WARNING – there's a fair bit of profanity in this chapter (which I think, given the circumstances, makes sense lol. Just a quick forewarning!)

Focused and feral in his attack, Dad doesn't say another real word as he throttles Eric into stillness, and watches his gasping face go scarlet. I'm screaming at the top of my lungs, but I can't even hear myself. This doesn't feel like reality.

It feels like watching a scene from a movie. Each tough, tight shake of the man on the floor's neck feels false; the deep red complexion of his skin doesn't seem real. But it is. And 'the man on the floor' isn't an actor, who can just get up and wipe his face when someone yells "cut!" It's Eric. And if someone doesn't stop Dad soon, he won't be able to get up.

"Dad, fucking s- just stop it!" I scream for what feels like the millionth time. My voice is hoarse with tears and terror, and I feel the roughness in my throat every time I shout, but the heavy horror in my stomach glues me to my spot. The screaming and crying and yelling-so-hard-my-throat-might-tear are all I can do.

Dad throws Eric down, hard, against the carpet, and I shriek when his limp body thuds.

"Don't start Evangeline, don't you fucking start!" Dad barks, sweaty faced as he jabs a finger at me. "You brought this bastard into my pub? Into my house!" His vicious stare drops to Eric on the ground.

"You think you can take advantage of my daughter under my own fucking roof!"

His voice grows louder and louder, until its booming like thunder, and before I can cry out again, his balled fist smashes, and stained with a deep red matching the trail of blood trickling from Eric's lip. Horrified, my hands snap to my mouth and I scan a shocked and frantic eye around the room. 

Walt and Jerome are stood by the door like hitmen, watching Dad beat the crap out of Eric, with folded arms and dark faces. When Walt and I catch eyes, I clamber off of the bed, almost tripping on the sheets as I run to him to plead.

"Walt," I croak as I beg, "do something! Please!" 

He's averted his gaze as quickly as it landed, and now he won't even look at me. His expression is stony as he watches, his jaw clenched with a rage of his own.

"He's getting what he deserves, Goldilocks," Jerome says, and if his countenance is usually cold, then tonight it's arctic. The venom drips from his words even after he's said them. "He's scum."

"You shouldn't have lied to us, Angie," Walt says. He still won't look at me, but the tightness of his jaw loosens, with the hint of a tremble in his voice.

"I know," I sob, "I know, and I'm sorry, but please, Walt. Please!"

Dad's grabbed Eric by the throat again and when he throws him against the dresser, the little box room shakes, and Eric doesn't open his eyes. That doesn't stop Dad. He balls his fist again, and raises it for another blow to Eric's defeated frame.

"Walt, please," I scream, a thud sounding when I jump like a howling, petulant child, "Walt, he'll kill him!"

Walt stares on sternly for a moment more, but he takes one quick look at my puffy, bawling face, and rubs his nose with a fast, gruff hand and starts to stride over to Eric.

"'Rome," he barks at his brother, nodding in Dad's direction, "grab him."

Jerome's burly frame dwarfs Dad as he yanks him away from my Eric, clipping his arms behind him to restrain him.

"Get off me! Get the fuck off!"

Walt's got Eric propped against the wall, and thank God, his eyes are opening. I rush over to touch him, hold him, anything, but Walt stands between us, and throws out a brawny arm that traps me before I can. He finally looks me in the eye.

"Not a good idea, Angie."

Eric's slumped against the oak wall, utterly defeated. When his vision is finally clear, he looks up at me. 

"I'm sorry, Eric," I whisper, sniffling, and the tear that falls this time is slow and full, "I'm so sorry." His lip already puffy, and slowly bruising, he doesn't answer. Given what's happened, maybe that's wise.

Why? Why did it all have to come crashing down like this?

Walt's barricade tightens around me as he snaps at Eric,

"I'm not exactly wellin' up with sympathy for you right now, Mr. Macklin, but I think there's been enough violence for one night. I'd get your shit and get out fast if you know what's good for you; I can't promise we'll be able to hold Dom over there forever."

Like a bucking bull on command, Dad flares his nostrils and growls his final threat at Eric.

"You're a dead man walking. I'll kill you, swear to God." Dad's given up fighting against Jerome's grasp, but his face is fierce as ever.

He's bloody and beyond bruised, but Eric's swift as he scrambles to his feet, grabbing his phone from the nightstand, and a gym bag from beneath the bed. He leaves in fast, silent strides with his head down, and a droplet of blood from his nose, or maybe his lip, hits the carpeted ground outside the door, as he turns the knob and opens the door. For a moment, he stops. Then, he looks behind me. He looks at me.

"I'm sorry, Evie."

'Evie' breaks me, and the bawling starts again; I struggle and slap and kick against Walt as I try to break free and follow him. But Walt's too strong, and my chance is too far gone. Eric's rushed out of the door, and I hear his footsteps away as fast as they can.

"Get off me, Walt!" I feel my breath running out, my tears beginning to run dry, but I have to keep fighting – I have to. "I'm going with him! I'm goi-"

"Give me a fucking break, Evangeline!" Dad shouts, and his voice in all the noise already in my head makes me snap.

