Daughter of the Refuge

Epilogue

Father,

That is the last time that word will ever fall from my lips. 

Do you know what love is? Have you felt it? Has it burnt you with it's painful sting, and comforted you with it's blanket of warmth? Because in all my life never once have I seen a sliver of the delicate and gentle, fiery and passionate emotion shine through your words or actions. 

Mother always said you loved in your own way. But what way was that? The same way that you abused and tortured children until they were inches from their death? Or what about when you would leave me lying out in the cold, dead of winter with nothing but the clothes on my back? What about when you killed Mother? Was that your way of loving? 

No, I don't believe that you are capable of love. Maybe at one point, but I've given up hope that even that is true. 

I used to spend my nights dreaming of a father who would hold me and love me and sing me to sleep only to wake up to my dark, brutal reality. I only ever wanted a father who would loved me. But if there is ever one thing that you taught me, it's that I don't need you. I don't need your love, I don't need your shoulder to cry on, I don't need you to pick me up out of the dirt when I fall, and I don't need you to save me. 

So thank you, for making me believe that I can do it on my own. It was awful, it was painful, it was lonely, and sometimes I would rather die than walk that path again, but I did it. 

Do you remember the children? Do you remember their faces, their screams, their tears, their terror? Do you feel any remorse? Or are you as heartless as I truly remember? 

This letter is not to be replied to. I don't want an answer to these questioned because after years of wondering I have finally found myself satisfied with never knowing. I was never meant to know. No, this letter is a closing between you and me. I will no longer be known as your daughter and you will no longer be known as my father. I am done with being tied to a name that finds joy in the torture of others. 

Threaten me, hurt me, kill me, but you keep away from my friends. I don't care what prejudices you have between the Newsies, but murdering innocent people to get your revenge is wrong. But you don't care about what's right and what's wrong. You touch another one of those kids and I will kill you before you ever see me coming. 

Goodbye.

- Samantha A. Snyder 

P. S. I know you didn't ever care for me, no matter how many lies Mother made up, but I've made resolution with that fact. 

Nigel Snyder set the letter aside and opened the small box that had come with the anonymous delivery. It was nothing special, a simple wooden box made by hand. As he pulled off the lid, for the first time since he had lost his wife, he felt remorse. 

Snyder had long ago mastered the art of closing himself off from any and all emotions. With a job like his, he had no choice. There had been times when he had taken his role too far, but he never blinked an eye and it never kept him up at night, nor did it haunt his dreams. No, he knew how to kill a brother and walk away like he had just thrown away his trash.

But something about the letter from his daughter shook him. She meant every word and he knew it. Hard as she tried to deny it, Samantha was exactly like her father: she spoke the truth with all the harsh brutality it possessed. She had chosen those wretched newsboys without knowing the truth, but there was nothing he could do. 

So as he picked up the piece of glass that lay at the bottom of the box, a wicked smile crossed his face. She was a smart girl, always had been. And nothing he had ever done to her has doused her flame. Sure it sputtered and there were times where he had held his breath, doubting that she would be able to pull through, but she did, every time, with a startling tenacity  

He turned the glass over in his hand, his mind remembering that night better than he could remember what he had eaten for breakfast that morning. 

He allowed one shot of guilt, just one, before he closed himself off, picking up a pen and scratching one sentence into a piece of paper. He signed his name, slipped it into an enveloped and laid it upon his desk. 

He had a job to complete, and nothing his daughter did would prevent him from finishing it. 

Samantha, 

Remember what I taught you: nothing is ever what it seems. 

- Your father

THE END