How could I have been so blind?
So foolish?
The answer was right in front of me, but I'd already convinced myself it didn't exist.
A love true enough to marry for the wrong reason. A love so genuine, so pure, it would put me first.
Outside, there are voices. Cars pulling up, engines turning off, doors opening and closing. Guests arriving.
Duke's messages.
I grab my phone, find there are now four.
Daisy, we need to talk.
Daisy, I'm rethinking this.
ANSWER ME
I'm coming to your dressing room.
"Oh, thank God," I say, showing my parents my phone. I'm smiling so wide it hurts.
Chapter 55
Duke
My dislikefor Penn Bellamy began sometime around the sixth grade.
For years, his mother came to our home once a week and cleaned. She was kind, and quiet, and brought me portions of homemade baked goods. She was far better to spend time with than my own mother, who is still cold and standoffish, a woman who regularly looks at me and my siblings like she's surprised we exist.
Ms. Bellamy was the only good thing about living in my house. One day a week, I actually wanted to come home from school, because I knew she'd be there.
Until she wasn't. Penn arrived in her place on a Saturday. My mom either didn't notice, or didn't care. As long as she wasn't breaking a nail or a sweat on the upkeep of her ostentatious home, what did it matter to her?
With Ms. Bellamy coming on a weekday, she never had to run into my dad. That meant she never had to see how he acted. How he treated me, his first born. The child he expected everything of. Nothing I did was good enough, no matter how hard I tried.Every A+ grade left him unimpressed, anything lower left him furious.
Penn saw it all. Every Saturday, Penn kept to the shadows of my home, staying invisible. But me? I was in the spotlight. Every cruelty my dad threw my way, Penn was privy to. And then came the day my dad decided I should know how to throw a fastball. Me, the boy who'd never picked up a baseball, suddenly needed this skill. According to my dad, it wasimperative.
Throwing a baseball was not something I took to with a natural aptitude, and I'd never seen my father so angry. What he said that day is etched into my heart, my brain, my soul.How is it possible I have a son who can't throw a fucking baseball?Then, he threw it at me. It hit me in the side, just left of my stomach, and I dropped to the ground. He stood over me, telling me to get up, but how could I when dragging a single breath through my body felt impossible?
I gasped for air while his face contorted into a mask of disgust. He walked away, leaving me there in the hot sunshine, and then I sawhim.Penn. Standing in an upstairs window.
Rage like I'd never felt filled me. Somebody with a loving mother, my own classmate, had witnessed the most embarrassing moment of my life. After that, he tried to be nice to me, but it only made me angrier. Meaner. I didn't know what to do with the overpowering emotions I felt, and so many of them were directed at Penn. I belittled him for cleaning our house, I made messes on purpose, and one day, after my dad yelled at me for forgetting to close the garage door, I made a comment to Penn about his mother.You must hate your life, Penn, trying not to let people see that your mom can't get off the couch.
The second the words left my mouth, I hated myself. What I really wanted to do was ask Penn if his mom was ok, but I was too jealous. Too sad that he got one good mom, and I got two bad parents.
It was only a handful of months later that Penn and Daisy got in that car accident, and soon after, Penn and his mom left town.
If it weren't for a few too many celebratory whiskeys after a particularly lucrative acquisition a few years ago, my dad would've never admitted what he'd done. The money he gave to Daisy's dad to get Penn and his mother out of the picture. To this day, I don't know why he did it. His lips might've been loosened enough to tell me about it, but he zipped them up after that.
My dad may be harboring a secret, but I know my motivations behind what I'm about to do.
There are two exits from the room where Daisy is getting ready, one that leads inside the building, and another that opens to the outside. In an effort not to gain the attention of the wedding guests, I am approaching from the outside.
"Daisy?" I knock on the door.
She opens it one second later, as if she'd been waiting for me.
