I really enjoyed being with the Bradford family. They had a close bond that I wished that I had with my own family. I was the only child to my parents. They were very loving, but they were not especially affectionate.
Plus, they had me when they were much older, so there was a lot that they simply could not relate to. They did the best that they could, though, raising me. It was only later that things started falling apart in their marriage, and then my mom was in a fatal car accident that turned my father’s and my life into hell.
Being around the Bradfords made me grateful that I could experience the intimate bond that they shared. They were close to each other and quickly grew close to me. Every day that I left them, the kids would cry and beg me not to go. While I didn’t like seeing them so upset, it felt really good to know that they liked me as much as I liked them.
When Whitney first asked me to go on the trip with them, I told her that I would need some time to think about it and then I would give her my answer. But then later that night when I got home, I walked into my small one-bedroom apartment and was greeted by a strong God-awful smell.
My father was laying on my couch, his face and shirt covered in puke and he was drenched in urine. That incident is what sent me on this fated journey into the woods with the Bradford family and their friend Darren.
Chapter 4 - Michelle
My dad had been drinking all day long, apparently in an even larger quantity than normal. He had peed so much that there was a fairly large puddle pooling around his feet. He was in a deep sleep, snoring so loudly that the walls of my apartment seemed to be vibrating.
I felt a strange combination of pity mixed with anger. I knew that my father was still grieving the loss of my mother. They had been together since they were in college.
My mother had always been the one to look after him, me, and anyone else who needed her help. So, when she died in a tragic car accident, of course we were all devastated, but no one took it harder than my dad.
He stayed holed up in their house for months, refusing to talk to anyone, even me. It wasn’t until the bank took possession of the house for non-payment that we re-connected. And it wasn’t even him who reached out. It was one of our neighbors, Mrs. Green, who called me to tell me that she saw the police carting my father away as he tried to fight them while the sheriff’s department was putting all my family’s belongings out on the curb.
I went to the police station to pick him up. I’ll never forget how he looked, like a kid waiting for their mom to retrieve them from detention. He didn’t say anything, but his eyes looked so sad. He barely looked at me at all when I told him that I was there to get him. He just slowly and silently stood up and walked over to my car.
I told him that he would have to stay with me at my house for a little while until we figured things out. Again, he didn’t protest.
As I was about to start up the car and pull off, a police officer came running to my vehicle. He got my attention and asked me to step outside of the car so that he could talk to me.
“Is there something wrong, officer?” I asked politely.
“Actually, yes. I was one of the arresting officers at your dad’s house. You may not remember me, but we graduated high school together.”
I looked at him more closely, trying to see if I could recognize him underneath all the facial hair. I couldn’t place him.
“You probably know me better as Dickie.”
“Oh, my God! Yes!” He was the little brother of my childhood friend, Stephanie. He used to torture us with his pet frog, letting it out whenever we would be in Stephanie’s room trying to play. Whenever we would see the frog, we would hightail it out of the bedroom, screaming, only to find him snickering by the door.
“How have you been?” I asked, leaning over to hug him.
“I’m good. Thanks for asking. I was glad that I was on the scene when we got the call. Michelle. If I hadn’t been there, they would have charged your father with assault and battery.”
“What?” I asked him, shocked.
“He was wildly flailing his limbs at the female officer who was present and who was attempting to evict him,” Dickie explained. “I had to beg her not to press charges. I knew he was just reacting badly in a very emotional situation, and not trying to actually harm her.”
I was shocked to hear this about my father because for as long as I had known him, he had never so much as raised his voice, let alone responded with violence. I guessed he was determined not to go down without a fight, as foolish as that thought was.
“Wow. I appreciate you telling me that,” I said.
“No problem. I just wanted to let you know in case there was something else going on and he needed help. Is he okay? I heard about what happened to your mother.”
“I sure hope so,” I said.
But, I wasn’t too sure of what was going on with him myself. I just wanted to help in any way that I could.
Dad told me that he wanted to go back to his house, so I contacted the bank to see if we could work something out financially. After weeks of trying to recover the house from the bank to no avail, we decided that the only option was for my dad to come and live with me.
I hadn’t really wanted to do it, but it felt like I didn’t have much of a choice. He was my dad, after all, and I didn’t want to see anything bad happen to him. But shortly after moving in with me, he started drinking heavily. It was like he was a haunted man, looking for answers at the bottom of a bottle— or, many bottles.
When I found him slumped over the toilet that night, sleeping in his own puke, I tried to talk to him, hoping that he would open up to me about how he was feeling. He wouldn’t. Instead, he attacked me and called me names. I ran out of the bathroom crying, cursing myself for even caring. I didn’t want things to get any worse, so I left him alone.
I cried myself to sleep that night as the realization set in that my father, the happy man who had raised me, was drowning in a sea of depression and perhaps alcoholism, and there was nothing that I could do to help him. I’d tried to talk to him about his drinking but he’d been resistant to any kind of rehab or therapy.
So, finding him that day covered in his own bodily fluids, was not a huge surprise. I was starting to fear that it would become the norm. And while I was sad to see my dad this way, part of me was angry.
I was angry that my mother was gone and had left me with this shell of a man. I was angry that I didn’t have the nerve to tell him to snap out of it.
I was just angry at the whole situation and I wasn’t sure that things would ever get better. I came to the sad realization that I may be coming home to my father in a pool of vomit and urine until the day that he died.
While cleaning him up and having him fight me the entire time, I made my decision about the trip with the Bradfords. This was my chance to escape my reality for a little while, so I told Whitney that I would be happy to join them on their trip. My dad didn’t seem to need me, since he tried to fight me for helping him and wanted to stay passed out instead.
A trip to the mountains would be a welcome distraction, I thought. Sure, I’d have to watch the kids sometimes, but Whitney had said they’d also be with Harlow and her a lot and that I’d have a lot of free time. So, it would be kind of like a vacation for me too. God knows I needed one. I’d said yes, and that was how I came to be here in the woods.
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Triple Pass: An MFMM Reverse Harem Romance Page 81
