You were just a baby when the storm hit. At first, your home was just cold. Not in temperature—just in feeling. Your mom and dad didn’t fight out loud, not right away. But you could feel it in the silence. The way they didn’t eat together anymore. The way your mother looked out the window while your father packed his suitcase again. Bang Chan wasn’t a bad man. He wasn’t absent either. He was a businessman. Young, smart, ambitious. Built his company from nothing. Wore suits to meetings, flew between cities, ran entire departments before age thirty.

But no matter how hard he worked, your mom said it wasn’t enough. Not for you. She wanted full custody. A stable household, she called it. One parent. One routine. She didn’t trust shared time. Said week-on-week-off was chaos. Said you needed quiet, order, structure. “Not a briefcase and a nanny,” she snapped in court. Chan offered everything: A nursery he designed himself. A schedule built around your needs. A house in a safe neighborhood with a big window seat just for reading time.

He told the judge he didn’t want to be a weekend dad. He said, “She’s my daughter. I want to raise her, not just visit her.” But your mother came with facts. How many hours he worked. How many nights he spent traveling. She made it sound like he was gone even when he was home. The judge sided with her. Full custody to your mother. Supervised visits. No overnights without approval.

You were too young to remember the look on his face. But he remembered. The way he stood outside the courtroom, fists in his coat pockets, jaw tight, eyes on the stroller as she wheeled you away. He didn’t stop trying. Birthday cards. Letters. A toy once a year, returned unopened. He had to watch you grow up from the outside. And you? You grew up in her house. A house of rules. Phone: 2 hours a day. Friends: must have straight A’s and parent meetings first. Bedtime: 8 p.m., no matter what. Allowance: $10 a year, if she remembered.

Music? “A waste of time.” Dreams? “Earn a real future, not a fantasy.” You used to draw pictures of albums you couldn’t buy. Scribbled lyrics in your notebooks. Hummed songs into your pillow so no one could hear. You learned to shrink. And then—she was gone. The charges were sudden. You didn’t understand all of them. Only that the police showed up, and your world went silent again. But not for long.

You were 14. And you were finally going to live with your father. Bang Chan. You didn’t even know what to expect. When the black Lamborghini pulled up outside the group home, you thought it might be a mistake. But then he stepped out. Taller than you remembered. Wearing a crisp black coat and button-down shirt, sleeves rolled like he’d just come from a meeting. His hair was messy but neat. His face looked exhausted, but when he saw you… he froze. Like he’d been waiting for this moment for years and now didn’t know how to move.

He didn’t speak. He just opened the passenger door for you. You climbed in slowly, clutching your worn-out backpack. You didn’t even own a suitcase. Just a hoodie, toothbrush, some books. That was it. The car was too clean. Too quiet. It smelled like mint and leather and something warm, maybe cologne or just… home. He helped you with your seatbelt. Didn’t ask questions. Didn’t press. Just drove. The city blurred by. You stared out the window, unsure. He didn’t turn on the radio. But there was a charger already plugged in on your side. A water bottle waiting in the cupholder. A folded blanket in the backseat.

At every red light, he glanced at you—but not too long. Just checking. Like you were still fragile glass he didn’t want to drop. And then—softly, halfway through the drive—he finally spoke.

"You can call me Chris if you're not comfortable with dad." He sounded unsure and proud to finally have you back.