Facing Away (Broken Streetfighter)

Chapter Thirty Nine

Amy’s POV

I sigh and stare up at the ceiling of my bedroom. I still find it hard to believe that my father has . . . I can’t even bear to think about it. 

Why me? I could continue to wonder about this question for weeks, months, maybe even years, but then where would I get? Nothing would get better, nothing would change. All I would accomplish would be to waste several hours of my life that I will never get back worrying about something that was out of my control.

It’s been a week since I found out about my father, about a couple days since Brenda, and today just makes things worse. 

My mother’s death anniversary. All these years I thought my mother had commited suicide, but it’s the opposite. She didn’t want to die, she didn’t want to kill herself, she just wanted to protect us from the life she never wanted us to be involved in.

But her tries were in vain, because we got dragged in anyways.

I feel a tear trickle down my cheek, but before I can get the pity party at a full on celebration, a knock on my door sounds.

“Come in,” I answer, quickly sitting up in my bed and wiping the lone tear away.

“Amy?” A soft voice sounds through the door. Sophie opens the door and comes towards me before laying down next to me. It’s almost like she was five again.

“Hey sweetie,” I murmur while playing with her hair. “Is everything okay?”

Through the very morning light Sophie’s glossy eyes shine with tears. “C-can we go visit mom?”

I smile a little before nodding. “How about we wait for Parker to wake up before we go out?”

She nods and snuggles in closer. Not long after her soft snores fill the silent morning air.

Getting out of bed, I glance at my alarm clock on my dresser. 4:57 a.m.

I groan before walking out of my room. Glancing towards the coach when I get downstairs, I sigh when I notice it's empty again.

Quickly, without thinking it through, I run towards the basement where we have an old computer stored.

As it starts itself up I run through all the possibilities that could arise. Maybe I'm wrong, and I'm making this a bigger deal than it has to be.

I want to look away as the computer fades itself into a white, blank screen. After typing the password in, I start to rethink this. Do I really want to know about my father and his disorder?

Sure, it would help me better understand this situation we are going through, but that doesn't mean I can change the situation.

Change is a silly thing. We spend hours of our lives as human beings thinking about how different things would be if we could go back and change our decisions. We can't change anything and that's the problem. All that time spent thinking and wondering what would have happened makes us not live in the moment of now and instead thinking of then. We can't go back, so there's no use being so worried about something that's already happened.

It's time to move on.

I shut down the computer without another thought. When I walk back upstairs a single light is on.

“Father,” I mutter when I reach the landing.

“Amy,” his gruff voice answers back. “You're going to visit the Black Knights tonight?”

His eyes are red and dark black bags hang beneath them. I didn't notice before, but a lady is walking around examining the living room behind him. She's blond, skinny, and can barely be any older than me.