Page 73 of Their Stormy Reunion

Dammit!

“Fallon, turn that goddamn thing off!” Dad hollered. I heard my parents’ bedroom door slam shut.

I pressed the code necessary to unarm the alarm, and my phone rang. It was the security company. I gave them the security word and told them that it was a false alarm, explaining my mom had her hands full as she came into the house.

I closed the front door and waited for Mom to return to the kitchen. After four or five minutes, I realized I was waiting in vain. Apparently, I was being snubbed.

Fine, just fine. I had work that I needed to get done anyway, but Mom and Dad were pissing me off. It was more than past time for us to have a conversation, Little Grandma was right. I went into my bedroom and grabbed my tablet and sun hat. Nobody ever said I had to create a presentation inside when it was so beautiful outside.

Mom had chosen the perfect spots for the dogwood trees. I pulled one of the lawn chairs under one of them and got to work.

“Fallon?”

I must have been really into things, because I hadn’t even heard the back door open or Mom cross the yard.

I jerked up. Once I had my heartbeat back under control, I gave her a half smile. “Hi, Mom.”

“Can you come inside? Your dad and I would like to talk to you.”

I took a deep breath, then nodded. Dad was waiting at the kitchen table. He was still in the same clothes that he’d been wearing when we’d gone out for lunch.

“Hey, Dad.”

“Hi, Fallon. Why don’t you take a seat.” He motioned to the chair across from him. Mom sat between us. “Your Mom and I have been talking.”

I nodded. I mean, what was there for me to say?

“She’s been talking to me for a while now. Apparently, you two talked a few weeks ago out in the yard, back before you got bit.” He wiped his hand over his face, then looked back up at me. “You know that we wanted a daughter, right?”

“Huh?”

“I mean, all we wanted was a healthy baby. Boy or girl, it didn’t matter.”

I looked over at Mom. She was staring at Dad like she was willing him to say certain things to me. “Yeah, okay. So, you were fine having a daughter,” I nodded. “But I’ve got to tell you, it never felt like you were fine having me as your kid.”

Dad reared back in his chair like I’d taken a slap at him. He looked over at Mom.

“See, I told you,” she said.

“Fallon, of course we were happy with you.”

I swallowed what little spit I had in my mouth. “Were you happy with me, Dad? Because most of the time it seemed like I was a nuisance.”

“Of course I was happy with you. I was just working a lot. Trying to put food on the table. I didn’t have a lot left over to cater to you.”

Anger flared up. “I never asked you to have a tea party with me, Dad. I did ask you to look at a paper of mine when I got an A on it. Not read the damn thing but look at the A at the top of the page. Then I was hoping sometimes you might be able to come to a soccer game of mine one Saturday, since you didn’t work on Saturdays.”

Dad didn’t respond by immediately defending himself. Again he looked over at Mom. Then he turned back to me. “I didn’t look at your papers?” he asked.

“I remember three distinct times you blew me off. All three times I was in elementary school. You can be damn sure by the time I hit middle school I knew better. But by high school I finally did something that made me a superstar in your opinion. You were finally proud of me and showed it.”

Dad brightened. “What did I do?” he asked, as he fell into the trap.

“I brought Michael Rankin home as my boyfriend. You finally had the perfect son you wanted. The captain of the football team. That day you gave me a big hug, then promptly ignored me every day after to focus on Michael.”

“It wasn’t that bad,” my mom defended.

I skewered her with a look. “It wasn’t?”