Page 84 of Family Bonds- Kelsey & Van

Even if it was the truth.

“Sorry,” he said.

“Do you think you’re like your grandfather?” she asked. “Is that what is bothering you?”

“Maybe,” he said.

She was going to go with it since he was opening up.

“Barry wasn’t a horrible person. I don’t think you are either.”

“Gee,” he said. “Thanks for that. I’ll take not a horrible person. It’s better than being an asshole or a dick.”

“Very funny,” she said.

“I wasn’t trying to be.”

“Neither was I. Why don’t you open up envelope number three? It might give you a better idea of things. You know where the pictures came from. To me that showed he was trying. That he thought of your mother often.”

“I think that is what my grandfather wants. He wants me to know he’d done his part for years. But then I have to ask myself if his part was enough. I would have loved for my mother to have a different life.”

“You can’t control those things,” she said. “Do you think your mother would have left your father? You were an adult in law enforcement. If your mother wanted to leave, she had a way out. Not even back to her father, but just with you.”

He let out a big sigh. “You think I haven’t thought of that? I just don’t know why she stayed.”

“Maybe she wasn’t as unhappy as you thought?”

“That is only going to piss me off,” he said.

“I’m not trying to get in a fight with you,” she said. “I just commented.”

“I think my mother and my grandfather shared a lot of genetics. One of them was being stubborn.”

“Like the one big gene that is overtaking your body?” she asked.

“Most likely,” he said, turning to look at her. There was silence for a minute. “Do you want me to open another envelope?”

“Of course I do,” she said. “But it’s not what I want. It’s what you want. If it were me I wouldn’t have waited as long as you to do anything. I can’t. It’s like putting Christmas gifts in front of me and telling me I have to wait six months to open them. Nope. I’m lucky if I can wait six minutes.”

He stood up and walked back into the house and she jumped up to follow, Frankie doing the same.

He went to his office, opened a drawer and pulled out an envelope.

“Here,” he said. “You open it.”

“Why me?” she asked. “You should do it.”

“Maybe I need the emotional support.”

It was the smirk on his face that told her now he was being a wise guy.

But deep down she did wonder if he truly needed it and could only ask it in that context.

She took it out of his hand. “You’ve got three seconds to change your mind; otherwise the contents will be out.”

She counted to three and he said nothing so she opened it. It was newspaper articles. Some old, some more recent and printed out as if they’d been read online.

The first one was a picture of Van playing basketball. “You’ve got some moves.”

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