Excuse me, are you using this extra chair?”
“Yes,” London said to the woman who’d already started carting the chair away from the table. “I’m waiting for someone,” she further explained.
Someone who should have been here twenty minutes ago.
She glanced at her Apple Watch again, then up and down Fourth Street. According to April’s text, Kenneth was to meet her here at noon. The downtown coffee shop was only a block from his law firm, but London refused to go to his office. Her olive branch extended only so far.
She returned to the journal Samiah had sent her. She hated to admit it, but this shit worked.
London hadn’t realized how much the guilt over her nonexistent relationship with her siblings had affected her. She knew it all tied back to Kenneth, of course, but as her pen flowed, a truth she was ashamed to own began to reveal itself.
She’d distanced herself from Nina, Miles, and Koko to get back at her dad. She’d robbed them all of precious time together, thinking that it would hurt him, when in reality, Kenneth was incapable of feeling hurt about something that didn’t directly affect him. The only ones who’d suffered were her siblings.
And her.
It wasn’t until she began writing down her thoughts that London recognized the pain she’d caused herself by staying away.
She closed her journal. She needed some space between these thoughts and seeing Kenneth face-to-face. If he ever showed up.
Just as she was about to text her stepmom so that April could, in turn, text Kenneth, London spotted him coming up the sidewalk along Lavaca Street. He turned the corner and climbed the concrete steps of Halcyon coffee shop and lounge.
“Over here!” London waved from the table she’d commandeered on the busy outside patio that spanned the front and left side of the building. Kenneth acknowledged her with a nod and pointed to the front door. “Can I get you something?”
London held up her cup. “Another iced coffee. Medium roast with cream and two sugars.”
She drained the rest of what she’d purchased when she first arrived, and continued scrolling through her email as she waited for Kenneth. Her thumb arrested on the screen when an email popped up from the head of the fellowship committee at the hospital in Chicago.
Dear Dr. L. Kelley,
It is no secret that my interest in having you join our pediatric cardiothoracic surgical fellowship program remains strong. I would like to personally extend to you an invitation to explore our medical facility in person this coming week. My assistant is cc’d on this email. If you would provide her with the necessary information, she will take care of your flight and lodging arrangements. We have booked a suite at the famed Drake Hotel on Chicago’s Magnificent Mile in anticipation of your visit.
Please respond ASAP. As you know, the deadline for accepting the fellowship is quickly approaching, and if you have to unfortunately decline, we would like sufficient time to offer the spot to our next best candidate.
I look forward to meeting you this week in the city that I hope you will soon call home.
Sincerely,
Dr. Bruce Davidson.
“Holy fucking shit,” London said.
“Have you always had such a foul mouth?”
She jumped at the sound of her dad’s voice over her shoulder.
“Sorry,” London said, taking her coffee from him.
She closed out her email and set the phone facedown on the table. She was happy for the distraction meeting with Kenneth would provide. It prevented her from shooting off a quick acceptance of Dr. Davidson’s invitation. She needed to think long and hard about the perception it would give if she were to allow the hospital to go to the expense of flying her to Chicago and putting her up in a suite at a four-star hotel. It’s possible they would see it as a guarantee that she would accept the fellowship offer, when she was all but certain that she would turn it down.
“So,” Kenneth said as he unbuttoned his suit jacket and sat in the chair across from her. “I assume the apology is first.”
“Okay,” London said.
He stared at her.
She stared at him.
“Okay,” she repeated.
“Well, are you going to apologize?” he asked.
“Me? You want me to apologize to you?”
“Your stepmother said that’s why you asked to meet with me today.”
What the fuck?
“I did not ask to meet with you. You asked to meet up with me. At least that’s what April told me. She said you wanted to extend an olive branch.”
Kenneth sat back in his chair and folded his hands over his chest. Releasing a weary breath, he said, “Well, it would seem communications were crossed, or, more likely, that my wife is up to something.” Annoyance pinched his brows. “I have no intention of being the first to extend an olive branch of any kind. I am not the one at fault here. You were incredibly rude and disrespectful to me in my own home. And for no good reason.”
No good reason.
“Are you fucking kidding me?” London said.
“London!” He slammed his fist on the table.
“What do you expect me to say to that, Dad?”
“I expect you to conduct yourself as a lady should. Using that type of language in front of your own father is beneath you.”
“Give me a fucking break,” she muttered under her breath. “My language is the last thing you should be concerned about right now. You should be grateful that I’m speaking to you at all, because I vowed I wouldn’t anymore.”
“And how would that be any different from the way things have been for the past few years?” Kenneth asked.
She huffed out a grunt. “You’re right. It wouldn’t be different.” London studied him as she took a long drink from her coffee. She set the cup down and assumed his pose, crossing her arms over her chest. “Did it ever cross your mind to ask why I don’t speak to you?”
“Probably because Janette fed you some kind of nonsense about me being a bad father.”
London couldn’t help herself. She burst out laughing, and once she started, she couldn’t rein it back in. Even as several people from neighboring tables openly gawked at them, she still could not pull herself together. She imagined how the two of them looked—Kenneth scowling and confused while she belly laughed to the point that she could scarcely catch her breath—and it caused her to laugh even harder.
Once she was finally able to get a hold of herself, she used a paper napkin to dab at her eyes.
“Are you done?” Kenneth asked in his most condescending voice.
“I think so,” London said. She took another sip of her coffee. “I’m just floored that you think I needed my mother to tell me that you were a shitty father. Do you not realize that Janette is the only reason we have a relationship at all? I would have washed my hands of you a long time ago if not for her constantly in my ear about how I should be grateful to still have a father in my life.”
