Chapter 9 - The Final Visit
Before Gordon and Elaine were transferred from the county holding facility to their respective state and federal penitentiaries, I made one final request.
I asked for a fifteen-minute visitation with my father.
Simone waited outside in the security lobby of the state correctional facility while a guard escorted me into a small, sterile visiting room divided by a thick pane of bulletproof glass.
A moment later, the heavy iron door on the opposite side opened.
Gordon walked in, wearing a oversized orange jumpsuit. His hair was cropped short, his shoulders were hunched forward, and his once-boisterous demeanor was completely extinguished. He sat down heavily on the metal stool, staring at the intercom phone resting on the wall beside him.
I picked up my receiver.
Slowly, reluctantly, Gordon reached out his trembling hand and lifted his phone to his ear.
"Cassandra," he rasped. His voice was cracked, robbed of the loud, booming authority he used to command our household with. "You... you came."
"I came to deliver a message," I said, my voice quiet, even, and totally devoid of malice. "From Melanie."
Gordon’s eyes flickered with a brief spark of desperation. "How is she? Is she... is the marrow working?"
"The transplant was a complete success," I replied. "Her blood counts are normal. Her doctors expect a full recovery. She is being discharged tomorrow."
Gordon let out a long, ragged breath, his shoulders shaking as he lowered his head. "Thank God... thank God..."
"She isn't thanking God, Gordon," I continued coldly. "She isn't thanking you, either. She asked me to tell you that she is changing her last name next week. She is taking my middle name, Vance. Neither of us will ever carry the name Whitmore again."
Gordon flinched as if I had struck him across the face. He looked up, his eyes bloodshot and pleading behind the glass. "Cassandra... please... I know I was hard on you. I know I made terrible mistakes... but I did it all for the family! I was trying to keep the business alive! I was under so much pressure—"
"You dragged me into an alley like trash," I interrupted, cutting through his excuses with the razor precision of a scalpel. "You didn't do it because you were under pressure. You did it because you thought I was weak. You thought that because I loved my sister, I would let you destroy me."
Gordon pressed his hand against the glass, tears finally slipping down his wrinkled cheeks. "I'm your father, Cass... you can't just leave me in here to die..."
I looked at his hand against the glass, remembering the way he had grabbed my bruised arm three weeks ago, dragging me across the cold asphalt while my mother watched.
"Dad," I said, using the word one last time, not as a title of respect, but as a final farewell to a ghost. "You told me in that alley that nobody would find me. You were wrong. I found myself."
I set the phone back on its hook.
May you like
Gordon began banging his hand frantically against the glass, screaming something I could no longer hear through the soundproof barrier. The guards immediately stepped behind him, grabbing his arms and forcing him back toward the steel door.
I didn't watch him leave. I stood up, buttoned my blazer, and walked out into the warm, bright sunlight waiting for me outside.
