Page 69 of The I Do Over

“You’re imagining things.”

“Am I? Because it all makes sense,” he explained. “You were always a confident and outgoing girl. The way you reacted the day we got back from Maryland was completely out of character for you. Looking back now after what I just witnessed, I can almost understand why you lied; if your father was abusive, I imagine having him freak out the way he did was a trigger for you. But now? Now you’re an adult and I was right here beside you. There wasn’t anything he could’ve done to you!”

“You don’t know what you’re talking about, Knox. Trust me. My father wasn’t physically abusive. He was just…” She paused. “He just knew how to say things to get people to do what he wanted.”

“So he was verbally abusive.”

“That’s not…”

“That’s exactly what you’re saying,” he argued. “Maddie, you were afraid of him then and obviously you’re still afraid of him. This was the perfect opportunity for you to set the record straight and make things right and instead of doing that, you just…you caved. You blew it all off like it wasn’t a big deal when you know this is a big deal!”

“To you!” she cried. “It’s still a big thing to you. I’ve apologized and done everything I could to make things right, but it’s not enough.” She shook her head. “It’s never going to be enough.”

Knox wanted to tell her she was wrong, but…she wasn’t.

“It hurt when you didn’t defend me seventeen years ago, and it hurts just as much now,” he said solemnly. “I can’t…” Pausing, he cleared his throat. “It was already going to be a struggle to deal with your parents, Maddie. In a perfect world, I’d never have to see or speak to either of them ever again.”

“That’s insane! They’re my parents, Knox! That’s never going to change.”

“I realize that. But knowing that you still won’t tell them the truth about me? About us? I can’t go there again. Not even for you.”

Slowly, Knox came to his feet and looked around. He hadn’t brought his luggage in earlier and they hadn’t gotten to the point where he was leaving any of his things here in between visits. That meant he could walk out the door and not look back.

“Knox, please,” Maddie began, and he didn’t even have to look at her to know that she was crying. “Twenty minutes ago, I was throwing up my lunch! I’m exhausted and feel like crap. You can’t possibly hold it against me that I wasn’t feeling up to fighting with my own father.”

Now he did look at her. “Here’s the thing. It’s always going to be something. You panicked, you weren’t feeling well, you wrote letters…” He growled with frustration. “You picked your father over me! You pick everyone over me! And I, like an idiot, was willing to try again! I was confident that given the opportunity, you would pick me.”

Maddie slowly stood. “I did pick you! You sat right there and heard me ask him to leave! I asked him to apologize to you! You can’t just pick and choose which part of the argument makes you feel better!”

“Yes, I can,” he countered. “And do you know why? It’s because the big issue—the issue that started all of this—is the one that you wouldn’t fight for. If your dad had shown up here and acted like a normal human being and the subject didn’t come up, it would be one thing. But it did come up, Maddie. It specifically came up, and he hurled the same accusations and you didn’t correct him.” He dropped his hands to his side and felt an overwhelming sense of sadness. “I trusted you. Hell, my friends warned me about this sort of thing and I defended you.”

“Your friends…?”

“They said you would choose your parents over me.” Then he shook his head. “No, when I said if the situation arose where you’d have to choose, that you’d pick me. And you didn’t.”

“I did! Dammit, Knox, you’re not being fair!”

Forcing himself to look away, he slowly walked toward the front door. He’d been swayed by her tears too many times in the past. When was he going to learn?

Turning, he faced her one last time. “I fought for you with everything I had in me then and I was prepared to do it again right here in this house, but I can’t be the only one. I just can’t.”

And with that, he walked out.

He felt numb as he got into his car and his mind was a complete blank for the first thirty minutes.

Then the silence was loud enough to make him crazy, and he knew he needed to talk to someone. He contemplated calling Xander or Daniel but he felt like too big of a loser right now to risk hearing either of them say “I told you so.”

So he did something he hadn’t done in a long time.

He called his parents.

Maybe they would be able to give him the comfort he so desperately needed.

“Knox!” his mother said cheerily. “What a surprise! How are you, sweetheart?”

“Not great,” he said, surprising himself.

“Oh my goodness. I can hear it in your voice. What’s going on?”

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