Chapter 26 - The Apology Between FathersDarnell asked Marcus to meet him at a diner.
Marcus almost refused.
Then Monique said, “You don’t owe him a conversation.”
“I know.”
“That sounded like you’re going.”
“I am.”
“Why?”
Marcus put on his jacket.
“Because I spent seventeen years imagining what I’d say if he ever admitted I was right.”
Monique frowned.
“And?”
“I want to find out if I still need to say it.”
At the diner, Darnell was already seated.
Marcus sat opposite him.
Neither ordered food.
Darnell began.
“I owe you eleven thousand two hundred dollars.”
Marcus sighed.
“If this is about money—”
“It isn’t.”
Darnell looked directly at him.
“You were right.”
Marcus felt nothing like the satisfaction he had imagined.
Darnell continued.
“I took Kiara’s money.”
“Yes.”
“I used her name when it benefited me.”
“Yes.”
“I blamed you for my absence.”
“Yes.”
“I told myself you replaced me.”
Marcus waited.
“But I left the space open.”
Marcus’s jaw tightened.
Darnell looked down.
“I hated you.”
“I know.”
“You had everything I thought a man was supposed to have.”
Marcus almost laughed.
“You saw the outside.”
“Maybe.”
Darnell continued.
“And every time Kiara loved you, it felt like proof I had failed.”
Marcus’s voice softened.
“She loving me was never proof she couldn’t love you.”
“I know that now.”
“Do you?”
“Yes.”
Marcus studied him.
“What do you want?”
“To apologize.”
“You just did.”
“No.”
Darnell breathed deeply.
“I’m sorry I made you carry responsibilities I abandoned and then resented you for carrying them.”
Marcus’s eyes shifted.
That one reached somewhere deeper.
Darnell continued.
“I’m sorry I let Kiara believe you kept me away.”
Marcus’s jaw flexed.
“I’m sorry I made fatherhood a competition because I was losing one I had created.”
Silence.
The waitress approached.
Both men ordered coffee simply to make her leave.
When she walked away, Marcus looked at Darnell.
“You want my apology?”
Darnell seemed surprised.
“For what?”
“I enjoyed being better than you.”
Darnell stared.
Marcus continued.
“Not every day. But enough.”
“You were better than me.”
“No.”
Marcus shook his head.
“I behaved better in specific ways.”
“That sounds like a distinction only you would make.”
“It matters.”
Marcus leaned forward.
“If I decide I’m fundamentally better than you, then I never have to examine the ugly parts of myself.”
Darnell looked curious.
“What ugly parts?”
“When Kiara chose you for graduation, part of my devastation was grief.”
He swallowed.
“And part was ego.”
Darnell remained silent.
“I thought every school pickup, every tuition payment, every fever, every dance meant I had earned permanent first place.”
“You did.”
“No.”
Marcus shook his head.
“I earned a relationship. Not ownership.”
Darnell absorbed that.
Marcus continued.
“She was cruel to me. That’s real. But her wanting you was not itself betrayal.”
Darnell looked down.
“Would you have given me the ticket?”
Marcus considered.
“Not that morning.”
Darnell laughed.
“Fair.”
“Maybe if we’d talked weeks before.”
“You would’ve missed graduation?”
“No.”
Marcus smiled faintly.
“I would’ve found a third ticket.”
Darnell looked at him.
“That’s the difference between us.”
“What?”
“You always think there’s another way.”
Marcus shook his head.
“No. I just had seventeen years of practice solving problems you weren’t there to solve.”
The words could have been cruel.
They were simply true.
Darnell nodded.
“I deserve that.”
Marcus leaned back.
“I don’t need you to deserve pain.”
Darnell looked surprised.
“I need you to stop creating it.”
Their coffees arrived.
For several minutes, they drank in silence.
Then Darnell reached into his jacket.
Marcus tensed.
Darnell placed a cashier’s check on the table.
Five hundred dollars.
Marcus pushed it back.
“It goes to Kiara.”
“I know.”
“This one is for you.”
“No.”
“Marcus.”
“No.”
“You replaced the account.”
“I did that for her.”
“I still owe you.”
Marcus looked at him.
“If you want to repay something, repay her consistently.”
“Money?”
“Presence.”
Darnell’s face tightened.
Marcus stood.
“Without making her responsible for your shame.”
Darnell nodded slowly.
Marcus put cash beside his coffee.
As he turned away, Darnell spoke.
“Marcus.”
He looked back.
“She calls you Dad.”
Marcus said nothing.
Darnell smiled sadly.
“I know that hurts me because I earned the hurt.”
Marcus returned to the table for one second.
“No.”
Darnell looked up.
“Don’t make the same mistake she did.”
“What?”
“Me being her father does not require you to become less of one.”
Darnell stared at him.
Marcus walked away.
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For once, neither man had won.
And because neither had won, Kiara no longer had to be the prize.
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