Chapter Thirty-Four: Closure and Dawn

                                        

                                              

I finally filed for a restraining order against Laura. Her lawyer was already frothing at the mouth by the time we left the courthouse. Apparently, this move had thrown their entire narrative into chaos. Good. Let them scramble. Let them feel even a fraction of the fear, the exhaustion, the sheer erosion of self she had dragged me through. If this weakened their case, all the better. For once, I wasn't thinking like a son or a shield, I was thinking like someone who deserved peace.
I couldn't care less about their reactions. Then, just a few days later, the news broke, the one we'd all been dreading, even though we saw it coming. My father was officially out on bail. The charges weren't disappearing this time. Fraud. Tax evasion. Embezzlement. And whatever new fire Laura's dramatic little deposition had added to the mix. Maybe for the first time in his life, the system wasn't folding neatly around him. Maybe the rot had finally spread too far, even for him to cover.
The trial date was set. His name, once gold-embossed and whispered with reverence in polished halls, was now something to be avoided, muttered only behind closed doors. I'd already decided I would go. I'd made the decision knowing I needed to look him in the eye, one last time, for myself, not for him.
And then, as if on cue, the message from my lawyer arrived: "He wants to see you."
Of course he did. He always did when things started slipping through his fingers. It wasn't even surprising anymore. That twisted part of him that still believed he could call, and I'd come. Not because he deserved it but because some part of me, the part he raised, the part he conditioned, still flinched when his name lit up my screen.
He knew I'd come. He counted on it. Not out of love. That was long gone but out of something deeper. Older. The leftover muscle memory of being his son. Of being the one who held his secrets, covered his tracks, absorbed his silence and his rage like a sponge and called it loyalty.
I hated how automatic it still felt, how the ache in my chest came not from the idea of seeing him, but from knowing I still didn't know how to say no and maybe that was why I said yes. Because somewhere between all the rage and the distance and the trauma, I needed to look him in the eye. I needed to feel nothing. I needed to know that whatever power he had over me was gone. Or going. Or dying, piece by piece, with every court date and every breath I took outside his orbit.
 So I went.
The meeting was set in a downtown legal office, late afternoon. He was already seated when I walked in, alone, for once. No lawyers, no assistants. Just him, hunched slightly over the long oak table. His suit looked expensive but wrinkled. His face was grayer than I remembered, eyes dimmer, like someone had finally turned down the volume on his ego.
For the first time in my life, he looked... old. Not weak, exactly, but dulled. Like power had been drained from his bones and left him hollow. I sat down across from him, slowly. Not out of fear, but because I needed the pause. I needed the breath. My hands curled into fists beneath the table to stop them from trembling.
We stared at each other for a long moment. He looked at me like he always had, no warmth or apology, only calculation.
"You came," he finally said, his voice raspier than I expected. Then, with a half-smile that didn't reach his eyes, he added, " I knew you would."
I exhaled hard. "I don't even know why I came," I started, my voice rough. "Maybe because for years, I used to picture this moment. Me, finally saying everything I've never said and you..what? Apologizing? Explaining? I don't even know what I wanted anymore. Closure, maybe but it's not real, is it?"
He didn't move. So I let it spill, all of it.
"You spent my whole life reminding me what a failure I was. When I brought home good grades, you called them average. When I won that regional competition, you said it didn't count because it wasn't national. You mocked me when I cried, told me to man up when I was twelve and Mom left the room crying because you'd said something vile. You made me believe that kindness was weakness, that vulnerability was something to be ashamed of."