“Uncle.”
“You’ve made a complete fool of yourself!” Leo’s harsh judgement drained the color from Harrison’s face.
Without so much as a glance in his direction, Leo spoke again. “If I hadn’t told you back then that I’d taken on a brilliant student, and if I hadn’t quietly allowed you to sponsor Selene’s education, maybe things would have turned out differently.”
Harrison stared at the blanket covering Leo’s legs. He lowered his gaze, hiding the fury in his eyes. “Uncle, what are you getting at?”
He let out a cold, bitter laugh. “You never make mistakes. Every word you say is treated as gospel by my father and grandfather. What’s this–are you saying even you have regrets now?”
For a fleeting moment, Harrison felt that Leo wasn’t so far removed from him after all. So, he thought, even he could make the wrong choices.
Harrison lifted his chin, his gaze fixed on the back of Leo’s head. He looked like a wolf, wildness smoldering in his eyes.
“Uncle, are you feeling sorry for my ex–wife now?”
He’d known from the moment Leo first mentioned Selene’s name that she was special to him.
Leo’s voice was deep and resonant, echoing like a church bell in a quiet valley. “I once believed that if I entrusted her to you, she’d have everything a woman could dream of. I gave you far too much credit. You never deserved her.”
Harrison’s hands clenched into fists, then relaxed. He drew in a sharp breath and gave a sardonic smile. “If she’s so wonderful, why didn’t you marry her yourself? Why make me do it?”
“Mommy, look at this!”
Daph handed Selene a stack of papers.
Selene took them and saw it was the annual notice for Charteris Academy’s outdoor family event.
The school was organizing a day for students and parents to spend time together
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outdoors, with the aim of helping families bond and giving parents a chance to connect and learn from each other.
Daph spoke earnestly, “It says here both parents are supposed to come. If one can’t make it, you have to write down the reason for their absence.”
Ever since Daph and Dames started at the school, Selene had always been the one to take them on these outings.
Harrison, of course, was always too busy with work, never once joining a family
event.
Still, Selene managed to win first place with her children in every competition, even handling two kids on her own.
But even winning couldn’t erase the sadness her children felt because their father
wasn’t there.
Selene said gently, “Of course, sweetie. Mommy will be there with you.”
Daph piped up, “But now I don’t have a dad anymore, so I asked the teacher if I could bring another uncle to pretend to be my dad, and she said yes!”
Normally, the school would never allow someone else to take the place of a missing parent; the teachers worried it might set a bad precedent.
But everyone knew about Selene and Harrison’s divorce.
When Daph told her homeroom teacher she didn’t have a dad anymore, the woman’s heart nearly broke. She bent the rules just this once for Daph.
Selene asked, “So, Daph, which uncle would you like to invite to the picnic?”
Adrian: “…”
…
Luke Holloway: ”
Neither man uttered a word; both sat perfectly still, barely breathing.
If you could hear their thoughts, you’d know they were both shouting the same thing:
Pick me! Pick me! Pick me!
