*CHAPTER 42*

*CHAPTER 42*
"Kassie?" The familiar sound of my Uncle's voice had my chest and throat tightening. No matter how strained our relationship was, he was still the only family I had. Still the person who raised me and took care of me for the years after my mom died.

No matter how frustrated he made me, the sound of his voice still had the power to make me feel like a little kid again. He still had a little piece of my mom in him somewhere deep down. A piece I kept trying searching for over the years. A piece of her that wasn't just the eyes that he shared with her...the same eyes that I saw staring at me in the mirror every day. A reason my mom had chosen to leave me with him besides the fact we were family.

"Yeah, it's me." I told him.

I heard him clear his throat over the line, "Oh good. Good."

Silence stretched over the line and I fidgeted with the hem on my shorts for a moment. Finally when he didn't speak, I said, "So was there a reason you were calling, or—"

The noisy sound of him letting out a deep breath on the other side of the line filled my ear before he said, "Look, Kassie, I just wanted to say that I'm sorry for not being...available much lately. Work has been a lot for me right now."

I pinched my lips together to not bring up the fact that I'd been busy too, with a lot more than just work. I stayed silent, deciding to see where he was going with this.

When I didn't respond he said, "But I got your text message about the mortgage and it took me a while to figure out the best thing to do. Anyways, I got a flight into town and I'm at the house right now."

I winced remembering the burn mark still on the tile in the entry way that I hadn't had time to cover up with a rug like I'd planned. Oops. Then his words started to sink in.

Uncle David was in town. At the house. Crap.

My grip on the phone tightened.

"When did you get in?" I asked, chewing on my lip.

"Late last night. I was surprised when I saw you weren't here this morning."

"Umm, yeah," I cleared my throat, pulling out the half lie I'd been tossing around, "I don't know if you heard, but there was a murder in the house next door. I've been staying with some friends until it gets figured out. I didn't want to stay there alone, you know?"

"No, I hadn't heard that. But I'm glad you had some friends you could stay with," he paused again, the sound of another deep sigh before he said, "Look, I was hoping we could talk. Can you swing by the house?"

Going to have an awkward conversation with Uncle David was one of the last things I wanted to do. And that was saying something after the hellish workout Malcolm had put me through this morning. What I did want to do was ask him what was so important he hadn't been around lately. Why he hadn't been able to make it to my graduation. Why he hadn't answered any of my calls or texts.

Instead I said, "Yeah, I can come."

"Good, that's...good—can you be here in the next hour?"

"I think so."

"Alright then, I'll talk to you soon—"

"Wait," I interrupted before he could hang up, "Can I ask you something?"

The silence was so stilted for a moment, I wondered if he'd hung up at first, until I heard the sound of his breath coming from the other end of the line. I swallowed, taking his weighted silence as confirmation and forced myself to continue, "When my mom...when she left me with you, did she ever mention anything to you about, weird...genetics?" I tried to ask him about Magic without straight up asking him about my magic.

And was failing miserably.

I winced.

"Or," I rushed on, "I know I've asked you about this before, but did she tell you anything about my dad? Anything I should be aware of?" When I'd been young I went through a few years of badgering him about information about my mom and dad and every time he immediately shut down. Ignoring any and all questions. I was prepared for this time to be no different, picking anxiously at the edge of my shorts.

Another long silence filled my ears. I haphazardly checked my phone to make sure he hadn't hung up on me, but no, the call was still going. I waited, the toe of my sandal tapping restlessly on the bottom step of the front porch. I watched a lizard skitter across the rocks along the Pembroke's walkway until it disappeared out of sight.

Finally David said, "Look Kassie, there are some things about your mom that I've been meaning to tell you. Things she told me about your father too." I could picture the expression he wore now, the same expression I'd seen him wear a thousand times—gruff, lips tight, "I kept waiting to tell you until you were older, but now that you are older—it's just hard to pull things back out that have been buried this long, ya know?"

I did know. Sort of. But more than any of that, I just wanted answers. Now that he was sort of talking, I wanted to badger him with so many questions that his ear would fall off. But I also didn't want to scare him away, didn't want him to clam up like he usually did. So I forced myself to stay silent, waiting for him to go on, biting the inside of my cheek to keep myself from erupting with all the things I wanted to say.

"The day Kate—your mom— dropped you off with me, I'd been shocked to say the least. I hadn't seen her in years and all the sudden, out of the blue, she was standing on my front porch. It was the first I'd realized she even had a kid."

I remembered that day. Barely, but flickers of memory still dredged their way to the surface. My mom promising me she'd be back, her unpacking my backpack filled with a few belongings from the back of our car. A hushed conversation with an uncle I'd never met before in his kitchen, the sound of cartoons they'd put on for me drowning out the sound of their tense words.

I'd only been twelve, so the memories were foggy, but they were there.

He cleared his throat and continued, "She told me a couple of things, before she left. About your father. And about you."

My grip on the phone was so tight it left my fingers feeling raw, "What sort of things?"

There was a sound of a chair scraping against tile like he was dropping into a chair at the kitchen table. Another long exhale, "Look, we should probably be having this conversation in person. I'll tell you everything you want to know when you get here."

No. I wanted to beg him to tell me now. To force him to just rip the band aid off and be done with it. Curiosity and dread lurched their way to the surface in equal parts, but I forced them down.

"Alright," I finally agreed, forcing myself to loosen my grip on my phone. I'd do whatever it took for him to finally open up with me, and be honest. If he wanted to have this conversation in person, I could do that, "I'll be there in an hour, then."

He grunted out a muffled, "See you in a bit." And the call ended.