Dad moved between us.<\/p>\n
That changed the conversation.<\/p>\n
Mitch hadn't answered my question.<\/p>\n
He hadn't explained the key.<\/p>\n
He hadn't offered any account of those ninety seconds.<\/p>\n
And now Dad was telling us the argument needed to end.<\/p>\n
I turned toward him.<\/p>\n
For a moment, I wondered what he expected me to do.<\/p>\n
Forget the damage?<\/p>\n
Forget what I had seen?<\/p>\n
Accept that Mitch had been standing there for no particular reason?<\/p>\n
I didn't say any of that.<\/p>\n
Dad's attention had moved to the flatbed.<\/p>\n
He pointed toward it.<\/p>\n
Then he told me to have the car taken down.<\/p>\n
I looked in the direction he was pointing.<\/p>\n
The flatbed was there.<\/p>\n
So was the driver.<\/p>\n
And the car was already secured.<\/p>\n
This was no longer just a disagreement about a recording.<\/p>\n
The vehicle Mitch had been driving for two years was being taken back.<\/p>\n
That was the decision I had made.<\/p>\n
I knew Mitch wasn't going to like it.<\/p>\n
I also knew I didn't need his approval.<\/p>\n
Two years was a long time to have the use of somebody else's car.<\/p>\n
Long enough for an arrangement to begin feeling permanent.<\/p>\n
But time didn't change who owned it.<\/p>\n
And the argument over my SUV hadn't changed that either.<\/p>\n
I looked at Dad again.<\/p>\n
He wanted the car taken down.<\/p>\n
I understood what he was asking.<\/p>\n
What I couldn't understand was why the condition of the car on the flatbed had become more urgent than what Mitch had done to mine.<\/p>\n
Maybe Dad simply wanted the confrontation to stop.<\/p>\n
I couldn't know exactly what he was thinking.<\/p>\n
I only knew what he had said.<\/p>\n
And I knew what I was going to do.<\/p>\n
I wasn't going to start another argument with him.<\/p>\n
I wasn't going to turn back toward Mitch and demand an explanation for the fifth time.<\/p>\n
That part was finished.<\/p>\n
Mitch had already shown me how he intended to respond.<\/p>\n
He would dispute the evidence.<\/p>\n
Question what I could see.<\/p>\n
And avoid answering the one question that mattered.<\/p>\n
I had given him the opportunity to explain.<\/p>\n
He hadn't taken it.<\/p>\n
I was done trying to make him.<\/p>\n
For once, I was going to let a decision stand without spending the rest of the conversation defending it.<\/p>\n
I turned away from my brother.<\/p>\n
Then I addressed the driver.<\/p>\n
Dad moved between us. That changed the conversation. Mitch hadn't answered my question. He hadn't explained the key. He hadn't offered any account of those ninety seconds. And now Dad … <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":40579,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-40582","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-insightdrama"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/insightdrama.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40582","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/insightdrama.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/insightdrama.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/insightdrama.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/insightdrama.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=40582"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/insightdrama.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40582\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":40598,"href":"https:\/\/insightdrama.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40582\/revisions\/40598"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/insightdrama.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/40579"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/insightdrama.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=40582"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/insightdrama.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=40582"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/insightdrama.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=40582"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}