Chapter 16 - What an Apology Could Not Buy
Lila didn't see Sal for eleven days. She read old articles about Fulton Row, helped Owen study for chemistry, and took a temporary intake job at the worker center Dina had recommended. The work was repetitive and sometimes heartbreaking. It also paid a wage that arrived when it was supposed to.
Nora found her one night at the kitchen table with Elena's notebook open.
“I don't know how Mom loved someone like that,” Lila said.
“She didn't love what he did. She loved the father she needed him to be. That's one of the hardest things to stop doing.”
Lila touched the little silver locket. Inside were the mother she remembered and the baby she barely recognized as herself. There was no photograph of Sal. Elena had made that choice.
When Lila finally agreed to meet him, she chose the darkened Harbor Diner. Curtis's attorney had arranged access so Ray could collect equipment, and Ray waited nearby while Lila and Sal sat at a booth. The red vinyl was cracked where Sal rested his hands.
“I read about the settlement agreements,” Lila said. “I thought maybe you just didn't know what happened.”
“I knew enough. Elena told me. I treated her fear as disloyalty because the truth threatened everything I'd built.”
“And now?”
“Now it's being examined. The attorneys are arranging restitution without requiring anyone to sign away their right to speak. It's a start, not an absolution.”
“Why didn't you look for her?”
Sal watched a bus move through the window's reflection. “I told myself respecting her distance was love. Sometimes it was. Mostly I was afraid she'd say she still couldn't forgive me.”
Lila let the silence stay. There was no sentence he could offer that would return Elena to them.
“I wanted a grandfather,” she admitted. “When I was little, I made up what one would be like. Somebody who showed up at school plays and knew how to fix a bicycle.”
“I could learn the bicycle part.”
A small laugh escaped her, surprising them both. Then she shook her head.
“You don't get to skip the bad years. You don't get to call me family and turn me into your excuse for being better.”
“I understand.”
“If we ever have a relationship, I decide how fast it happens. Owen decides for himself. No people watching our door. No favors bought with fear.”
“Yes.”
She reached across the table, not to touch his hand, but to place Elena's notebook between them. She opened it to the page addressed to Dad. He read it once, then again, his face folding inward.
May you like
When he finished, he did not say that he had loved his daughter. He said, “She was right.”
For Lila, it was the first thing he had said that didn't ask her to carry any of his pain.
