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Chapter 353 I Forgive You

　　Inside Lucy\'s office, she stared at her phone for a moment as she tried to make up her mind whether or not she should speak with her mother. 

　　It was time she related with her family as she related with everyone else. Maybe if she expressed her genuine emotions with them for once, then they would all stop tiptoeing around each other and be more expressive.

　　Even though she didn\'t want to compare her family to Tom\'s family since she knew that each family operated on different dynamics, and had their problems tailored to their dynamics, she loved Tom\'s family and how they understood each other. She wasn\'t sure her parents understood her, and she also was beginning to learn that maybe she didn\'t understand her parents either. She wanted her family to do better, and to achieve that she needed to let go of her resentments.

　　Without wasting another second thinking about it, she dialed her mom\'s line. 

　　Janet, who was still pacing around the house thinking about where Lucas could have gone, received the call the moment she saw Lucy\'s name displayed on the phone.

　　"Lucy," her voice came out as a hoarse whisper, and she cleared it.

　　"What is wrong? Are you okay? Did something happen?" Lucy asked in concern when she heard the distress in her mother\'s voice.

　　"I thought your father told you that Lucas is missing?" Janet asked, surprised that Lucy was asking her such a question when she knew about the situation of things. 

　　"Lucas hasn\'t called you yet? I spoke with him earlier, and he said he was going to give you both a call after our call. I thought he did so already, else I would have called...."

　　"He called you? Did he tell you where he is? His line is going through now?" Janet asked as Andrew who had just returned from walking down the block to see if he would learn anything new, rushed to stand beside her when he heard her question. Janet placed the phone on speaker so that he could hear Lucy.

　　"Yes, he returned my call. He said he wants to be alone for the time being, and he doesn\'t want to come home now because everything at home reminds him of her," Lucy explained.

　　"Do you think he is okay? Did he sound fine?" Andrew asked as he took the phone from Janet.

　　"You don\'t expect him to be okay, mom. He isn\'t okay. He had a headache, so he must have gotten drunk last night, but at least he had the sense not to take his car. He assured me that he wasn\'t going to do anything stupid, so you don\'t have to worry," Lucy said, and they both relaxed. 

　　"Still, it would help if we knew where he was staying. At least that way, I can be very sure that he is fine," Janet said with a sigh.

　　"Don\'t worry, at least now that Lucy has heard from him, we can relax until we hear from him directly. And we can also try to reach him again after talking to Lucy," Andrew said, patting her back.

　　"What about you? How are you?" Janet asked when she remembered that she was yet to ask.

　　"I\'m holding up," Lucy said and then cleared her throat, "But I would like us to address what you said last night," she added.

　　"Baby, I\'m very sorry..."

　　"I\'m not talking about an apology," Lucy interrupted. "I just want to know why you said that. I don\'t think that was something that you blurted out carelessly," Lucy said, and Janet glanced at her husband helplessly.

　　"Lu..."

　　"Stay out of this, dad! It has nothing to do with you... At least not yet. It\'s either you both want me to talk about this and get it out of my mind, or you\'d rather we all ignore the elephant in the room," Lucy said testily.

　　"Fine. I\'m sorry. You can go on," Andrew said apologetically.

　　"I didn\'t mean what I said. I don\'t even know where it came from," Janet said apologetically.

　　"I\'m sorry, mom, but I don\'t believe you. I really wish I could believe you and take your word for it, but I can\'t. The choice of words you used didn\'t sound like a mistake. But that\'s okay," Lucy paused to take a deep breath while her parents stared at each other, wondering what was going through her mind. 

　　"I wish I could take it back. I wish there were a way you could see into my heart and see that I really didn\'t mean it," Janet said weakly. She was exhausted both physically and emotionally, and she didn\'t know what else to say to convince Lucy that she really didn\'t mean it, so she let her husband lead her to the couch where they both sat while he held on to the phone.

