Blink

Chapter 30: People change when they are hurt.

Another hour into the journey and the girls were sleeping, Mrs Simpson joined shortly afterwards and the car was hushed.

"Hey Iya, can we talk?" Mr Simpson said, in almost a whisper.

"Okay sir"

"I'm sorry for how I behaved for all these years, how I treated the family. I am truly sorry, and I want to be better" Mr Simpson said, in a pleading tone.

"It's okay sir"

"Thank you," he said gratefully.

For the next few moments, silence filled the car, at least till Mr Simpson turned the radio on. He lazily hummed the song playing, glancing at the clock on the dashboard.

"Why though?" I finally said.

"What?"

"Why do you want to change now?" I asked a bit more loudly.

Mr Simpson turned the radio off "because Michael deserved better" he said shakily. I watched his forearm tense on the steering "I wish I were a better father for Michael, I wish I were kinder, accepted who he wanted to be, I wish I knew more about him. He was such a good kid, and I didn't realize how much I didn't deserve him, till I lost him, my only son, the best one there was" Mr Simpson said with a whimper, as he slowed the car to a halt at the roadside. "Sorry, something entered my eye, I have to take it out" he muttered as he subtly wiped his eyes.

"Sir-"

"So I don't want to lose more precious people in my life. I know I haven't been a good man, but I want to be better, a better husband, and a better father to Diane, Stella and You" He shakily said, as he drove back into the road.

"Thank you sir" I muttered. I wanted to also tell him I wanted to be a better daughter too, that I would do my best, but I didn't, partly because after all these years, I still couldn't trust Mr Simpson though, I didn't want my tone to hint that I was happy he called himself my father. For the next hour, I watched his face through the driver's mirror, for a smirk or anything that could prove he was lying, but nothing. He just smiled gratefully ahead.

"I really hope I'm overthinking this, I hope he is now different," I thought.

"Are we there yet?" Mrs Simpson said, but she didn't sound the least like someone that had been sleeping for 2 hours.

"She definitely wasn't sleeping," I thought with a sigh. The woman smiled knowingly at me, before turning back out the window.

Shortly after, the car began ascending a hill. What was so odd was that the top border of the hill seemed to be illuminated by blue light. When the car finally reached the top of the hill, it was evident what caused the blue glow, it was Neocity. The city screamed its technological prowess from afar, with its bluish tint, skyscrapers and most of all, its super highway in the sky. Flying cars drove at absurd speeds over the superhighway, none of them hit the other, as if they all had the restricted paths they followed.

The gasps in the car got louder as we entered the city, I stared with my mouth wide open. There were advertising holograms everywhere, in all I could see, police drones and robots were patrolling the city, cars with no drivers, the posters for shops seemed to catch your eye, for some reason, and they got brighter the more you looked at them.

The city was busy the least, everyone was moving, the honks of cars got louder every minute, and the flying cars streaked red above.

"We are spending the night here, so I got us rooms at a hotel here," Mr Simpson said between yawns.

"Wouldn't that be too expensive?" I asked

"Not at all, the owner is a friend of mine from the army, so I got a huge discount," Mr Simpson said proudly.