"Finn, can I talk to you for a while?"

I ducked my head out of the sheets to look in the direction of the door which had creaked opened, making my father visible to my eyes, leaning between the angle of the wall and the door itself.

"I...." Squeezing my eyes shut and wincing, I let my hand ruffle my hair. I had no clue why I was so frustrated. "I just don't feel like talking at the moment."

I buried my head into the mattress once again. He didn't respond leading to the confirmation of the fact that he had probably left. I laid on my back and stared at the ceiling.

"Are you okay, son? You seem to be -"

He hadn't left, after all.

"What do you want, Arthur?" I snapped as I jolted to sit down, folding my legs firmly as I pushed the sheets away from my body. "I don't think I have failed to make myself clear."

I was rude. Very rude, but it seemed as if my words had absolutely no effect on him because he stepped in, letting the door open behind. It was not like we had anyone else listening us in here.

"This is something I had been trying to say since so long and if I don't talk to you now, I won't be able to say that ever again."

I looked at him in confusion. What was he trying to say?

"I don't know what you are saying."

"Well, I believe the life is not always unfair to us. The complexity of situations builds up our courage. Things always tend to go down unless we muster the courage to face them. To confront them. And if we let that chance slip away, we might not able to justify ourselves ever again. "

"You are making no sense to me." I started at him blankly. Soon a small smile crawled upon his lips that looked so foreign. I had not seen my father smile. Not in front of me and I had no memory of the times when it wasn't like this.

"Okay, so here's an example. Just for the sake of making it easier for you to comprehend." Taking a spot beside me to sit down, he said. I scooted away from him, rolling my eyes having no clue about what trick was upon his sleeves.

"I'm feeling the exact same way as you felt that day when you were about to tell Charlotte that you loved her." His words died down for a few seconds. "But you couldn't and now you won't. You lost the chance."

"I-" I scoffed, still trying to catch his bluff. "-I was never in love with her, alright? I liked her, sure which was too in the past tense. And out of all the people, you, Mr. Arthur Walker, don't get to say that to me when you were the one who fed her the crap about my life without my own fucking permission! "

He flinched at my sudden outburst, but he was the one who dragged this conversation. I wasn't in the one interested in talking.

"I would've asked you to mind your language, son, but I guess I have a bigger crisis to take care of." he quietly mutters.

"Of course." I taunted.

There was a moment of silence between us. An uncomfortable one and Arthur was the one break the ice yet again.

"Do you know, I was jealous of your mother when you were born."

"Are we kidding now?"

He chuckled, adding more to my irritation. "No. We are not. I was at the top of the world when you were born, Alex-"

"-That's not my name." I cut him off. I hated when anyone called me by that name.

Anyway, he continued. "I was so happy to hold my baby boy in my arms." It felt almost unbelievable, thinking about the old times and he seemed to have had read it through my face. "I know you won't believe it but it's true. Hard to believe but true."

"But you, Finn were always closer to her than to me. You stayed with her all day and when I used to hold you, if only for a while, you started crying and your mother never stepped back from laughing at my face."

I felt quiet. I didn't know why he was speaking. I didn't know why either but something inside me wanted him to hear him out. I was actually interested in talking about something so normal with my dad.

"And then came the happiest day of my life when you first called me 'dad'. It was the very first word that came out of your mouth and I can't express how elated I was. Do you know why?"

I remained silent, with my jaw tightened. I felt empty. Almost sad. Not for me but for this whole different guy sitting beside me with a gleaming guilt sitting in its pride within his eyes with no fear of being caught, as he reminisced the happy moments of the past.

"Because I wanted us to never be like what me and my dad were. I thought I would never mend it with my dad, but I had hoped to make the things go great with you and me. I didn't want to hurt you and..... then Olivia left. She just-"

"You still love, mom, don't you?" the words involuntarily rolled off my tongue, as my eyes stayed fixated on his face which was clouded by a sense of regret. The word mother sounded so foreign, almost sinful, coming out of my mouth after a span of more than a decade since I last used it.

"I don't want to lie to you about anything anymore. I still love her."

Heaviness sank at the bottom of my heart at his words. I felt a pain settling withing me. A kind of pain that made my throat sore and my eyes moist.

"That's it." I chuckled bitterly. "That's the reason why the things between you and me went exactly they went with you and grandfather, dad. You loved her too much for letting her go. You invested yourself in her so much that you didn't remember that you had a seven-year-old at home who was just bailed upon on by his own mother who needed help!"