“She’s correct. And at least you have a father who took care of your needs, and not some deadbeat.”
“You do realize that making child support payments was the bare minimum, right? That doesn’t get you the Father of the Year Award that you obviously think you deserve.”
He jabbed a finger at the table. “I did more than just pay child support. You wore designer clothes throughout high school. I bought you a brand-new car your senior year. I offered to pay off your college loans and to add a porte cochere to your house, but you refused because apparently you’re too good for my money now.”
“You also skipped my high school graduation for a golfing trip,” London said.
“That was a business trip,” he countered. “And it was fifteen years ago. Get over it, London.”
“I’ve tried,” she said. She shook her head and swallowed down the lump of emotion that formed out of nowhere in her throat. “I have spent countless hours telling myself that it doesn’t matter. It’s in the past. Just move the hell on.”
She pulled her bottom lip between her teeth when she felt that son of a bitch tremble. She wouldn’t allow Kenneth to see how much this still affected her.
“I think it’s the constant gaslighting that makes it so hard for me to move on. You telling me how great you were as a father when I lived through years of being ignored, and that was before you and Mom divorced. It only got worse as you went through your parade of wives.” She toyed with the frayed paper napkin, studying it so that she wouldn’t have to look at her dad’s face. “If you would just acknowledge that you could have been a better father, maybe I could let it go.”
Several moments passed without a word from the other side of the table. When London looked up, the coldness of her father’s stare was enough to freeze her eyebrows.
“I will do no such thing,” Kenneth finally responded. “I gave you everything you needed.”
“I’m not talking about things! See, this is the gaslighting! You’re a smart man, you know that I’m not talking about the physical things you bought me.” London held up a finger. “And since we’re on that subject, let’s be clear: Even when you gave me those things, it was never really about me. You bought me designer clothes because it made you look like a generous parent. The same goes for the car. It was something you could brag about to your buddies on the golf course. It was always about you.”
His irritated expression bordered on disgust. “After all these years, you are still an ungrateful brat.”
“And you are still a clueless, unfeeling father,” London said. “I would have rather you throw me a ‘good job, London’ every now and again than to have a closet full of brand-name clothes and tennis shoes. I had to hear about your compliments secondhand.” She shoved her hands in her hair. “I didn’t realize you were even capable of paying attention to your children until you finally had a son. Then you suddenly became this ultra-involved parent.”
“Are you jealous of a nine-year-old?” The censure dripping from his words made her feel like a recalcitrant child, but London would not allow him to discount her extremely legitimate feelings.
“I’m not jealous of Miles. I’m disappointed in you. It’s upsetting to see you treating Nina and Koko the same way you treated me. Except this time, your indifference is amplified when weighed against the amount of attention you shower upon your son. Stop treating your daughters like shit.”
He steepled his fingers and rested them against his lips. After several uncomfortably tense moments passed, he pointed at her and said, “I can only hope that you one day come to realize just how good you had it, London. Maybe then you’ll show me a little gratitude instead of constantly engaging in such vile behavior.”
“You know what? I’m not doing this.” She threw her hands up. “I’m just not doing it. One way of controlling my blood pressure is to cut down on stress, and this stresses me the fuck out. You stress me out, Kenneth.”
“I have given you everything, London. I don’t know what else you want from me.”
She just stared at him as she allowed the sobering reality to sink in. He would never be the father she needed him to be. She’d told herself this countless times over the years. But she had always held out hope that if she ever took the time to truly explain how his utter indifference had affected her, he would acknowledge his role in this fucked-up relationship.
But he wouldn’t. He wasn’t capable of it.
It was exactly as Drew had said. Kenneth Kelley was a textbook narcissist who simply could not view the world through a lens that wasn’t focused entirely on him.
“I don’t want anything from you,” London said. “I will make sure that my sisters know they are loved and appreciated just the way they are, and that it isn’t worth their time to seek any further attention from you.”
London pushed her chair back and stood. She did her best to stem the tide of disappointment and utter sadness that rushed through her—at least until she was no longer in the presence of the man who’d caused it for much of her life.
She hadn’t expected a storybook ending, but she had hoped to walk away from their talk today feeling as if her dad had finally heard her. She had hoped to mend what was broken.
But some things were not meant to be. It was time she finally, conclusively accepted that.
“London,” Kenneth called after her as she walked away from the table.
She didn’t look back.
She got behind the wheel of her Mini and held on to the steering wheel in a vise grip. London waited for the tears that had collected in her throat to burst forth, but none fell. Her dad had broken her heart so many times that this final crack barely had an impact.
Still, as she started her car, there was only one destination her brain would even allow her to consider. She turned toward Drew’s building, and five minutes later, parallel parked in a spot across the street from the high-rise.
She used the code to take the elevator up to his floor. But when she knocked on his door, it wasn’t Drew who answered, it was Samantha Gomez.
“Hello, Dr. Kelley. Come in,” Samantha said, stepping aside.
London entered the apartment and stopped short. She had been to funerals with a livelier atmosphere.
She spotted Drew leaning over a laptop on the conference table. His shirtsleeves were rolled up, and whatever tie he’d put on this morning was long forgotten.
He stood up straight when he spotted her. “London.”
Trepidation skirted down her spine at the strain she heard in his voice. Something was wrong. Something was very wrong.
“What am I missing?” she asked as Drew approached.
His shoulders dropped in arrant defeat.
“I’m sorry, London. I’m just so, so sorry.”