All I Ask of You

Chapter Seven

Saturdays were meant to be spent being White Swan while claiming to be hanging out with friends. They weren't supposed to be for letting her father explain himself or justify his cheating. However, because he offered to take her to the matinee of Phantom of the Opera, she had been won over. Granted, she would be stuck hearing her dad's side anyways, it would either be over a bribe or him cornering her while she was in the apartment with him. Ever since her mom said she told Annie why they really moved, her dad had been waiting to tell her more. All Annie wanted was to move on and forget about it all, that was the best way to get over the news that she never wanted to hear.

Annie ate some chicken nuggets and looked over at her dad. Forcing her to sit and talk before the show was probably for the best. If he had waited until after, she would have booked it and called Peter or Ned, even MJ or Tina if she had to. Listening to her dad justify being the root of all the issues in their small family was not how Annie felt a lunch at McDonald's should be spent either, but there were too many things going on that she didn't have a say in that she didn't have the motivation to cut her dad off.

"I know what you've been expecting me to say," Carter Hardwick started.

Annie swallowed a chicken nugget, "You couldn't possibly know, and even if you did, I'd bet I'm right."

"You know, you're not as perceptive as you think. Before your mom said anything, did you know anything was wrong?" he asked, drinking the black coffee he bought for himself.

Annie looked down, "I knew it was weird that Melanie quit tutoring me and that we moved."

"But you know what else? Why your mom and I didn't divorce?" he asked.

She shrugged, "Because me not having a broken home mattered more to mom than your need to tap it without wrapping it?"

Her father's forehead creased as he sighed, "Well, that factored into it... but do you remember your mother's partner at the firm?"

"Yeah, Jim, cool dude, what about him?" Annie prompted.

"They were seeing each other as well, I suppose she left that out, didn't she?" he questioned.

Annie blinked, her grip tightening on the flimsy plastic cup her caramel frappe was in. Her dark eyes looked up to meet her dad's. It had to be a lie. There was no way that both of her parents had been the bad guy in the relationship. Who was the victim supposed to be then? Could it be her even if she hadn't known what was going on?

It was silent while Annie took a few drinks of her overly sweet iced coffee. There wasn't exactly a manufactured response or a pre-ingrained retort for her to deliver. She couldn't just run away, there wasn't someone she could run to and ask to help her ignore everything going on around her.

All she could do was slowly nod, "Oh... she forgot that, I guess... well, anything else you wanted to say?"

"Actually, yes, you know how you were adopted right?"

"What does that have to do with anything?"

He cleared his throat, "It's the way you were adopted, well, the way you had been found."

"Now what the hell is that supposed to mean?" she spat.

"Hey, I need you to calm down."

"Why should I? I was doing great back home and you move me here without hearing me out and I find out why we're even here... and now you're gonna distract me with my birth parents or some bullshit like that?"