"Shut up!" Instinctively, I lunge at him, but Walt's bear grip holds me back. "You don't even get it, Dad! Of course, you bloody don't!"

When I start to sob and slump, limp, against Walt's arms, he lets me down gently, and I collapse onto the bed in a snivelling heap. I can't deal with Dad right now. I can't deal with any of this.

Dad's raising his voice again, and he's enraged and righteous as ever.

"He was in my house, Evangeline! Under my fucking roof!"

When I don't fire back this time, Dad goes quiet, just for a second. He was always like that – Mum said so too: he never takes anything seriously until you're broken by tears or hysterics.

For a moment, I think it's over. But Dad just has to speak again, in his voice of empty menace,

"I leave you with your mother, thinking I can trust her with your basic wellbeing. My mistake! I turn around and a teacher, a fucking teacher is grooming my little girl! I never should have left."

"Are you fucking kidding me?"

I've never cursed right at Dad. As I sit up slowly, even Walt looks surprised at my choice language.

"No, Dad," I snap, and I feel like a brewing storm, "he wasn't bloody grooming me, I love him. He loves me, and you don't love anyone but your fucking self, so stop pretending you get a say in my life – my uni, my diet, my bloody boyfriend – when you're the one who walked out of it!"

'Boyfriend' sets Dad off, bellowing and thundering about how Eric's not my boyfriend, just a liar and a predator, and now Jerome has to restrain him again, throwing an arm around his neck and locking his elbow under Dad's chin, before he gets out of control. His prowess tells me he's done it before.

"Are you calm?" Jerome asks brusquely. "Are you gonna be calm if I let go?"

"Yes, I'll be fucking calm," Dad hisses, struggling futilely against him in the hold, "get the hell off me."

Jerome only lets him go when Walt gives him a sombre nod. Except for my sobs that only seem to get worse when I try to stop them, it's quiet. And everyone's eyes are on me.

"Angie..." Walt says, approaching me slowly, like I'm a wild animal on the verge. Dad tries to speak again, but Walt shoots him a glare that shuts him right up. Even in all the noise and anger and panic, he's been watching me; protecting me.

"Angie, sweetie, what do you want to do?"

What I want is for this to all be a nightmare. I'll wake up and Eric and I will be on the motorway, laughing, smiling and singing Billy Ocean, as if none of the bad ever happened. But I know that's not what he means. I shrug, sniffling.

"Do you want us to take you home?"

"Like hell you will!" Dad spits. "This is her home."

The moment he makes his declaration, the sound of a smashed pint and drunken whoops rings from below the floor. The irony of calling the pub my 'home' strikes him.

"Well, it's as good as her home," he adds, flustered, "and I'm her father. My daughter is staying right here. If you think, after all this shit, that I'm letting her get in the car with two American blokes I hardly know, I'll tell you what, pal, you're sorely mistaken."

"Oh, calm the hell down!" Jerome booms, still maintaining his cool with squinted frustration. "She'll do whatever she likes; I think you'd better settle down."

"She's been doing what she likes!" Dad shoots back. "And look how that's turned out! Who the hell d'you think you are?"

"And you," he goes on determinedly, his attention turned to Walt, "you think that because you live in my house, sleep with my ex-wife, you're her father? Fuck right off."

"You'd better get away from my brother, buddy – before I do something I won't regret."

"Oh, I'd like to see you try, mate!"

"Stop it!" I yell, my voice cracking as I lift my tear-stained face from my hands. "Just fucking stop! All of you!"

I can't take more screaming. Not my own; not anybody's.

"Evangeline." Walt says my name with firm gentleness. "What do you want? Where do you wanna go?"

I breathe out shakily, and look at my red-faced father, his face still a picture of anger. If I tilt my head, he doesn't look so angry. When he doesn't look so angry, I remember who he was to me, to us, years ago, when he'd take me to ballet, play castle with Aug and I in the garden, and buy us strawberry milkshakes just because.

But I look at Walt, and I don't have to tilt my head or squint my eyes to see how kind he is; how good he is. When I look at him, I see him dancing in the kitchen with Mum; picking me up from school in the Dad-mobile; making me and the girls pancakes on a Saturday morning, and remembering to make Caz's gluten free. I don't have a clue how he got here tonight, but I do know what I see when I look at him – I see home.

"I love you, Dad," I admit both to him and myself, looking at him with watery eyes, "but I'm not your little girl anymore."

I wipe my nose with my pyjama sleeve as I look to Walt. "Can we go home? Please?"

For once, Dad's left speechless. Walt nods silently, and I take the hand he reaches out to me to help me up.

"My stuff's down the hall," I sniff as I start to leave. Jerome stands in front of Dad to clear my path.

I'm halfway down the hall when I hear Dad call out.

"Tange, don't be stupid, I'm your father. Evangeline!"

"Give it a rest, Dom," Walt says, in his tone of quiet strength. "You heard her. She's not a little girl anymore – whether we like it or not."

He tries his best to keep his voice down, but as I shove my things into my bag, I hear Walt ask Jerome to check out of the window to see if Eric's gone, and all I can wonder is where he is now, and how everything went so wrong so fast.