CHAPTER 225: SINCE WHEN?

Jamal stood in the usual spot away from the house where he knew he could talk comfortably. Emily was the first to join the call.

"Hey, Jam! I’m glad you called back before I left the house," Emily said the moment she received the call.

"I just got back from work a while ago. So much is going on Em. And..."

"Hey, besties!" Mari greeted excitedly as she joined the call, "what’s happening over there? You won’t believe that Jax..."

"Not now, Mari," Emily cut her off gently, "I’m sure you have some pretty exciting stuff going on over there. But let’s talk about it after we talk about Cal."

"Callan? Did something happen to Callan? Jam, is it about him being related to Genevieve?" Mari asked, thinking Jamal had told just told Emily about it.

"What? Cal is related to Genevieve? The Genevieve that’s connected to Dawn or another one?" Emily asked in disbelief. "Is that the reason he is on his way to Ludus?"

"Callan is on his way to Ludus?" Mari asked, surprised to hear that.

"Yeah. He got a call from his father asking him to come home. It sounded urgent and was about his biological parents," Emily explained to Mari, "Jam, what’s going on? Is Cal truly related to Genevieve?"

Jamal let out a deep sigh. "No, he’s not. We were mistaken."

"He’s not?" Mari asked, surprised.

"Yeah."

Emily let out a relieved sigh, "That’s such a relief. I can’t imagine Cal being related to someone..."

"I think it would have been better he was related to Genevieve," Jamal cut in, making them both frown.

"What do you mean?" Emily asked, beginning to feel uneasy.

"How did you confirm that Callan is not related to Genevieve as you thought?" Mari asked at the same time.

"Why did you think they were related in the first place? Did Callan also think so?" Emily asked, feeling lost.

"No. Callan wasn’t aware," Jamal said, and went on to explain all about Karen Combs and how Callan had been trying to find his biological mother. "Tom confirmed that Ryan Harris is Callan’s biological father."

Emily gasped. "That can’t be true."

"How? That doesn’t make any sense. Why would such a person be Callan’s biological father?" Mari asked, equally shocked.

"Maybe they’re mistaken. It’s possible it’s all a mixup. How did they confirm it? Did they carry out a DNA test?" Emily asked, not wanting to believe what she was hearing for Callan’s sake.

She couldn’t imagine how Callan would feel if he got to know that sort of person was his father.

Jamal went on to explain how they found out about it and what had led to Ryan’s madness. By the time he was done the line was silent as Emily and Mari tried to process it all.

"So, that’s it. They’re going to try to stall Ryan’s return home by keeping Cal in Ludus so that we will be able to leave before he gets back," Jamal said quietly.

"I think you should have told him about it, Jam," Emily said after a while. "It’d be better for him to hear it from you first and brace himself. This is going to change his life. I’m not sure if it’s for the better or worse," she said, her voice thick with tears and her heart heavy.

Mari, who usually had a lot to say was unusually silent. She didn’t know what to think or say.

"How am I supposed to tell him that Abigail’s mom killed his mom and his father killed her family for revenge? I can’t do that. I don’t know how to do that. Callan doesn’t open up how he feels, so if I tell him that he’d bottle up whatever he’s feeling. That won’t do anyone any good. And I doubt if he knew the truth he’d go to Ludus," Jamal said, and Emily sighed deeply.

"Maybe I should have gone with him..."

"As what? His girlfriend? His mom? Em, Callan will be alright. His parents will make sure of it. There’s little or nothing you can do for him over there," Mari said softly.

"I don’t need to do anything. Just being there is enough. If you were in his shoes wouldn’t you want to have someone other than family there with you? I know I would love to have either of you with me. There are things he might not be able to say to his parents but he’d say it to a friend," Emily countered.

"Would he say it to you? Would he want YOU there? Put your feelings aside and..."

"It’s not about my feelings!" Emily snapped, annoyed that Mari didn’t understand her. "If it were either of you, I’d want to be there for you too. It has nothing to do with my feelings for Callan. Regardless of whatever is between us, I care about him, and if he needs a friend I should be able to put aside whatever I feel to be a friend for him."

