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I hadn’t deleted it though.

Nor blocked him, or removed his contact from my phone and I think I knew why, and it wasn’t this present.

“Hello, love.” The smile was back again, and the tension in his face let me know he was determined to maintain it now. “The house looks nice.” His eyes narrowed slightly. “Those gutters might need a bit of work, though.”

“Dad…” Frankie hissed.

“Well, I’m not staying long,” Dad forged on. “I just came to drop this off.” Something tall, wrapped in bright paper was wheeled forward as I came closer. I looked at him, then the present, and when he urged me to open it, I peeled a corner of the paper back.

Damn, this was thousands of dollars of tools standing here.

“I didn’t do enough to support you during your apprenticeship. Part of me was sure you weren’t going to stick it out,” he explained. “More fool me. Doesn’t let me off the hook, though. When you were in your second or third year, I could’ve stepped up like I did your brothers, but I didn’t.”

His hand shook as he put it down on top of the towering tool box, each drawer stuffed with high-end tools. I’d be the envy of every bloke in the garage come Monday.

“I didn’t. I made a mistake, many really.” The quaver in his voice had me meeting his eyes. My big, tall, tough dad was collapsing before me. “That’s become clear. So now I’m trying to make things right, before it’s too late.”

I spied the white band of pale skin on his finger before he said the words.

“I’m divorcing your mother. Should’ve happened years ago, to be honest. I know now how hard she rode you and the other girls.” He was talking about my sisters-in-law. “But at the time, I thought she was just directing all that venom at me. Never fucking happy, your mother.”

My eyes widened at the sound of him cursing. It usually only happened when he was watching the football or when he was working on the car.

“She pick, pick, picks until there’s nothing left.”

His hand slid across the toolbox slowly, ready to grab mine, or leave me be if that’s what I wanted. Feeling him hold my hand was weird. We didn’t really do shows of affection in my family, so I didn’t really know what to do.

Dad did.

When I didn’t pull away, he gripped it tight, giving it a squeeze before continuing.

“I thought I was the only one she was haranguing. I thought if I just held her focus, she’d leave you lot alone.”

“The boys.” I croaked that out, my throat suddenly dry, and when a drink was placed next to me, I grabbed it, drinking it down greedily. People had come spilling out of the house to see what was happening, Millie and her parents hanging back, but not my guys. They took up positions around me, staring at my father meaningfully. If my family thought I was an easy target before, that was no longer the case.

“You made sure the boys were left alone.” I jerked open a drawer, picking up a gleaming spanner and then turned it back and forth, watching the way the moon played along the chrome. “That’s why I came down to the garage or the games room or the garden. I needed to escape…” It took conscious effort to slow my breath down. “To escape her.”

“I know.” His face crumpled then, and for a moment I just stared. I’d never seen my father cry for even a second, and it took me a moment to realise what this was. “I failed, love. I failed you.”

“Dad—” Frankie moved closer, but our father brushed him away.

“No point trying to soft soap this,” he ground out. “I fucked up. I let my fucking wife talk like about my daughter every day. I know this is something you can’t ever forgive, Jamie?—”

“Forgive?” I shook my head feeling curiously light. No psychologist would say my family trauma was healed by this one admission, but you know what? It felt like a step was taken. One that finally, finally took us away from the shitty patterns of the past. “Probably not. Too much happened to just brush that under the carpet.”

Dad nodded sadly, and as I watched him collapse in on himself, a thought occurred to me.

“But finding a way forward to ensure the same problems aren’t repeated?” He met my eyes. “I’m open to that.”

“I’m Angus McDonald.” The guys’ father stepped forward then and offered Dad his hand. “Me and my wife, Heather.” She appeared by his side and he wrapped his arm around her waist. “We’ve seen a lot of Jamie over the years. We’ve been there when she’s had her successes and dried her tears when things haven’t gone to plan.”

“I’m glad my Jamie had that,” Dad replied, shamefaced.

“It hasn’t always worked out right. Sometimes we’ve said the wrong thing or tried to smother her, right when she needed space. Parenting’s difficult like that.”

Dad met his eyes and I saw a brief flicker of hope there, but it was ready to be extinguished with one word from me.

I didn’t say it: get out, leave me alone, never come back, and it wasn’t the shining tower of tools that changed my mind. I’d practised this scene over and over in my head since the party, but faced with the reality of it, things changed. I couldn’t imagine my father saying sorry for one, or admitting he was wrong. Dream Dad was a monolithic enemy in my head, negating my feelings over and over, whereas in reality, he was just a man. A man who fucked up, but right now, was willing to work on that.