Pfeiffer freezes for several long, horrible seconds.
Then she reaches for him, and I recognize something I saw when she worked in my club, when she talked to guests, showed them to their tables, talk their drinks orders. She wore the same protective mask that slides over her face now.
"Dad," she says gently, taking his hands. "Mom passed away. Remember?"
Frank blinks and for a moment, sinks deeper into a state of confusion. Then his eyes fill with tears.
There’s something painfully vulnerable about one man watching another man cry, and something akin to utter devastation in knowing I’ve made this life worse.
"Oh,” he whispers. “That's right."
"It's okay," Pfeiffer says, in a well-practised, soothing voice. "It's okay."
His voice cracks. “No. I forgot her again.”
Again?How often does this happen? How many times has Pfeiffer had to survive this?
Frank stares somewhere over Pfeiffer's shoulder, grief washing over his face with such raw force that I have to look away.
“Florence,” he whispers. “She'll think I didn't love her.”
Pfeiffer swallows loudly. I can see in this moment exactly what she’s been holding together and it makes me sick to my stomach.
“Dad, no.” She squeezes his hands tighter. “Mom knew you loved her. She always knew.”
“Okay,” he mutters, but it’s uncertain.
“Come on. Let’s get you to bed, Dad,” Pfeiffer says, gently steering him from the kitchen. Then she glances over her shoulder at me. “I’ll be right back.”
I nod, the movement gnawing at my skull.
A sudden onset of indescribable grief makes my bones vibrate. Now, I understand. Every time she checked her phone, every time she left to ‘check on her father,’ every time her smile seemed just a touch forced, this was why.
Pfeiffer isn't just caring for her father. She’s losing him.
And while she’s been carrying all of this alone, I’ve been taking her away from this, using her for pleasure and destroying the one thing that brought her light.
Jesus Christ.
What the fuck have I done?
She offers me an apologetic smile when she returns to the kitchen.
“Would you like coffee?”
I’m a shell of a person right now—exactly what I deserve to be. I certainly don’t deserve coffee.
“Okay.”
I watch her move around the tiny kitchen, and the normalcy of it kills me. She clicks on the coffee machine and reaches for a pair of unmatched mugs. She pushes dampened hair behind her ear. Her face is completely free of make-up and she looks young and innocent and not at all deserving of what I did to her.
She hands me a mug without meeting my eyes.
“Thanks.”
Her fingers brush mine briefly, and the contact unravels me. Then her gaze drifts toward the wall near the refrigerator and her expression changes instantly.
“He used to do it there,” she says quietly.
