Page 26 of Peaches

“I…”

But his icy stare raises quickly and locks on my own, forcing my lips shut and making me sweat under his scrutiny.

I wish we could both bypass all of this and just fast forward to when it’s all over with. If he’d allow it, I’d give myself the bashing I know I’m about to receive. Honestly!

How’d I get so unfortunate to have a son like you?

Can’t count how many times I’ve heard that.

One day, this will all be yours. Knight Publishing. But I’ll be damned if I hand it over to an idiot!

An idiot? Yup, the sting still stays with me no matter how many times he calls me that name.

You think school is hard? Try running a damn business. A business you’ll never be worthy of when you bring me home disgraceful grades like that! School is your work now, Brettly! If you can’t succeed in school, you’ll never be man enough to take your spot at Knight Publishing.

A fact I’ll gladly accept just to never be under his thumb again.I’ll start my own damn business. One that will rival his, and my Pops. He’ll see! The only sadness in doing so will be the whole doing business against my grandfather thing, but never my old man.

“I’ve spoken to your school…”

“I can explain…”

“You won’t be going back tomorrow.”

What the…

My eyes grow wide as I stare back at him in disbelief.

What happened that I missed?

“You’re needed at home. At Knight Publishing. Your mother…I was just on the phone with…”

His voice trails off as his eyes leave mine and he pushes himself off the desk in front of him. A heavy sigh wedges itself between us as I try and understand what he’s attempting to say.

“Besides,” he grates out, as his eyes trail back to meet mine. “You’re almost sixteen. It was a waste, anyways, wasn’t it Brettly? This way, failure is no longer your option. You’ll take classes at home to complete your credits. Work is your life now.”

Even though I’ve heard worse, the blow still hurts.

“But, what about…”

“It’s already done,” my father quickly interjects, cutting me off as he takes a few steps and stands in front of the large window in the library. He studies the outside for longer than expected as I sit with the little information he just gave me and try and make sense of it all.

“Your grandparents are on their way home. Your grandfather will go over all you need to know before starting Monday. You get any shit from the older partners, you talk to me or your grandfather, you never talk back to them, got that?”

I nod nervously and blink a few times, still trying to figure out what the hell is going on.

“Good, now go see your mother. She’ll be needing you to take her to the doctor’s tomorrow morning. Besides, I have some work to do.”

I stand as he makes his way back to his desk. My entire world thrown off its axis and me standing in the middle not being able to grasp why.

Maybe I am fucking stupid!

But as I go to speak, to ask for more information, my father looks up sternly over his desk and the papers stacked across it, and gives me a violent and intense stare.

“Is there a problem, Brettly?”

“No, Sir,” I stammer, clamming up and backing away towards the door. “No problem at all.”

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