PRETTYMUCH a Lie [n.m]

Sixty-Five

Nick

The ride home with Amelia's dad was quite entertaining. He asked me a ton of questions back to back about my childhood, parents, and our band.

In return, I asked him about his family, trying my best to avoid the elephant of the conversation, obviously that was Amelia's mother and the whole lying situation.

"So, how long have you known each other? Tell me how you met," he added to his line of questions.

I was dreading this one.

'Umm yeah, I met your party girl of a daughter at a club and I fucked the shit out of her, turned out I forgot a condom and got her pregnant before I even knew her name. Yeah, on top of that we were both wasted out of our minds.'

Yeah, fuck no.

"Well, my band was in Florida for a few days for our concert, we went out to celebrate and I met Amelia there with Alison and a few of her other friends. We just really hit it off and from then on it's kinda just been super easy to talk to her and get to know her. She's a really great person, beautiful in and out," I explained, dancing around the truth, trying to enlighten him on the fact that his daughter was basically perfection.

The fact that I was good at dancing in real life didn't help my case though. I sucked at it verbally.

We should have discussed this before she left; what we were going to use as a reasonably and appropriate answer to this question when any of our family members asked about it.

"The tour that was a few months ago?" he clarified.

"Yes sir."

Damn was it getting hot in this truck.

"So you've only known her for a few months?" he asked drilling me a little more on the subject.

"Yes sir, almost two and a half months ago." I answered honestly this time.

"Hmm, and Amelia is two and a half months pregnant, am I right?" he looked over at me with a stone cold expression.

Shit. Shit. Shit.

"Uh, yes sir," I stuttered out in a low voice.

"Look son, we've all been there before. I remember what those days were like for me," he started after taking a seemingly stressed deep breath.

I hunkered down in the passenger seat praying this ride home would speed up. I could foreshadow a 'man to man' talk coming. I wondered if I opened the door, tucked, and rolled if it would hurt at all? I was willing to test out any theory in order to get out of this conversation. I found myself chatting back and forth with my mind and blocking out Mr. Parker's speech.

The last thing I heard was, "If you ever hurt my daughter, I know where to look for you, and I will find you."

He stared at me for close to a full ten seconds after that.

What scared me the most, was that he wasn't even phased by not looking at the road or where he was driving to for a full ten seconds. That was the longest ten seconds of my life.

"Yes sir," was all I could scrummage out.

"Alright then," he stated and locked his eyes back on the road once again.

As the truck filled with an uncomfortable silence, I decided to speak up again.

"I don't want you to get the wrong impression of me, I love your daughter and I'm going to love her no matter what. We are having a baby and I couldn't be more excited. I was meaning to talk to you about something," I started strong but toned it down toward the end.

"Uhh, I was wondering what your take on Amelia moving here was?" I asked timidly.

Mr. Parker pulled his bright red sunglasses down his nose a bit and looked at me.

"You know I've been thinking about that too," he smiled.

"Really? I mean, I don't know how it would work with her schooling and all, but all I know is it makes me nervous as hell to stay across the United States in California while she is in Florida with my child," I explained.

After a second, I continued, "I just want her closer. I want to be able to protect her. I want to be there for her and the baby."

"I like you, Nick." Is all he said.

He reached up to push his red sunglasses back up the bridge of his nose, focusing on the road again.

"How about I pick you up later for dinner and we can talk, I have to take Steffi to her dance class in a few, so I don't have a lot of time right now."

"That would be great," I replied and continued, "Steffi dances? Maybe I could teach her some moves."

"Ballet," he chuckled but continued, "She would love that though. Although, she does have Brandon posters up in her room. So you might not be the one she would like the lessons from," he finished while scratching his beard.

I laughed lightly, masking the fact that my ego was a bit bruised from an eight year old girl.

Once we finally got back to the house, Mr. Parker told me he would be back around seven to pick me up. I had no idea where we were going either. I was just happy we were on the same page as each other when it came to Amelia. I was also happy that he didn't make a big deal out of exactly how we met. That was a weight lifted off of my chest.

"Fuck you, you piece of shit!"

I stopped in my tracks at the front door when I heard a loud bang come from upstairs. I ran full speed up the stairs and into Zion's room.

"Bro really," I panted, out of breath from running up the stairs.

"Fucking Austin. You fucking cheat all the damn time," Zion huffed as he got up to retrieve his controller from the floor across the room.

I looked over to Austin's tall frame sitting in a bean bag chair hysterically laughing at himself and Zion's overreaction.

"You and this dumb ass game," I chuckled trying to calm my panting down.

Damn, I was out of shape.

"Bro, don't act like you don't love this shit. Come on, let's run it," he said and tossed me a controller.

I couldn't help but sit down.

Soon enough, I was shouting with Zion and Austin into the T.V. screen.

I love Amelia's dad. :)

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-Tay