Brandon's POV
I took Sophia and Victoria to a restaurant for dinner together, then took them to the playground, shopping for whatever she wanted. All the time, she was so enthusiastic, as if she had never felt the freedom to buy whatever she wanted before, even eating so much that she was now full and exhausted after playing, finally falling asleep in the back seat.
I focused on driving, while Victoria remained silent beside me. You know, all the time she stayed quiet, only occasionally speaking to warn Sophia not to ask for too much from me but Sophia ignored her.
"Where are we going?"
Finally, I heard her soft voice asking a question.
"We're going to meet Miss Lennon," I said.
"Who is she?"
"A property entrepreneur."
"Why? Why are we meeting her?" She turned to me with her serious gaze, while I remained focused on driving.
"You will know," I said casually.
I heard her sigh heavily, perhaps anxious, even occasionally glancing at Sophia sleeping in the back seat, as if feeling worried.
"I'm going to buy a new house for her, not far from my apartment so that I can see her often, or even take care of her when you leave her to work," I said.
"Brandon, that's too much!" she whispered.
"There's no such thing as too much for a father who wants to make his daughter happy. This is not enough because your attitude makes me feel like I owe her love for five years... And nothing can bring that back," I said bluntly, unable to deny that I was very upset every time I thought about this issue. "I feel like I want to see the moments when she was still a baby... want to kiss her want to hold her want to play with her want to know how she first crawled, then walked... I want to know who she first called... I want to know if she often wet the bed if she was satisfied if she wore nice clothes..."
"You talk as if I'm a bad mother." She interrupted me.
"Then what? What do you call it if not a bad mother?" I wondered, remembering how she just left like that. "You hid your pregnancy from me... You..."
"It's because of your mother, she kept threatening me!" she cried.
"I know, you should have trusted me instead of constantly fearing her!" I insisted, accelerating the car even faster. "I hate this... You're silent, you don't think I'll be a good father to her... you don't trust my love... I don't know, I don't know what's on your mind!"
She just remained silent, turning her face away.
"I told you from the beginning, whatever happens, you have to trust me... You have to maintain our relationship... But what, you decide to distance yourself from me as if you're not sure about my love..." I shook my head, feeling choked up. "Five years is not a short time...."
"Then do you think I didn't think about myself?" she asked softly.
I glanced at her briefly. "When you become a mother, you don't need to think about yourself but your child!"
"But I'm like this to protect my child, you don't know how cruel your mother is!"
"And you don't believe that I can take care of our child!" I asserted, spontaneously pulling over the car and stopping, staring at her sharply. "Don't talk too much to find justification for your behavior... You made me feel like a useless father for five years, without any fault of mine!"
She just remained silent, stunned, her face tense, and I hated it.
"What? What else are you going to do? Do you want me to follow all your plans? Keep me away from her just because you're afraid of my mother?" The question came out of my mouth again, truly curious about what she wanted as she kept preventing me from doing various things for Sophia. "Please... Please stop thinking that I'm useless, stop thinking that I'll bow down to my mother. No, not at all!"
"But you're so obedient to her," she whispered with teary eyes. "You obeyed her orders for the bride selection competition..."
"That's different!" I insisted. "And you should know, all of that happened because I was too fed up with the situation... I always missed you, I was like crazy missing you every day without being able to find you... You were like lost in the earth!"
She just remained silent, perhaps satisfied seeing my madness now.
"You know, almost every night I cried, got drunk, slapped myself, I didn't know how to get rid of your shadow... I always wondered what mistake I made that you chose to leave. I always blamed myself... You made me dead in my life. This is crazy, Victoria!" I poured out my heart, and she just remained silent in her tears. "Why are you crying? Do you regret what you did? If you weren't selfish, maybe Sophia wouldn't be a little girl begging for love and the things she wants! Maybe she wouldn't suffer!"
"Brandon..." She looked at me and shook her head. "It's not as simple as you think. I suffer too without you... I'm suffering too!"
"It's because of your stupidity!" I snapped, not wanting to hear her complaints anymore. "It's all because you don't trust my ability as a man who can protect you!"
"You're blaming me..." She wiped her tears. "It's because of your mother... she's crazy, she made me have no choice..."
"You always have a choice!" I pointed at her. "Five years... My mother won't always watch you, neither will your mother... You had thousands of chances to contact me... I never even changed my phone number or my social media accounts... Even my apartment PIN... Everything is the same as before because I always hoped you would come back anytime!"
I sighed, and swallowed saliva, my throat suddenly felt parched.
"You always had a chance... But you chose to bear your burden alone... And I suffered too," I said, then looked ahead again. "And now I want us to be together again... Like before... But you break me again... Who's that guy? The guy who's there for you so you forget about me?" I wondered, staring at her again.
"Um..." Suddenly she became nervous. "He... You won't know who he is... I mean, you will know but before, he wasn't someone we knew."
"Or maybe he never existed, but you made him seem real to avoid me..." I sighed heavily. "It's fine... I won't prevent you... It's your right, but never separate me from my daughter."
"But..."
"I won't accept rejection!" I asserted before she could speak again.
"Oh my God..." She sighed heavily, sounding frustrated, but I was far more frustrated than her.
For several minutes of driving, she remained silent until we arrived at an upscale housing complex with wide distances between each house.
"Brandon, are you serious?" she asked.
"I'm always serious!" I replied curtly, quickly unbuckling my seatbelt and getting out of the car.