It was my chance to let out the passive aggression housing my heart.

"I don't even want to talk about Olivia Brown anymore. I might've been only seven years old when she left but I was grown up enough to digest the fact that she didn't love you or me anymore. Then why was it so hard for you to take it in? You used to spend all your time at work! I tried to talk to you, you pushed me away. And I tried doing whatever it took a little boy to gain his father's attention. I picked fights so that they would call you at school!"

His head down. He was out of words.

"And what did you do, dad? You sent me to London for seven whole years? Who does that?"

"I-I just thought it would be easier for you to stay there than with me. You were born there."

"For seven years?" I demanded an answer. "I don't I would've been back if the institution wasn't shut for good!"

"I was born to my parents! I remembered living with two people I loved more than anything and suddenly you made me feel like I was an orphan! It's not that hard, now, is it? I was a kid-" I pushed my hair back and rubbed my eyes. "-but I knew that buying things for me or getting me live in a mansion wouldn't buy me happiness. And that's the exact reason why I became Samuel Barconn and deliberately raced for your team. To defy you."

"You were always a smart boy, Finn. You learnt to walk, rather run sooner than an average child does. You learnt to defeat your grandfather in chess when you were ten. You learnt the meaning behind your mother's last goodbye. You leant the value of family long before I could, then how could you miss this?"

I arched an eyebrow as his words baffled me. "Miss what?"

"You missed the lesson that I taught you." his lips were pressed into a tight smile. "I was always in front of your eyes, a living example of how you, as a person shouldn't be. I was a good bad example, kid and you decided to walk down the same path?"

I wanted to say so much in my defense, but I couldn't afford it at the cost of this moment with my father. I hated him almost all my life only to realize that he wasn't wrong.

His words worked like a slap. A reality check. When you hate someone, you are not supposed to become them to give them the taste of their medicine.

"See, Finn, I won't say that I don't care about what you think about me because you're the only family I have. I worked hard to give you everything you would need to live a life of a prince forgetting that.... That you would lose your father. You became exactly like me. Defiant of your father, ruthless, manipulative. Karma did find its way back to me after all." he scoffed.

I have heard Char and now, even Jax using these words to describe me, but none stung as bad as they did when my dad said it to my face. His blue eyes, an exact replica of mine, reflected disappointment.

I always thought anyone would feel proud to call me their son. What I didn't knew how much of an embarrassment I was. I was not a good guy. Not a good son at least.

My dad thought- no scratch that, my dad knew what exactly my problem was. I kept my pride before everyone around me.

"I just hoped you thought from my perspective as well but then I never explained myself to you." he said, "Afterall, losing someone you love isn't easy to take, son and I hope you never get even close enough to that feeling ever in your life."

"What do you mean?"

"Jaxon and Charlotte."

"Jax hates me, dad."

His eyes shined as I called him 'dad' again. I called him that occasionally, so it wasn't much of a deal for me. For him it was, though.

"I saw how you never tell any of them anything. You just keep pushing them away. Don't take the best people in your life granted. You could push them past their limits, and it would be too late to get them back."

Just remember, don't build too many walls around yourself just for the sake of your own protection because one day you might find yourself screaming for help and no one would hear you through them.

Why did her words only came back to me while I was either dying or was on the verge of crying?

"I thought you hated them both."

"Well." he laughed, causing wrinkles to from at the corner of his eyes. "I was highly repulsive of the idea of you and the Hayes's kid being friends, but he was the only one to get you laughing and talking. He changed your life for better since you two grew closer. Heck, he's been better at being your Mommy-figure than your biological mother." his words suddenly made me remember the day when I last played football.

I was pretty good at it too but during a match I slipped and got the ligament in my ankle torn. I didn't cry. I didn't shed a tear but Jax? Lord, it was so difficult to shut him up. He refused to go to school because 'his brother was injured'.

Charlotte was rather happy because for one, I was her enemy and second, her brother got to be the captain but that is a story for some other time.

Fuck!

We were practically brothers and he was mad at me. For a reason. I hurt him.

Stupid. Stupid. Stupid!

I am an idiot.

He had every right.

"Besides." Dad says with a small grin. "Jaxon doesn't hates me. He's probably the only person who doesn't."

I frowned. "Jax, doesn't hates anyone."

"Exactly." he said, keeping a hand over my shoulder. "So, he doesn't hate you. He's upset and it's your turn to make things better, okay?"

I immediately stopped chewing this inside of my cheek and nodded.

