Episode 923: Daddy Lessons

Justine turned, a smile sweeping across her face. “Are you for real?” she asked as they walked towards one another. “Or are you just something my frazzled brain conjured up like when someone’s lost in the desert and they see a lake up ahead.”

“It’s that good to see me?” Her husband, Quent, asked.

Justine nodded and teared up a little.

“Hey.” Quentin smudged aside a solitary teardrop and pulled her in for a lengthy embrace.

When they broke apart, Justine said, “you never mentioned you were coming.”

“I didn’t know if I’d be able to get away from work and I didn’t want you to expect my support only to have me not show up. Luckily, I was able to get away.”

“If you need to get back to work, it’s okay. It’s not like my dad scares me, it’s just so aggravating dealing with him and I’ve grown to hate it.”

“Well, the whole point of having a partner is to face these things together. I figure the two of us go in there together there’s better odds of us keeping each other’s tempers in check. Losing it with your dad is rarely the right tactic.”

Justine nodded. “Reasonable isn’t generally his go to response, everything has to be his way or it’s wrong. It’s why I’ve been in knots and teary. I’ve been trying to figure out how to make an unreasonable person do the reasonable thing and leave it to our daughter to forge her own path. How do we convince him that she doesn’t need his pushy brand of guidance?”

“What if we tell him the truth about Tansy, that she’s going through some stuff and given how there are so many things he doesn’t approve of, it wouldn’t exactly be leap to guess that what she’s going through might be on that list. Anything that’s different from his life, from what he knows, he sees as a bad choice. Maybe he’ll cut her loose like he does with everyone else he claims is making bad choices.”

“And if he tells her that’s why he backed away? What does that say to her? What does that do to her self-esteem?”

Quentin nodded. “You’re right. I didn’t think that through. Bad idea. I wouldn’t put that conversion therapy garbage past him either. So how do we handle him?”

Justine shrugged. “I wish I knew. I’ve been trying to figure that out my whole life.”

Episode 924: Don't Let Me Down