Chapter 1 - The Night My Father Walked Away
The last thing I remembered before the hospital was Vanessa screaming.
The next thing I remembered was the smell of disinfectant.
Everything between those moments came back in fragments.
Rain against the windows.
A glass bowl hitting the floor.
Vanessa shouting that I was just like my mother.
My own voice telling her to stop.
Then the sharp pain above my eyebrow.
After that, nothing.
When I opened my eyes in the emergency room, my father was standing beside the bed.
For one hopeful second, I thought he had come to apologize.
I was wrong.
His face looked unfamiliar.
Cold.
Disappointed.
“You attacked Vanessa.”
I shook my head.
“No.”
“She says you pushed her.”
“I didn't.”
“She has a cut on her hand.”
“She broke the bowl.”
He stared at me.
“You expect me to believe that?”
I wanted to scream.
Instead, I whispered,
“Yes.”
Because he was my dad.
He was supposed to believe me.
Vanessa sat behind him, her hand wrapped in gauze.
She looked exhausted.
She looked innocent.
She looked like the perfect wife.
And I suddenly understood that none of those things mattered.
My father had already chosen.
The doctor had told him I needed observation because I had been disoriented after hitting my head.
Dad didn't care.
He turned toward the door.
I thought he was leaving to speak privately with the doctor.
Then he stopped.
He looked at me.
“Don't ever come back.”
My heart stopped.
“Dad?”
“We're done.”
The doors closed.
I stayed completely still.
I didn't cry.
At least not at first.
Instead, I reached into my hoodie pocket.
Rachel's letter was still there.
The paper was damp from the rain and wrinkled from my grip.
I unfolded it.
My mother's handwriting stared back at me.
If you ever need the truth, call Grandpa Thomas.
There was a phone number beneath it.
I had been afraid to call.
Now I had nothing left to lose.
I dialed.
The phone rang once.
Twice.
Three times.
Then a man's voice answered.
“Hello?”
I couldn't speak.
“Hello?”
My throat tightened.
“Are you Thomas Mercer?”
Silence.
Then his voice changed.
“Who is this?”
I whispered my name.
Another silence.
Longer this time.
Then he said,
“Where are you?”
“The hospital.”
“What hospital?”
I told him.
He didn't ask why.
He simply said,
“Stay where you are.”
Twenty minutes later, he arrived.
And Denise dropped her clipboard.
I didn't know then that the man beside my bed had spent eight years being officially dead.
I didn't know he had once been one of the most powerful judges in Ohio.
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And I certainly didn't know that my mother hadn't abandoned me.
She had been trying to save me.
