. “It must’ve driven him mad. I’m not sure how he was ever good with you kids.”
“He was,” Ethan says sharply, leaving no doubt.
She’s right, it did make PopPop crazy.
He just hid his agony very well.
It’s obvious from his journal, from his obsession with the shoes he broke, that he was consumed with finding a way to repair the family rift created by his pride.
If only to regain a little of the deep, everlasting love he clearly had for my grandmother.
Half the entries in that journal were pondering what he could do to fix all the hurt he caused. Whenever he wasn’t journaling about his art collection or a day out on the water with us kids, he was bleeding.
Ink doesn’t need to be red to look like a murder scene, and this poor, damaged man died a thousand times. He relived losing his wife and his daughter over and over.
No, there won’t be any easy answers about why he makes everyone’s inheritance so difficult. That’s just the kind of tortured weirdo he was.
But he was our weirdo, and I loved him.
Also, I can’t wait to find out what’s in store for my little cousin soon, last on the list to inherit his kind of crazy.
In the end, he was a teacher, and he left us lessons he couldn’t just give us in life.
Gramps couldn’t have known I’d meet Kane at the lake house, but he knew I struggled to slow down, to stop and breathe and find myself.
He called me May. Not just because I resemble Grams, but because he’d laugh and tell me I don’t slow down.
Being at the lake house made me hit pause.
And yes, it brought me Kane, but if he hadn’t been there, I think I still would’ve walked out of there in a better place emotionally. Assuming the Babins didn’t burn my body, of course.
Gramps made a lot of mistakes, no question.
Yet there’s no doubt he loved fiercely.
Just as fiercely as Ethan and Hattie.
Just as fiercely as Kane and me.
Reading his journal with time and space to reflect taught me a lot. It’s given me the chance to understand Gramps in a different way.
The way he and Mom left off, too. She wouldn’t even look at him or come to his big house in Portland to pick us up when those long summers ended.
Ethan leans forward, his hand covering Hattie’s on his shoulder.
“Does that mean you forgive him?” he asks.
The trillion-dollar question.
My breath stalls.
Ares perks up and whines, his thick tail slapping the floor.
Mom dabs her fingers at the thin, wrinkled skin under her eyes. When she drops her hands, I see the moisture gleaming there.
Unexpected and scary.
“Not today. Not yet. I can’t,” she whispers, but there’s something in her voice. Genuine regret? “It’s still too raw. Reading this book, looking at these shoes, they—they beat me to a pulp again. And that man has done enough of that for this lifetime.”
Devastating.
Kane tightens his grip on my hand, his thumb stroking my skin.
Mom looks at me, and her face softens.
“But someday… someday, maybe,” she says. “Maybe I just need time.”
Holy crap.
Nodding, I wipe away a tear with my own shaking hand.
Time.
I can give her that.
We all can, if that’s what she needs.
This isn’t a slamming door.
It’s an opening, one tiny step in the right direction.
“We wanted you to realize how much it meant to him,” Ethan says.
Mom smiles.
“Thank you,” she says simply.
It’s not what we wanted.
No big, dramatic, heartfelt conclusion to tie up everything real neat, but that’s life.
For now, someday is enough.
Someday, we’ll have true closure. An end to the hate, the heartache, and tears between the people we love most.