Page 147 of Infatuated as They Come
“Is that okay?” Holly asked.
Looking back at her, I nodded. “Yeah, honey, it’s okay.”
“Are you sure?”
“I’ll be fine.” I looked at her dad. “We’ll be fine.”
“I guess I’ll go find Mom then,” she said, tone all hesitant. Worry crossed her face as she looked at me, taking slow steps back into the crowd, leaving me and her dad all alone.
“It’s pretty busy in here tonight,” he said, keeping thatdistance between us.
“Yeah.” I looked over at the hoard of people. “It is.”
“Holly, um… Holly mentioned that you were the reason she invited me and her mom here tonight,” he said lowly. “Thank you for doing that.”
Hands stuffed into my pockets, I nodded. “I know how much she missed you. I’m glad you’re talking again.”
“Me too,” he said, taking a slow step towards me. “I missed her. I miss what we used to have. We never used to fight so much.”
“I don’t wanna be the reason you guys fight.”
“You’re not the reason.” He let out a long breath. “I’m the reason.”
“Is that right?”
“I haven’t been the father Holly needs me to be. I also haven’t been the person you need me to be. I’ve protected Holly her whole life, you know? From the second she was born. All I’ve ever wanted was for her to be happy and safe and loved. For her to never worry about anything,” he said, brows pulling together. “It’s a scary world out there, and the world feels scarier when you have a daughter, and when I saw her with that bruise on her face…”
“You panicked,” I said. My eyes flickered over to the side, and I could see Holly standing there with her mom, a look of concern on both their faces. “I get why you did, but I’d rather die than put my hands on Holly. I’d never hurt her like that.”
“I’m sorry for that night. For the accusation, for sending you to jail, for… bringing up your mother,” he said, voice sounding strained. “That was wrong of me. It was insensitive. It was stupid.”
I couldn’t quite believe what I was hearing. Every word sounded real enough, though, because that tone he always used when he talked to me wasn’t there in the slightest, and I knew he had never been able to hide that.
“I forgive you,” I finally said. For Holly, I forgave him. For myself, too, because we couldn’t keep fighting and going at it. We couldn’t keep dragging out whatever was between us.
“But that doesn’t excuse how I treated you before. From the beginning. I haven’t really given you a fair chance, and that’s because I’ve been judging you the whole time. I don’t see the good in you, but I know you have a lot ofit. Holly wouldn’t be so in love with you if she didn’t see that good,” he said, as he looked over to the wall, where painting after painting of his daughter stared back at us. “And it seems like you’re just as in love.”
“Yeah, extremely,”
“You must have spent a lot of time on these,” he said as he turned to face the first canvas. “It looks like Holly’s your favorite subject.”
“She’s kinda the only thing I can paint now. She’s in my head all the time, and the second I pick up a brush, I don’t know what else to make but her. She’s just… there.”
“They’re nice,” he said, eyes scanning down the line of canvases, and then they narrowed when they made it to the last one. “That house looks familiar. It looks like… God, I forgot all about that place.”
“Holly told me she really liked it there.”
Slowly, he turned to me. “She was always really happy at that place. Me and her mother would take her there during the summer when she was a kid. We just sort of forgot about it after a while. I guess she liked it more than I realized…”
“I hope one day I can give it to her,” I said, eyes falling to the last canvas. “Not now. I know I can’t give it to her now, but one day. I’m saving up for her. Every paycheck I get. Every dollar, every cent. I want it to be for the life I wanna give her one day, and it might not be the one you pictured for her, but it’d be one where I loved her forever.”
Hand clasping my shoulder, he gave it a squeeze. “You will. I know you will. And I bet she’ll be over the moon to be living in that house with you. She’s so in love with you, Sawyer, and no one is ever gonna beat that, and I’m happy she’s found someone who loves her just as much.”
“I do love her.” I nodded. “And I always will. Nothing’s ever gonna change that.”
“I know,” he said with the smallest of smiles, hand squeezing at my shoulder again. “You probably want to speak to her and show her all these paintings. She’ll love them. I’ll go get her for you.”
I watched as he moved through the crowd and over to Holly and her mom. They shared a quick conversation before she made her way backover to me, and it took me just a second to grab at her hands.
