mythsandmonsters:
“The problem is that’s not sorry enough. Not by a long shot.”
Whether Chance was telling the truth or not, it was painfully obvious that Jack couldn’t and wouldn’t accept anything by way of an apology without Chance making independent steps to earn and prove it, and Jack doubted that Chance could even grasp that fact without having someone spell it out for him.
“You can’t rely on her all the time to tell you where you fucked up if you’re actually going to learn from it,” Jack pointed out, his tone dropping from aggressive to trying to approach in a way that might actually reason with Chance’s warped logic.
“If you want to even start to fix any of what you did, to me especially, you need to go right back to the beginning and figure out every step for yourself. You need to learn to recognise what you did wrong without someone telling you, and then you need to teach yourself the appropriate responses to those things, whether you’re capable of genuinely feeling them or not. You wanna fix all this? Fix your-fucking-self first. Maybe then you can earn your way toward making up for what you did to me.
“We both know I’ll never be able to be sorry enough, Jack. That’s just a fact.”
He knew saying that wasn’t going to help, but it was the closest he had ever been to outright admitting that his son was right. Things were easier with Manson and even that was slow going. Sure, what he had done to Oona had helped, but it was still a long road and she still refused to let him meet her kids. Not that he blamed her. Jack hadn’t gotten that option with his youngest though and Chance couldn’t help but wonder how much that bothered the boy.
“The only thing she’s really pressed on was taking you from her. And she’s been harping on that one since she was pregnant with Teddy.” The rest he had sort of gotten a grasp on by watching Arcadia.
“I’m trying. I never laid a hand on your younger brother and I’ve done nothing to your baby sister either. Those mutts aren’t even family and I haven’t laid a finger on them either,” he explained, trying to get Jack to see that he was, in fact, making a solid effort at least.
Chance sighed and rubbed at his temples, trying to reel in his own anger again. “I’ve also made no attempt to threaten you or hit anything despite wanting nothing more than to put my fist through something. I am trying. But it takes your mother explaining some things because I don’t understand your emotional responses. Manson hugged me and I didn’t even know what to do with that.”
ofviolentdeath 