"Blaire let me explain - "
"SHUT UP!" I roared. "My sister, my other half, died. She died, Dad. In a car on her way to the store with YOU. It was like my soul had been taken from me and torn in two. Losing her was unbearable. I watched my mother wail and cry and mourn and then I watched my father walk away. Never to return. While his daughter and wife were trying to pick up the pieces of their world without Valerie in it. Then my mother gets sick. I call you but you don't answer. So, I get an extra job after school and I start making payments for mom's medical care. I do nothing but care for my mother and go to school. Except my senior year, she gets so sick that I have to drop out. Take my GED and be done with it. Because I had the only person on the planet who loved me dying as I sat and watched helplessly. I held her hand while she took her last breath. I arranged her funeral. I watched them lower her into the ground. You never once called. Not once. Then I had to sell the house Gran left us and everything of value in it just to pay off medical bills." I stopped and took a loud heaving breath and a sob escaped me.
Two arms wrapped around me and I screamed, slinging my arms and moving away. "DON'T TOUCH ME!" I didn't want him touching me. He had lied to me. He knew this and he had lied to me.
"Now I'm being forced to hear you talk about my mother who was a saint. Do you hear me? She was a saint! You are all liars. If anyone is guilty of this bullshit I hear pouring out of your mouth it is that man." I pointed at my father. I couldn't call him that anymore. Not now.
"He is the liar. He isn't worth the dirt beneath my feet. If Nan is his daughter. If you were pregnant." I swung my eyes to the woman I had yet to look at and the words froze on my lips. I remembered her. I staggered back and shook my head. No. This was not what it looked like.
"Who are you?" I asked as the memories of that face slowly came back to me.
"Careful how you answer that," Rush's tight voice came from behind me. He was still close to me.
Her eyes shifted from me to my father then back to me. "You know who I am Blaire. We've met before."
"You came to my house. You... you made my mother cry."
The woman rolled her eyes.
"Last warning, mother," Rush said.
"Nan wanted to meet her father. So I brought her to him. She got to see his nice little family with pretty, blonde twin daughters he loved and an equally perfect wife. I was tired of having to tell my daughter she didn't have a father. She knew she did. So I showed her just what he had chosen instead of her. She didn't ask about him again until much later in life."
The little girl my age that had stood holding her mother's hand tightly and studying me as I stood at the door. It had been Nan. My stomach rolled. What had my father done?
"Blaire please look at me." Rush's desperate voice came from behind me but I couldn't acknowledge him. He knew all this. This had been Nan's big secret. He had protected it for her. Did he not see this was my secret too? He was my father and I knew nothing. Woods' words rang in my head. "If he has to choose between you and Nan he will choose Nan."
He knew then that Rush had chosen Nan. Everyone in this town knew the secret but me. They all knew who I was but I didn't.
"I was engaged to Georgianna. She was pregnant with Nan. Your mother came to visit her. She was like no one I'd ever met. She was addictive. I couldn't seem to stay away from her. Georgianna was still pinning over Dean and Rush was still visiting his dad every other weekend. I expected Georgie to go to Dean the minute he decided he wanted a family. I wasn't even sure Nan was mine. Your mother was innocent and fun. She wasn't into rockers and she made me laugh. I pursued her and she ignored me. Then I lied to her. I told her Georgie was pregnant with another of Dean's kids. She felt sorry for me. I somehow convinced her to run away with me. To throw away the friendship she'd had all her life."
I pressed my hands over my ears to block out my dad's words. I couldn't listen to this. It was all lies. This sick world they lived in wasn't for me. I wanted to go home. Back to Alabama. Back to what I understood. Where money and rock stars weren't an issue.
"Stop. I don't want to hear it. I just want my things. I just want to leave." The sob that followed couldn't be helped. My world and what I'd known of it had just been blown to a million pieces. I needed to go sit by my mother's grave and talk to her. I wanted to go home.
"Baby, please talk to me. Please." Rush was behind me again. I was too tired to push him away. I moved away from him instead. I would not look at him. "I can't look at you. I don't want to talk to you. I just want my things. I want to go home."
"Blaire, honey, there is no home." My dad's voice grated on my nerves. I lifted my eyes and glared at him. All the pain and bitterness I'd kept from creeping in when he left us had consumed me.
"My mother and my sister's graves are home. I want to be near them. I've stood here and listened to y'all tell me my mother was someone who I know she wasn't. She would have never done what you're accusing her of. Stay here with your family, Abe. I'm sure they will love you as much as your last one did. Try not to kill any of them," I spat.
Georgianna's loud gasp was the last thing I heard before I left the room. I wanted to leave but I needed my purse and my keys. I ran up the stairs and threw everything I could back into my luggage and slammed it shut. I swung my purse strap over my shoulder and turned to the door to see Rush standing there watching me.
His face was pale and his eyes were blood shot. I closed my eyes. I did not care that he was upset. He should be. He'd lied to me. He'd betrayed me.