Tenn and Lark

Chapter 22: We Had Love

Tenn walked toward my parents' car, and I was right beside him.

"You need to leave," he said to my dad as he began to get out of the car. "If you want to talk to her, you need to talk to me first, and then I'll decide. But we're definitely not doing this here, and we're definitely not doing this now."

I understood why Tenn didn't want my parents here. He wasn't going to allow them to ruin the peaceful atmosphere of our soon-to-be house. He didn't want any tension or ugliness to taint this house and the safety and comfort I felt here.

"It's just --" my dad began.

"It's just nothing," Tenn said. "You didn't give Lark the support she needed when I fucked up, then when she kicked you out of her life, you waited and waited and waited instead of trying to make things right with your daughter and apologize. You didn't show her support. You didn't show her that you loved her and could be there for her when she needed you." 

My mother tried to get out of the car, but Tenn shook his head at her. "Don't even think about getting out of the car."

Surprisingly, my mother stayed put. And her face looked...sad, I guess was the best word for it. It was a look I'd never seen before on her face, so I wasn't exactly sure what it meant.

"Call Tenn tomorrow," I told my dad. "Please don't stop by here again without an invitation."

My dad looked at Tenn. "I'll call you first thing in the morning," he said, then got back into the car and drove away.

Tenn and I watched them leave, not saying anything until their car disappeared.

"You OK?" he asked, his hand rubbing my arm. Tenn was still tentative about touching me, understanding I wasn't there yet. It was something we were working on in therapy, and as much as I craved his touch, I was still afraid to take that last step.

Shrugging, I wasn't even sure how to answer his question. I hated being estranged from my parents, but I also wasn't going to let them barge into my life at will when we weren't on speaking terms. This wasn't just something a quick sorry would fix.

"What do you think they wanted?" I asked, knowing it could go several ways.

He pressed a kiss to my head. "I don't know, sweetheart, but I'll find out as soon as he calls tomorrow. My guess? They tried to outwait you. They wanted you to blink first and you didn't. So maybe they figured out how serious you are and realized they needed to make amends and make the first move."

"I guess we'll see. But I'm also wondering how they knew where we were."

"I'll find that out, too," Tenn promised.

The next morning, I made it down to the kitchen later than usual to find Tenn standing at the sink, freshly showered and dressed, draining the last of his coffee from a mug. Fredward was still upstairs sleeping and had shot me a nasty look when I'd gotten up and disturbed his sleep.

"Good morning, Lark," he greeted me. Tenn was a morning person through and through and loved early hours the best. I considered it suspicious that anyone could willingly want to beat the sun up.

"Morning," I said as he smiled at me. I tried to smile back, but I'm sure it came out as more of a grimace. Smiles were difficult for me before eight a.m.

"Heard from your dad bright and early today," he said without any warm up. "The easy question to answer is how they knew where we were. They drove by our house, and not seeing us there, drove by all the properties I own. They'd looked up Larkenn Homes online in the tax rolls, grabbed the addresses of my six properties and did drive-bys until they saw our cars at the project house."