Paternal and Proud [LAMS Short Story]

XII - Fixing and Fortunate

Frances stayed closed-off for a couple of days. She just really wanted to feel isolated and empty and alone - it was all she'd ever made her friends feel, right? She stayed in her room all hours after school, sometimes not even eating dinner regardless of how hungry she was - she couldn't face her dad after what she'd done to him. She didn't look at Philip or Theodosia. She wasn't good enough to be their friend. They didn't deserve to see someone who had done a part in ruining their lives, so she did everything in her power to avoid them, to disappear from them. Toxic people needed to be cut out of their lives, so she cut herself out.

She thought she was doing perfectly fine, feeling miserable with every step she took and also cynically pleased with the absolutely shriveled, rotten way it made her feel inside. She was getting what she deserved for what she'd done, and she was completely fine with it.

Frances twisted her key through its hole on her front door and lazily opened the door. Turning the bolt so the door locked behind her, she kicked off her shoes and was about to go straight to her room when she saw her father. She hadn't taken a good look at him in an insanely long time. It was almost alien to not talk with her father after school, but, as it was with Philip and Theodosia, she didn't want to make him feel worse by having to talk to someone who'd been so selfish as to take his happiness away from him.

Today, however, he was already looking at her. He had the worst possible look on his face. It was devastated and lonely and all Frances wanted to do was wrap her arms around him and give him a hug that would say more than she ever could to him. He gazed at her, eyes glassy, and Frances almost stumbled with the way it made her heart feel. "Frances, Frances, Fran, I'm sorry," her father murmured, looking down. Frances sucked in a breath, feeling tears sting her eyes, and desperately raced to her room. There she threw herself on the bed, a new feeling in her heart, overwhelming her.

It was a surprisingly... empowering... feeling.

Something she'd never felt before. Was it... confidence?

Or maybe it was determination.

Whatever it was, it sent her adrenaline wild, coursing through her veins as she realized how truly unhappy her father was and how blind she was to it. He was clearly depressed to the point of detriment. And though she saw the desolation and hopelessness in his eyes, she could still see the way he looked at her longingly, lovingly. He loved her. And deep inside, she knew that. She knew it was a dumb thing to remind herself that he loved her. But the more she thought about it, the more she realized it wasn't dumb. She always knew inside that he loved her, but she had always taken it for granted.

And if someone whose life she'd turned upside down for worse still loved her - and not only that, loved her unconditionally - then what was she doing? How could she leave someone behind who still loved her? How could she just push him away like that when he missed her?

The adrenaline was still tingling inside of her, but it had caused her heart to take on a jittery feeling, and she knew that she couldn't just cut herself out of these people's lives. She'd taken enough from them already, and she needed to give back, not take more away.

Because problems couldn't be healed with time, or healed at all, for that matter. They had to be solved and fixed.

And even if Frances had no clue as to how, she was going to fix the problems she'd created.

--

So maybe it wasn't adrenaline in herself. Maybe it was just confidence. It was a lot lighter than anything she'd felt in the past couple of weeks, anyway. It was uplifting and gave her a sense of freedom, a sense that she was going to make things work because there was always a chance that they could go amazingly right.