Chapter 18

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Alexander's POV:

I woke up with a stiff neck. I opened my eyes and looked around to see I was still in the kitchen holding Lexi to my chest where she was sleeping soundly.

"Lexi." I shook her.

She grumbled and lifted her head from my shoulder. She, like me, looked around before her eyes settled on me.

Her eyes were puffy and red from crying too much.

She gave me a smile. "Hi." She said.

"How do you feel?" I asked.

"A little better than yesterday. What about you?"

"Same."

We were enveloped by silence after that. Lexi and I didn't move from our spots and just stared ahead of us, both drowned in our thoughts.

13 minutes later, Lexi asked, "Do you think we should call Mike?"

"We should." I answered and took out my phone.

I searched through my contacts and found Mike's number. I pressed the call button and out it to my ear.

"Hello?" He said after picking up.

"Hey Mike." I said and put the phone on speaker so Lexi could hear what he says.

"I was just about to call you guys. How are you?" He asked.

"We're better than yesterday. What about you?" I asked.

"I'm good." He answered.

"How are you dealing with it?" Lexi asked.

Mike paused over the phone and then said, "I'm just dealing with it."

We sighed.

"Do you wanna talk about it?"

"Not really no."

"It might help a bit." Lexi said.

Mike was silent for a few seconds before he answered, "It's fine. I'm fine."

We sighed because knew Mike wouldn't give in because he was stubborn like that.

"Well, we're gonna hang up now. We just called to see if you were okay." I said.

"It's alright. I was about to call you as well to check up on you both." He said.

"Alright. Bye."

"Bye."

I pressed the end call button and put the phone on the floor.

"You need to take a shower, Alex." Lexi said out of nowhere.

"What? Why?" I asked genuinely confused.

"You stink, brother. I can smell your stinky smell all the way from New York." She said getting up and going out of the kitchen.

"We don't even live in New York!" I yelled after her.

"Whatever!" She yelled back.

Change of mode real fast. Nice going Lexi.

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I took Lexi's advice and took a much needed shower. I didn't realize how stiff my muscles were until the hot water hit me.

After taking a shower and getting dressed, Lexi and I went to the main house where everyone - except for Philip - was waiting for us.

They all gave us a smile and we smiled back. We all sat down at the dining table for breakfast.

During breakfast, Luke asked us, "Are you guys okay?"

We both looked at him. "We're dealing with it." I answered truthfully.

"It's not everyday you lose your mom." The rest stiffened at Lexi's statement.

She noticed it and quickly said, "Sorry. It's just hard to take it in."

They relaxed and smiled at us. "It's fine. We might not know what you're feeling, but we have an idea." Mark said.

"We know that we never want to lose our parents. But then we never think about their death. And when we do end up losing them, especially when it's unexpected....we have an idea of how it feels." Harris said.

"Thanks." Lexi said with a small smile.

Just then, Philip walked in the dining room. He looked at Lexi and I before taking his seat.

"Good morning." I said to him.

He looked at me surprised but quickly composed himself and said, "Good morning."

How the hell does he not see the hints? Literally we've been leaving hints here and there to let him know that we forgive him for the past two years.

But he just tends to ignore them.

We've tried start a conversation with him. We've tried to help him with his work. We've tried to make him feel better like that.

But he doesn't get the hint.

"How are you doing?" I asked.

"Fine." He lied. He's not fine. He still blames himself for what had happened.

I guess it's partly our fault. During our first few months here, we've continuously reminded him about it.

"Are you sure you're okay?" Lexi asked.

"Yes. I'm fine." He's lying.

Lexi was getting frustrated with not noticing the hints for the past few months.

I was too.

She crumbled the napkin in her hand to stop herself from snapping.

We continued to eat breakfast and make small talks here and there.

||◻️||◻️||

"I don't want him to blame himself for this and he's going to realize this now!" Lexi said as she went to the door.

"Lexi stop." I said. "Think about it. We've continuously reminded him about it during our first few months here. So, technically we are to blame."

"He notices the hints we've been leaving yet he still chooses to ignore it. I can't leave anymore of them so let's just suck it up and say it straight to his face." She said.

After breakfast we came back to the pool house. At first everything was fine. All was well. Until Lexi suddenly went angry and said that we need to talk to Philip.

No doubt she was replying the conversation during breakfast.

Times like these have already happened before so I thought I could stop her like the other times. But this time, she was stubborn.

I sighed. "Okay fine."

She gave a satisfied smile and yanked open the door.

"Remember, don't punch him." I said as we walked to the main house.

"I know that." She said and I rolled my eyes.

"And don't get snappy."

"I know that too."

"And please be calm."

"Fine."

Once we reached his office, Lexi ignored everything I said and opened the door without knocking.

She went to his desk and put her hands on it, leaning forward in the process.

"Why are you ignoring all the hints we've been leaving these past years?" She demanded.

"Lexi really?" I asked.

She looked back at me. "What? Just 'cause you said it doesn't mean I'm listening."

I shook my head at her and looked at Philip.

"Are you going to answer her question or not? Because I remember telling her not to punch you." I said.

He looked at Lexi and asked, "What hints?"

"Hints that we forgave you a long time ago! How can you not notice? I'm starting to wonder how you even manage-" Before she could continue, I came behind her and put my hand on her mouth. So all that came out of her mouth was a muffled mess.

"Sorry about her. She's been holding it in for a few months now." I said to Philip with a smile.

We're becoming like them. But at least our smiles are genuine.

He looked lost for a minute, like he was thinking over what Lexi had said just a few minutes ago.

"You forgave me." He said.

"You said it yourself." I replied.

"Why? I didn't provide you with anything for sixteen years of your life. I left your mom at the time of need and I pushed all of you away. So why?" He asked.

I shrugged. "The past two years we've been here, you've proved to be a good father. That and we gave you a chance from the second day we moved in."

He was silent after that. Lexi removed my hand that was on her mouth and asked, "Are you capable of answering or not?"

"Lex, stop it. Seriously." I said.

"Okay fine." She said then went over to sit on one of the chairs across from him.

"On the more serious note, we actually forgave you a long time ago, like I said before. Ever since we were little, we had this hope buried deep inside of us that our dad would come back and apologize for leaving us. He would take us with him to parks and zoos and wherever the hell we wanted. He would make us happy and teach us things that only a real father could. He would tell us his dad jokes to make us laugh. He would protect us from harm. But that never really happened because he was busy protecting us in a different way. You protected us because you knew bringing us into your life would only bring harm to us. So in a way you helped us out."

During her rant, I sat in the chair next to hers.

What she said was true. We did have this deep buried hope that we could meet him. And when the opportunity did present itself, we were given two choices.

One, be happy and live with him or two, remind him of what he did.

We chose the wrong one and we realized it after a really long time.

"Also, we're sorry....for making you feel like you were to blame this whole time. When in reality it was this 'Deadly Squad' to blame. If it weren't for them, you wouldn't taken a loan from them and you wouldn't have pushed us away. So... We're sorry." I apologized.

Philip was quiet for a long time and he just stared at us for what felt like forever.

When he didn't say anything Lexi said, "Well then, if you don't know what to say then we must best be leaving."

We both got up to leave but he stopped us. "Wait!"

We both turned to look at him in confusion. He was standing at the side of his desk looking at us.

He came forward until he was in front of us and looked between the both of us.

"Do you really mean what you said?" He asked.

Didn't Lexi just said that during her rant?

"Yes we did." I answered.

Just then his arms wrapped around both of us and he pulled us in for a hug and thanked us continuously for forgiving him.

Guess we should've taken option number one from the beginning.

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