"And what about, Charlotte?"

"You hate her too." More like she hated me, I wanted to say.

I had treated him horribly and instead of running after her or maybe trying to do something that she would've done if she were in my place, I hurried myself under the comforters in my bed. Somehow, thinking that sleep would consume me.

The only thing that consumed me were the thoughts about her.

He scoffed again. "I just didn't want another woman to break my son's heart just the way his mother did. I knew she'd leave you the moment she caught your lie. She was too smart to believe you. I-I didn't want you to go through it all again."

"I am so sorry, Finn, for whatever I have done."

I was perplexed. I didn't know what exactly I was required to say but I wanted to. I didn't want to hate my dad anymore but at the same time, I couldn't allow myself to forgive him this soon. Complex human nature.

"I can't forgive her either, for what she did to me and to Dave."

"Son, do you know that girl is smarter than we assume. The moment I told her about you being Samuel, she didn't believe me for a second. She said she didn't trust a word out of my mouth, unless you tell her. She trusted you too much and-and you-"

"-I gave it away." I ran a hand through my messy bed hair as I registered the situation in my head.

"It's never too late."

"What if I can't?"

"One word from you and she went to Christian to reprimand for what harm she caused. She spent the past week fretting about you. She came here to see you. She lost her mind all the while you were lying, pale and unconscious at Olivia's place last month. What part of you doesn't understand that she obviously loves you?"

I looked at him to check whether he was being serious or not. Chewing my lower lip, which grown more of a habit in the past few months, I framed the sentences in my head.

"Are you serious, dad?"

His eyebrows furrowed. "I don't know what you kids call it these days but for me, when you get wounded and someone else cries in pain, it definitely means that they love you." He took a long pause before continuing. "I don't know what kind of love it is- whether she's in love with you or if she's not- either way she cares about you a lot. It's your duty to never insult that love, okay?"

Without giving a second thought, I nodded in agreement.

I wouldn't.

It was incredible how so many people around me cared for me and yet I had always been so repulsive of them.

It is okay to guard yourself, but it isn't okay to make yourself fragile by not exposing yourself to all the insecurities of the world. There is a difference between immunity and fragility.

"Finn?" my father's voice drew me back from my thoughts.

"Sorry?"

"Good." He smiled. I figured it out that he asked me how I will start mending up the things I messed up and wanted me to begin with a sorry.

"And what about, Evans? You said too much to her, you know."

"I am going to apologize to her too as Jax." It sounded as if I was asking for his suggestion than providing my own.

I was both, a big miser and thus, a big failure, in the sorry department.

"You realize that Jaxon is your friend, right?" He said, as if somewhat disagreeing.

Feeling confident out of nowhere, I rolled my eyes. "Yes dad, and so is-"

Oh no, I know what he meant. I thought.

"Is she, Finn?" dad quirked up an eyebrow.

What was the chronology of our relationship status over the years?

1) The moment my eyes fell on her she practically bullied me (in kindergarten).

2) I had a crush on her.

3) She slapped me in the high school.

4) We had been enemies for three years.

5) We hung out once. (I ended up kissing her)

6) And BAM! She was suddenly aware of all the lies I had fed her and I had been a douche bag to her since then.

But we missed a very important step.

"Tell me son, is she even your friend?"

Oh crap.

A/N

HAHAHA This chapter was written before the previous one and I kinda like it because of the whole father/son thing.

Hope you found it better too, if not dramatic like the last one.

Again, it's question hour because I love your comments and you should feed me some XD

1. What do you think of Arthur?

2. Was Arthur's betrayal to his own son in the last book justified?

3. Is Finn being bipolar? Or he was just having a low point which led to his outburst on Char? And that there's still good left in him?

Well, for me you might be good underneath but it's what you do defines you.
-Batman Begins (2005)

4. Do you ge irritated when I have a long author's note?

5. Finn and Char were never friends lmao. What would Finn do now?

6. Who wants a big fight between Finn and his best friend Jaxon Hayes?

7. I swear it's the last one. My mom told me that she only believes in the things she can see. Of course the author in me had a reply but I didn't want a beating of a lifetime. She's not into books and doesn't (sometimes) believes in what I do. So can you please leave some reviews about the book or my writing here? Just so that I can show her.

I am desperate 😂

Anyway, I'm gonna go and gush on Ralph and Sue after the s6 finale of the flash. You all stay healthy.

Love ya all.

TRIVIA
This is the shortest chapter in the book with just 3000 words.