I slammed the door to my car way harder than was needed and marched into the house without a plan. I was fueled by new revelations, and all the things I had been swallowing down for the last year or so were breaking free of the stranglehold I normally kept on them. I shoved open the front door and didn’t even bother to close it as I marched with purpose and ferocity to my dad’s closed office door. I didn’t bother to knock and didn’t bother to announce myself or make any kind of pleasantries. I just stormed in and attacked.
His head snapped up from the computer screen and his eyes got wide. “Brysen?”
I put my hands on the edge of the desk and leaned over so that he had no choice but to look at me and not at the computer monitor.
“I know you lost the Lexus because of a gambling debt, Dad. I also know it doesn’t even begin to cover what you owe.”
His eyes got even bigger, if that was possible, and all the color fled from his face.
“What are you talking about?”
I narrowed my eyes at him and pushed off the desk so I could cross my arms over my chest in a defensive stance.
“I know, Dad.”
“You don’t know anything, little girl.” His tone got sharp, and where he had been pale a minute ago, now a hot red flooded into his cheeks. “Everything I have done I have done to keep this family afloat since your mother’s accident. Do you think those doctor bills were cheap? Do you think the settlement we had to pay to that other family was pulled out of thin air? I did what I had to do.”
“Yeah, but you didn’t stop, did you?”
He just glared at me and I glared at him even harder.
“How much do you owe, Dad?”
He huffed and puffed and pushed back in his chair. “That’s none of your concern. I have everything under control.”
I wanted to chuck something heavy at his head. He most definitely didn’t have anything under control. It was glaringly obvious.
“What about Mom? Does she know about this, or is that why you have no problem keeping her in a steady supply of booze? She’s already depressed and all messed up, so maybe you think enabling her to self-medicate will keep her off your back while you lose whatever this family has left.”
He flinched and I saw the horrible truth of my words reflected in his gaze. What in the hell was wrong with my family?
He heaved a heavy sigh and flopped back in his swivel chair. He covered his face with his hands, and right before my eyes suddenly looked a hundred years old.
“There isn’t anything left to lose, Brysen. My 401(k), all our savings, the credit cards, and my car—all of it is gone.” His eyes got glassy and he looked really scared when he told me, “The mortgage on the house hasn’t been paid for months and months. We went into foreclosure a month after you moved in. Luckily, the banks are still trying to dig out of the rut the recession put them in and are backed up. It’s going to happen eventually. We’re going to have to leave when the bank takes possession.”
I felt my lungs seize, felt everything inside of me go ice cold. I exhaled slowly and saw the room start to fade around the edges of my vision.
“So you are telling me you knew this entire time that you were going to lose the house, that no matter what happened, Karsen was going to have to change schools and end up tossed around and uprooted?”
He didn’t answer me, but he didn’t need to. The truth was evident in everything that had happened inside these walls over the last year.
I shook my head. “You’re disgusting.”
I turned and went to go find my mom. I was over it. I was telling her it was well past time that she checked into an in-patient treatment program and I didn’t care if I had to get two more jobs to pay for it. The chaos that was the Carter household ended today.
“Brysen.” My dad’s tone was sharp, so I stopped and looked at him over my shoulder with one foot already out of his office. “How did you find out?”
Well, that was a tricky question, wasn’t it? I gave a bitter little laugh. “Race Hartman is Dovie’s older brother. We’ve been spending a lot of time together the last few weeks.”
He bolted up in his chair and slammed his hands down on the desk.
“No. I forbid that. He’s not a young man you can have in your life. He’s dangerous.”
I knew that, but so far, all that danger was directed at other people and all he had done for me was try and protect me and take care of me. Right about now, out of the two of them, Race and my dad, Race was by far the lesser of two evils, even if I was seriously pissed at him.