Back to Where We Started From (Miracle)

Chapter Fifteen

"Julia, did you ever call your grandparents back?" Herb asked Julie a few nights later at dinner.

"Nope," Julie said casually, pushing some peas around her plate. She always hated peas.

"Why not?" Herb asked, watching his niece avoid his eye contact.

"I have nothing to say to Francis and Irene," she stated.

"They're your grandparents, you need to hear them out," Herb reasoned.

"They're my grandparents but I haven't heard from them in eight years? Do they even know what's been happening the last five years? If they had called two months ago I wouldn't have even been here!"

"Julia, you owe it to them to just call them."

"I don't owe them anything."

"Well, then you owe it to yourself."

"If anything, they owe me!"

"You're calling them, Julia. End of discussion," Herb said simply. The rest of the family knew not to intervene when Herb and Julie argued, but it was hard for Patti. Herb always knew exactly how to push people's buttons, and the way to push Julie's was to stay calm while she did the freaking out.

"I am nearly 22 years old," Julie huffed, crossing her arms over her chest.

"And sure as hell don't act like it or you wouldn't be here, would you?"

Julie's mouth dropped open, before she glared at her uncle, her cheeks heating up with rage. 

"Ugh, I want to go home! I am so sick of being in Minnesota, and I hate being in this house!"

Julie got up from the table, picking her plate up and putting it in the sink before stomping up to her room and slamming the door behind her.

Kelly and Danny remained silent, eating their food and staring down at their plates. Patti sighed, looking at her husband.

"Kelly, Danny, why don't you go eat in the living room?" Patti suggested to her children. They looked to her wide-eyed. They were strictly forbidden from eating in the living room. She nodded her head towards the living room and the kids quickly rushed off to the living room with their plates. Patti looked to her husband.

"Do you have to be so hard on her?"

Herb just looked to his wife, raising his eyebrows.

"You think that was being hard on her?"

"Herb, she's going through a lot right now. I mean, she has a point; what could Francis and Irene possibly want with her right now? After all this time?"

"I don't know, Patti. That's why she should call them."

"Have you ever considered that her feelings are hurt and that's why she doesn't want to talk to them? As a mother, I can't imagine what it would be like to leave my kids, or to stop speaking to my grandchild, but Julia was on the receiving end of all of that. That has to stick with a person."

Herb sat quietly, looking at his wife.

"Of course I've thought of that, Patti. But I just think that with all the heartbreak that girl has faced, she needs family. They're her grandparents, and if they want to mend that relationship, it might be worth her giving them a shot."

Upstairs, Julie had flopped onto her bed in a dramatic heap of tears. She had allowed herself to cry quietly for a few minutes, before wiping her tears and picking up the phone. She dialed the number to the boys' dorm, hoping someone was around and would pick up.