AN: I haven't thought about this story in about two years, but a few days ago the characters started talking to me again. This is a short into but it seemed like a good place to stop. I hope my original fans are still around, and new ones pop up. Be sure to check out the other three in the series if you haven't already.

"You simply cannot be serious . . . Well, that is unacceptable. . . Do NOT tell me that I have no say. She is my child. . . Then my lawyer will be in touch with you."

"That can't be good," Kara said to Dave from where they had entered the house a moment before. "Must have been my father."

Upon seeing the pallor of her face, he decided to send her elsewhere. If his wife was having such a strong reaction, he may as well. Of course there was also the chance that it wasn't Roger with whom Erin had been speaking. It could have been work related. While determining how to best get Kara to leave the room, she saved him from the deed.

"I think I'm going to go take a shower." She handed him the bag of Chinese take out and he added it to the one he was already carrying. "I'll eat later. Maybe by then mom will be calmer."

"Good idea, honey," Dave said. "I'll go see to your mother. We'll all eat when you come down."

He watched her climb to the top of the stairs and turn the corner towards her bedroom before he moved down the hall to his office where his wife was sitting at his desk. Call ended and phone discarded, she sat with her head in her hands. "Oh, I'm not going to like this, am I?"

"He's coming back," she said, not bothering to move her position.

"Please tell me we're not talking about Roger."

"We are." When her husband walked around to the front of the desk and sat on the edge of it, she lifted her head to him. "He bought the house on the cul-de-sac around the corner."

"Around the corner from here?" he asked. That was a bold move, even for Roger.

Erin nodded her head and sat back in her chair. "His wife came to her senses and left him. There's nothing holding him to California, so he's coming back to 'reconnect with his daughter.'"

"Did it occur to him to discuss this with his daughter first?"

Erin shrugged one shoulder. "Seems she blocked his number on her phone. He says he couldn't get in touch with her but we both know he wouldn't have cared how she felt about it. Roger knows best."

"Ok," Dave said, "let's look at this logically. Roger is moving here. We can't stop him. Not even your lawyer can stop him as he's doing nothing illegal. But Kara is an adult. She can make her own choices about the type and extent of a relationship she wants with him. We just have to be here to support her."

"Chronologically speaking, she's an adult, but we both know she's a very young twenty-one year old. She was subjected to parentification as a teen by my alcoholism, then abused by her father, so her emotional maturity is a bit lower than adult."

"Wow," Kara stood in the doorway of the office trying to process what she heard from her mother.

Her parents leapt to their feet. "Kara," Erin said.

"Um, I was just coming to tell you that Rachel called and we're heading to a party at the dorms. So, I guess I'll see you guys later." She turned and left.

Erin tried to scramble around her husband to get to her daughter, calling out her name in her efforts, but David stopped her. "Let her go," he said. "There's nothing you can say right now to make her feel better. You can talk to her tomorrow."

"Yeah, ok," Erin said. She ran her hand through her hair and tried to compose herself. She couldn't believe her daughter overheard her comments. What kind of mother was she anyway? She needed a drink. The feeling overwhelmed her. Her ex-husband, who she learned only a few months ago had been abusive to her daughter, both physically and emotionally, was returning to live in a house down the street from them and try to rekindle a relationship with Kara. What fresh hell was this? "I think I need to go call my sponsor," she said. David kissed her on the head without saying a word and closed the door on his way out.

He grabbed the bag on Chinese food abandoned in the foyer and brought it onto the patio. "Moo shoo pork for one tonight," he said to the stars.

CMCMCMCMCM

Erin waited up for her daughter that night. She was sitting at the kitchen table with files from work to keep her alert and occupied in the late hours of the night, turned morning. The phone call with her sponsor calmed her and then the sex with her husband relaxed her. She left Dave to sleep in bed, convinced that the forthcoming conversation would go well. She needed to apologize for the abruptness of what Kara overheard her saying, explain what she meant, and inform Kara that her father was coming home. Likely everything would have gone well, if it weren't an intoxicated daughter that came through the door.

"Kara," Erin was aghast at the condition of her daughter stumbling through the foyer.

"Mom," Kara said, "what are you doing up?" She tried to stand as straight as possible and hoped she was pulling off a sober, albeit tired, persona.

"You're drunk."

"I told you I was going to a party," she said, stepping around her mother. "Now I'm going to bed."

"How did you get home?" Erin asked. "Tell me you didn't drive." She followed Kara to the stairs.

"I didn't drive," was all Kara said as her mother watched her stumble up the stairs.

Erin's feelings went from shocked to sad to angry in the seconds since Kara entered the house. They stopped at angry. She brushed past her daughter on the staircase and said, "Your father's moving down the street. He'll be here in a week," as she passed her and went to bed.

The bile rose quickly in Kara's throat and she thanked God that she made it to the bathroom before she heaved. Her father was coming home.

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