In The Bleak Midwinter | T Shelby

FORTY - FORGIVENESS

Aberama knocked on Kaia's bedroom door, pausing for a moment before slowly pushing it open, peering around the wood.

Kaia was sat on the bed, her knees hugged to her chest and tears flooding down her face. She looked up at her father when the door opened, her eyes bloodshot and her bottom lip quivering.

"Kaia, darling, what's wrong?" Aberama walked over to her, sitting down beside her on the bed and resting his arm across her shoulders, pulling her into his chest tightly.

"The walls and floors in this house are thin," she sniffed, "I heard everything that you said."

Aberama sighed, looking his daughter in the eyes and wiping the tears from her pale face with his thumbs. It pained him to see her cry, especially when it was his own fault.

"I'm so sorry, Kaia." He said, his face full of sorrow.

"Is that what you really think?" She asked, "You think you're not a good enough father?"

He bit down on his lip in thought, worried about what to say. He knew she'd heard everything he and Thomas had said, and he also knew that while Tommy sat downstairs waiting, he could hear everything they were saying above him.

"I should've tried harder with you, Kaia. It wasn't easy for me when your mother died, and that's not an excuse, I know, but I struggled."

Kaia just shook her head and wrapped her arms around her father's shoulders, hugging him tightly as she cried. Listening to the words he'd said downstairs to Tommy had broken her heart. Kaia adored her father, her family were the only thing that truly meant something to her, to hear him think he hadn't done a good enough job at raising her made her feel like her whole world had just shattered.

"Dad," she whispered, "I couldn't have asked for a better father, you gave me everything I ever needed, Bonnie and I were so happy growing up, you know that."

She watched as her father blinked back tears, taking Bonnie's blanket and resting it around both of their shoulders, huddling together in the glow of the late afternoon through the window.

"I'm just worried I've taught you the wrong thing, I wish I could've shown you more how much I love you, Kaia, I just didn't know how."

Kaia gave her father a sad smile, tilting her head to the side.

"You did show me, dad. I'm brave like you, strong and confident, I'm independent, just like you. Can't you see that it was you who raised me to be like this? It was you that told me that if I got pushed around at school to push back harder, that I could do anything I set my mind to because I was capable of anything in the world, do you not remember that?"

Aberama did remember. He remembered the day Kaia came home from school crying with a cut on her knee when a boy had pushed her over. He cleaned her up and sat her down by the fireplace, telling her that if he ever touched her again, to kick him where it hurt, and she did. The next day Bonnie came running in the door after school, laughing as he told his dad how Kaia had floored the boy that had hurt her, to which his little girl shrugged her shoulders and said, 'I did what you told me, Dad.' He'd never been prouder.

"You taught me that not everybody is worthy of me, that I deserve the best and not to take shit from anybody, that's why I don't open up to people, Dad. It is because of you, because of the values you instilled in me growing up that I love about myself, not because you weren't good enough, because you were more than good enough to me."

He swallowed the lump rising in his throat as he listened to his daughter speak. For the first time in his life, he didn't see his wife in her, he saw himself. He'd always thought that Kaia was just like her mother, both inside and out, but it was in that moment that he realised she really was just like him.

"God, Kaia," Aberama laughed through his tears and held his daughter close to his chest, kissing through her hair, "I love you so much, alright? Do you know that? I'm so proud of you."

"I love you too, Dad." She pushed back a strand of his hair that had fallen down his face, "But you have to believe in yourself, otherwise how can I?"

He shook his head with a smile, "You're so much wiser than me."

"Maybe that's one thing I did get from mum."

They stayed wrapped in Bonnie's blanket for a while longer, laughing as their tears dried, looking through the photo album on their laps. There were photographs of Aberama and Kaia together scattered across all the pages, both of them beaming with their faces beside each other. It had taken him a very long time, but as he sat and reminisced with his daughter, he realised that he was a good enough father, and the regret that had been eating away at him her whole life, had now gone.

"Can I give you some advice? You don't have to listen, I know you have your own mind, your own beautiful mind, but as a father, it's my job to tell you what I think."

Kaia nodded, closing the photo album and placing it to the side of her, the blanket still wrapped tightly around the two of them.

Aberama wasn't sure what was going on inside Kaia's mind. He knew she was hurting, the way she'd withdrawn into herself told him that, but it also told him that she still cared for the man downstairs.

"Thomas loves you dearly, sweetheart."

He'd half expected Kaia to roll her eyes at his words, but instead, she grabbed her father's hand, squeezing it tightly inside her own.

"He does?" She whispered, the innocence of a child glowing in her eyes that reminded Aberama that she would always be his little girl, no matter where life took her.

He nodded with a tender smile, "He does, I know he does, I can see it in the way he looks at you, the way he cares about me and about Bonnie, you don't do that if you don't love somebody, Kaia. I know he made a mistake that's hurt you, I know, but as a father, I don't think I could wish for you to be with anybody other than him. He will give his life for you, love you relentlessly, that's all I can hope for."

Kaia's eyes softened and so did her heart. She thought from the very beginning that her father despised Tommy Shelby and everything to do with his family, especially when Bonnie began working alongside him. Only now, that had clearly changed.

The one thing Kaia had never been taught by her father was forgiveness. Throughout her life, she grew up understanding that it was every man for himself, that everything happens for a reason, and that there are more bad people than there are good. She was never taught to move on, to overlook or be the bigger person, she took everything in her stride and always came out on top by putting herself first.

Though now, it looked like Aberama would have to give his daughter the life lesson of understanding when it is right to forgive someone, something that he should've taught himself a long time ago.

"He is sorry, darling. I know it's hard to forgive, and sometimes you shouldn't, but if you have that feeling inside your heart, that pull on your soul that hurts you even when you sleep, reminding you constantly of him, then it's safe to forgive him."

"And if he hurts me again?" She asked, doe-eyed.

"If he hurts you again, you're strong enough to deal with that, because that's how I raised you, isn't it?"

She smiled at her father, feeling the warmth slowly creeping back into her soul as he looked into her eyes. She felt safe with her father, she always had done, but she also felt safe with Thomas. He made her feel alive, pulsing excitement and passion into her life that she'd never had before. She felt like she belonged in his arms, safe and protected. She couldn't imagine herself feeling like that with anybody else and she knew Thomas couldn't, either.

If soulmates were real, Tommy was definitely hers.

an;;
sorry I feel like there's been tons of dialogue in these past few chapters but that's just the way things have fallen! I hope you've enjoyed nonetheless!