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to talk. "Upon your father’s incarceration, he signed over all of his legal rights to your mother and allowed your stepfather to adopt you."  
    I heard the words he was saying, but I just couldn't believe it was happening. "No, this can't be right."  
    He pushed a couple pictures toward me and I felt the room beginning to spin. The first picture was my mother in a wedding dress with a man I didn't recognize and the second picture was the man leaning over my mother and a newborn baby in a hospital. On the back of the picture were my parents’ names and my name. I covered my face with my hands and started to cry. "This can't be happening. How could I not have known this?"  
    Elle was quiet as she rubbed my back. This wasn't exactly how she had imagined this going and I knew she felt horrible for me.  
    "Charlie, you were only ten when your parents died. Maybe they planned on telling you when you were old enough to understand."  
    I heard what she was saying, but all I could think about was how he hadn't come looking for me when he found out I was an orphan. "Why was I put into foster care if I had a father out there somewhere?"  
    “When you were adopted your biological father had signed over parental rights and even if he wanted to care for you, he wouldn't have been able to because he was incarcerated."  
    "Great, as if it couldn't get any worse, my father is a murderer."  
    The lawyer clocked his pen over and over. "He didn't murder anyone. Look, my father was the divorce attorney for your parent’s case. I took over his practice when he retired. From what I gathered from his notes, twenty years ago your father was addicted to alcohol and then narcotics. He used to beat on your mother, which sent your mother into the arms of your step-father. One night he drank himself to a stupor and tried to drive home. He hit another car and killed someone. That is what sent him to jail. Once he was clean, he was a different man. In fact, my father helped him out when he first got out of prison. Your father owned a bar, and even though he was a recovering alcoholic, he never took another drink, not even when he was on his deathbed."  
    There was a lump in my throat and my eyes were filled with tears. "Just tell me why I'm here. It doesn't even matter what kind of man he was, because I needed him to be my father and he wasn't."  
    He cleared his throat again and slid me a stack of papers. "Your father set up a will the day he found out he had cancer. He stipulated that you were to get three quarters of the ownership of his business located at Highland Street."  
    I don't even know if what he was saying was registering. "Three quarters? Who gets the other quarter?"  
    He passed me another paper. "The other quarter goes to a John Thomas. We have yet to locate Mr. Thomas."  
    "This John guy, is he like my brother or something?"  
    He turned white and his face changed from steady to worried. "No, John is not your brother."  
    "Well can I just sell him my half of the bar?"  
    "Your father stipulated that the bar isn't to be sold until after five years of you taking it over." He explained.  
    "I don't want the damn thing. I'm in college, what would I want with a bar?" I was being a bitch, but this was just unreal.  
    "I think it could be cool. Maybe we would go visit the location before you freak out any more." Elle was really trying to get me to be more optimistic.  
    "The tavern has been in your family for over thirty years now. Your grandfather opened it when he moved here from Ireland. It was the one thing that he prided himself in keeping in the family."  
    He could say all the good things about my father that he wanted, but the only memory that I ever had of the man was the one where he was beating the shit out of my mother. The fact that he went to jail, didn't make me feel all giddy about finding out my long lost dad left me anything. "He still killed someone and I'm pretty sure that he would have killed my mother