I laugh loudly this time, barely able to catch my breath. There’s a knock on the door and my dad and Poppa Silas come in.
“Is everything okay, Becca?” Dad asks.
I’m still laughing. All I can do is nod and pass him the phone.
“Hello?”
…
“Oh, hello, Alex. So nice to hear from you.”
…
“Well, thank you so much. Yes. Okay. Sure. I’ll tell her. You have a wonderful day, darling. Bye-bye.”
Dad hangs up my phone and puts it on the nightstand.
“Alex says you have something to tell me. But she said that it’s not actually funny?”
That sets me off into a fit of giggles, but the giggles quickly turn to sobs.
“She did it on purpose,” I choke out. “She told me to check the soup. She burned me on purpose.”
“Oh, honey,” Dad says, wrapping his arms around me.
The bed dips on the other side of me, and then Poppa Silas is hugging me too.
“She did it on purpose, and I can’t even hate her.”
“Well, I certainly hate her,” Dad says, leaning back to look at me. “Why on earth would you not hate her?”
“Because if it weren’t for the scars, Becca and I would never have met. And then she’d never have found you. Isn’t that right, darling?”
“Poppa is right, Dad. If it weren’t for the scars, and the way she treated me, none of the rest of this would have happened.”
Dad pulls me in tighter. “Well, fine. But I still hate her.”
“Me too, Dad. Me too.”
And then it hits me. How will I ever apologize to Johnny now?
