HIS DEBT, MY RUIN

Lily's pov My eyes were sharp as I stared towards the rumpled papers under my father's bed while I was sweeping his room, a morning chores I still do even as I'd turn twenty this year. “What? Nineteen million dollars?” I mumbled as I read the content in the paper. My hands trembled as I read further…. FINAL WARNING TO MR RICHARD WILSON. The due payment is : $17,000,000. The accumulated money: $2,000,000. Seventy-two hours remaining, and failure to adhere to this warning, there'd be consequences! My heart skipped on reading the last paper, which was boldly written in red ink, anxiety creeping through my veins. “What has dad gotten himself into?Nineteen million dollars!” My voice barely rose like a whisper. The amount of money written in that paper is absurd. It seems like a nightmare we can't escape. I turned to make my way to wherever my Dad was, to demand an answer only to see him standing behind me all this while with his trembling eyes. I could see confusion and disdain in his clear blue eyes, which I had inherited from him, now looked vacant. “Lily, I swear I can explain….” I interrupted him, “Explain? Dad, what's going on? What's this?” The question shouted out of my mouth like venom, sharp and bitter. “Explain how you own Nineteen million to a man named Lucas who's demanding payment in the next 72 hours because it's due? Explain how you've been deceiving me for months while I worked two jobs at the diner, believing we were just struggling to make rent? I'm listening, dad….” He closed the doors behind him moving forward as if he was walking on thin ice, “Lily, I just borrowed some money from him, before I knew it, it amounted to millions and had accumulated ones too, I thought…, he paused then began, I thought I could win it back” “Win it back? Are you serious right now?” I laughed out loud with no humour in it; my laugh sound was razor-sharp and bitter. “Oh my God, Dad, have you been gambling while I've been working so hard to keep us afloat? Don’t tell me you have been wasting the money we can't afford on illegal games?” “Nooooo, just that the underground poker circuit can pay well if you know what you're doing” It's obvious you don't know what you're doing, that's why you gambled away a huge amount,” I flung the paper on him watching it drop on the floor “Do you even grasp what nineteen million dollars is or what it could have done for us if you at least invested it or you haven't realised up till now how spending that money has ruined our lives?” He flinched as if I had struck him. “I was trying to make things better for us. After your mother died, I wanted to provide you with everything she would have wanted you to have—” “So where has the provision gotten us to right now? And please don't you dare use mom as an excuse to your pathetic gambling habits” my voice lowered to a menacing whisper. “Don't ever invoke her memory”. There was total silence between us, which was suffocating. We faced each other in his tiny bedroom, which felt suddenly vast, decorated with peeling wallpaper, with a small couch near the bedside with its springs sticking out, and a television that never worked. This was our reality for two years, ever since Mom's medical expenses depleted our savings. But apparently, that hadn’t been enough agony for my father. "How long?" I finally asked. "What?" “How long have you been gambling away our future? How long did you lie to my face while I sacrificed everything and worked effortlessly to keep us from losing this apartment?” Dad ran his shaky hand through his greying hair. "Six months, maybe seven." "Seven months." I repeated the words, testing their weight. "Seven months of deception. Seven months of watching me skip meals to pay the bills while you played high-stakes poker with money we didn't have." "I thought I could manage it. I thought I could win enough to cover your mother's medical bills and maybe even buy us a real house—" "You thought wrong!” I shouted, raw and furious. "You were wrong about everything! Do you know what I've given up for you? Do you know what I've sacrificed?" His expression crumbled. "Lily, please—" “I rejected a scholarship to study in the State University because I couldn't leave you alone. I've been working sixty-hour weeks since I was seventeen! While other girls my age went to prom, dated, and figured out their lives, I was paying our bills, feeding us and looking after you because I thought you needed me but no I was wrong about you.” My words pierced him, sharp and deliberate. I want him to feel the pains, to bear every shattering weight of disappointment that was gripping the breath from my chest. “You just needed a money-making machine. Someone foolish enough to drain themselves working hard while you squandered every cent on your addiction.” “That's not true…” “Isn't it?” I snatched another letter on top of the television stand, this one bearing a different name. "Because this one says you borrowed against the diner where I work. My boss could lose his business because of you. Mrs. Betty downstairs? The lovely old lady who brings us soup when we're sick? You pledged her grandson’s college fund, and the worst part was that you looked me every day in the eyes and lied, watching me stress for every dollars then making me think we were, team!” "We are a team—" "No." My word was final, stark. "We were never a team. I was your enabler, your meal ticket. And I was too foolish and loyal to see it." I headed for the door, grabbing my jacket from a chair. I needed to breathe, to be away from him with all his lies "Where are you going?" “I'm walking away from this bullshit, I can't deal with you any longer because you disgust me” I said coldly, and I couldn't look at him. “Lily, wait—" I turned back, and the words erupted from deep within me. "I hate you. Do you hear me? I hate that you're my father. I hate the fact that for the last two years, I've been working so hard caring for someone who cares only for himself” Instantly, I got blanked from the slap, which landed on my face so quickly. I felt pain across my cheek, and I tripped over, holding my face. For a moment, we both froze, stunned. “If only mum was alive, I won't pass through this mess you put me through” Dad's hand stayed up, his eyes wide shaking with fear at his own action. "Lily, I'm sorry, I didn't mean—" But I already made my way out , opening the front door with enough force to slam it against the wall. I paused briefly in the doorway to deliver one final blow. "Such a miserable father," I said quietly.” They would come for you and don't expect me to rescue you because you made your choices. Now live with the consequences." I bang the door behind me, which sounds loud through the hallway, running downstairs as if someone was chasing me. As I came outside, the cold breeze touched my skin, but I walked past instantly, not noticing the two black SUVs parked across the street. The men on black suits came out of those vehicles and moved towards the building I had just left. But one thought raced through my mind, how to distance myself from my selfish father.