　　"I called because I wanted to let you know that I am not insensitive. I don\'t care if there is a tiny part of you that thinks so, or maybe it came from your subconscious. I\'m letting you know that I am not insensitive, and I\'ve never been insensitive... Well, apart from what I said to Lucas immediately after he broke up with Rachel."

　　She continued, hardly pausing for breath, "As far as I\'m concerned, I have been the most sensitive member of this family for way too long, and now I\'m done carrying that burden. My feelings matter too. Because I care too much about all of you, I have tried to keep most of my fears and feelings to myself, so you don\'t feel guilty or get upset, but now I\'m done doing that too."

　　"I love you both very much, but I realize that I\'ve not loved myself enough, and I think it\'s time I started doing so. I\'m not angry with either of you anymore. I have chosen to no longer be resentful of you both for not noticing when I started withdrawing and for not trying to find out if I was okay as I would have wanted you to do as my parents. Also, I will no longer silently blame you for not being there for me as my parents as I needed you to be either. You have both been perfect parents in your own way, and I\'m grateful that I got you both. I understand now that you\'re humans and because you do not have this whole life and parenting thing figured out as I assumed, you are still prone to making mistakes. I forgive you for being yourselves, and I hope you can forgive me for silently resenting you all these years based on my own expectations and for whatever else I may have done that triggered you to speak to me in that manner." Once Lucy was done speaking, she let out a relieved sigh, and that was when she realized that she had been crying, and her face was wet with tears. 

　　"Lucy, I\'m sorry we hurt you without meaning to. We would have done whatever you wanted us to do as your parents if only you had told us. You always seemed so independent and self-sufficient even before the incident, and we didn\'t want to take that away from you because we believed it was your identity. Lucas was always more dependent and more open about his feelings. We wanted you to be yourself because we trusted you, not because we didn\'t care about you or notice the changes in you. When you stopped joining us in the living room for the soap operas, we noticed. We noticed, but we assumed you were outgrowing it, and we didn\'t want to bother you. When you started eating less, I asked if you were having boy trouble, and you said no, so I assumed you were just trying not to put on weight the way most teenage girls do. I always believed that we were the kind of parents you would come to if you needed help, and you wouldn\'t need to be coerced to tell us if something was wrong. Hence I didn\'t see the need to pressure you to talk. I\'m sorry I assumed wrongly. It was my fault. I should have asked. I made so many assumptions, and I will always live with that regret knowing what it cost you, what it cost us. I should have made sure I found out what was wrong with you. I\'m sorry I never realized this was how you felt. You just kept saying you were fine after everything, and I didn\'t want to force you to speak because I didn\'t want to trigger bad memories. I\'m sorry I failed to be a good mother," Janet pleaded amidst her own tears and covered her face in her hands, while Andrew just sat beside her with a sad look on his face and his hand draped around his wife\'s shoulder in comfort.

　　"You didn\'t fail me. Maybe I thought so at some point, but I don\'t think so anymore. You weren\'t perfect, but you were a good mother," Lucy assured her mother. 

　　"I will do better, I promise," Janet said in a broken voice, and Andrew nodded.

　　"I\'m sorry, princess. We will do better. We will pay more attention to you," Andrew said, and Lucy shook her head as she wiped her tears.

　　"You already do. I just wanted to get this off my chest because I\'ve kept it in for so long. I love you both, and I wouldn\'t trade you for anything," Lucy assured them.

　　"We love you too, pumpkin. We really do, more than you can imagine," Janet said, feeling relieved that Lucy had expressed her feelings.

　　"Everything will be fine, mom. And don\'t worry, Lucas will be fine too," Lucy said confidently, wanting to move on from the subject.

　　"What about Tom and the others? How are they?" Janet asked curiously.

　　"Tom is okay. His parents should be on their way to Sogal by now with Bryan and Sonia," Lucy said and remembered that she was yet to speak with Sonia.

　　"I will give them a call after I hear from Lucas," Janet said, and Lucy nodded. 

　　"I need to get back to work now. I love you both."

　　"We love you too. And give our regards to Tom," Andrew responded before hanging up.