Jamal listened with a raised brow, wondering what feelings they were talking about but he didn’t ask.

"No need to get testy, Em, I’m just trying to look out for you that’s all," Mari said, sighing softly. "So, what do you want to do? Abandon your program and go to Ludus?"

"I don’t know. I can’t do that. I guess I’ll just wait here for him. This is all very poor timing," she said with a resigned sigh.

For a while, none of them said anything.

Jamal leaned against the tree beside him and looked up at the dark sky above, stars blinking faintly through the clouds. His heart felt heavy. He wished they didn’t find out the truth about Callan’s connection to Ryan. Truth didn’t care about timing. Or pain. Or broken lives.

"What about Abigail? How did she take the news?" Mari asked thoughtfully.

"She was pretty upset, but Ryan’s reason for doing all of this doesn’t justify all he’s done to her. She still wants him to pay for it," Jamal said, and both Mari and Emily sighed simultaneously.

"That’s understandable. I wish I didn’t know," Emily whispered, her voice quiet, but raw with emotion. "I wish we never found out about that man being Callan’s father. I wish Cal never had to find out. He doesn’t deserve something like this. Now he’s going to have to mourn the mother he never knew, and he’d have to face having such a father."

Mari exhaled slowly. "I wish so too, but wouldn’t he feel better knowing now that his biological mother never abandoned him?"

"Which would you prefer? Thinking you were abandoned? Or finding out your mother died after giving birth to you and your father killed so many people to avenge her death?" Jamal asked reasonably.

Mari frowned as she thought about it. "None, I suppose."

Jamal pinched the bridge of his nose. "I’m sure we all wish we didn’t get to know about this, but unfortunately we found out, and now Callan has to face it. We can’t fix this for him. I hate it. But we can’t. All we can do is be here when he needs us. Hopefully he’ll still be in Ludus by the time I get there."

"Alright guys. I need to be on my way to the hospital now," Emily said when she heard the doorbell, knowing that the driver had arrived to take her as Callan had said.

After Emily hung up, Jamal decided to ask Mari what they were talking about earlier. "What was that about earlier? Does Emily have feelings for Cal?"

Mari sighed. "Sort of."

"Sort of? Since when? I thought she hates him?" Jamal asked with a frown.

"She doesn’t hate him. She’s only mad at him. Did she sound like she hated him just now?" Mari asked dryly.

Jamal’s frown deepened. "When did she begin to have feelings for him? Is he aware? Is it even okay that she has feelings for her cousin?"

"They’re not blood related. And last I checked it’s not against the law. Are you not in a relationship with your uncle’s wife’s step aunt?" Mari asked, and Jamal frowned.

"That’s a very distant relationship."

"Not very distant if you take out the prefixes. You’re in a relationship with your aunt’s aunt," Mari said sweetly.

"Okay. Point taken. How long has she been feeling this way? How come I don’t know about it?"

"She didn’t want you to know about it because you are Callan’s best friend. She has loved Cal since we were kids, only God knows why."

"Is Callan aware?" Jamal asked, remembering how Callan was always correcting him each time he referred to Emily as his cousin. "Does he feel the same way?"

Mari snorted. "Who knows how Callan feels? He’s always treated her like a jerk from the onset. I believe he knows how she feels even if he pretends it not to."

"Now that I think about it, I believe he has feelings for her," Jamal said with a frown, wondering why he had never really paid attention to Emily and Callan.

Mari scoffed. "He has feelings for her yet he jumps from one girl to the other and hurt the one he cares about? I don’t think so."

Jamal sighed. "Callan is complicated, but if they both have feelings for each other I’m sure they’d find a way to be together. I hope their parents approve."

"Maybe after this is all over and everything is normal again, we can find a way to help them if truly the feeling is mutual and Em’s feeling isn’t unrequited. I’ll slap some sense into Callan if I have to. I’m tired of seeing Em pining for him."

"Sure. Let’s do that."