Chapter Fourteen

THIS TIME HE APOLOGIZES WITH PANCAKES instead of flowers.

On Saturday mornings, the Auburn Diner is the most popular place in town. We have to wait thirty minutes for a table, which means a lot of small talk. Something my father excels at. The Barnes family has lived in Auburn for three generations, and my grandfather created Barnes Construction from nothing. His business is responsible for a lot of the buildings still standing, including our house, which my dad grew up in before buying it from his aging father.

Legacy is a strange thing.

My grandfather’s legacy in this town is literally carved in stone—his name and the dates of construction are chiseled into cement blocks on almost everything built here over the two decades when his business was booming. The legacy of the people he employed. But I’m starting to wonder how many men have two faces. One for inside their home, and one for outside.

“Hey, Erin.” Our waitress, Christine, greets Mom first. They work together here. “No shifts this weekend?”

“No, not in again till Tuesday, actually.”

“Lucky girl,” Christine says, her eyes falling on my dad. “You been watching these games, Jesse Barnes?” Christine is an old friend of Mom’s from high school. She would have watched the entire rise—and fall—of Dad’s football career.

“Sure am,” Dad says. “Auburn proud, right?” My father orders pancakes for everyone, because they’re cheap. But he adds coffee for him, Mom, and me, and hot chocolate for the girls.

“Aw, what a special treat,” Christine says.

She turns back to Mom. “So if you aren’t working, do you want to join us for girls’ night out, for once? Nothing special, we’re just meeting at Jimmy’s Tavern for a few drinks.”

Dad speaks first.

“That’s nice of you, Christine,” he says, and she flushes a bit when he says her name. “But Erin can’t tonight.”

“Aw, well. Maybe next time,” Christine says, still talking to Dad.

“Maybe,” Mom says, and Christine takes our order to the kitchen.

That won’t happen, either. Next time. One by one, Dad has found reasons to push people away. Your friends always hated me. They aren’t good influences on you.

Eventually, she just let those friendships slip away.

Our food doesn’t take long, but right as it arrives, someone else stops by our table.

“Hey, Jesse! It’s been a while,” Mr. DiMarco says. Officer DiMarco. He’s on duty, wearing his police uniform.

“Bill, how are ya?” My father stands and greets him. He hasn’t been over in a long time—his own kids are really young—but when I was little, my father’s best friend from high school was at our house all the time. I used to call him Uncle Bill.

He greets my mom and then looks to us girls.

“Wow, they’re all so big,” he says with a laugh.

“Crazy, right? Leighton’s applying to college this fall. Perfect GPA.”

“Ah, wow. Let me guess. You’re hoping she picks state college.”

“What kind of fan would I be if I didn’t?” Dad says.

I turn my attention back to my plate and take a bite of pancake. It’s covered in butter and syrup and sprinkled with confectioner’s sugar, but when I take the first bite, I gag, something sour flooding my mouth. Everyone else seems to be enjoying the meal. Juniper’s grin is huge and real.

I hate the bad nights. I hate how loud and cruel he can be. How scared he makes us.

But it is mornings like this that hurt the most. When we are expected to pretend that everything is okay. Because my legs are sore from how we slept in the armoire, an entanglement of limbs and fear, and the bite of pancake that I managed to swallow refuses to settle in my stomach.

“Hey, listen,” Bill says. “I heard the council didn’t pick your company for the library renovation. Tough break, man, I’m sorry.”

My mom and I look up in surprise. This is new information. Dad worked on that proposal for months.

“I didn’t realize—” Mom starts to speak, and my dad’s hand falls to her shoulder. He grips it, pats her back a few times. Squeezes again. All with a smile on his face. But there’s white tension in his knuckles, and a look that crosses Mom’s face. He’s hurting her.

“Yeah, well, what can you do? You win some bids, you lose some bids. That’s the job,” Dad says.

Juniper and Campbell sit forward in their seats.

Juniper’s eyes stay fixed on Mom, like she’s watching for a signal from her. How do we react? Do we smile and nod?

We do.

We smile.

We nod.

We say pleasant goodbyes.

But the milk in my coffee tastes curdled, and the sugar turns to salt on my tongue, and I’m bolting from the table, barely making it to the diner restroom before I throw up flour and sugar and salt and grief.