“I DON’T PAY you to not write the reports,” Dad says, dropping down into a seat at the kitchen table, where I’m slurping up Frosted Flakes. Technically, this is the first time we’ve had breakfast together. In my life, probably, but definitely since I got here.
I’d give anything to already be skating over to Peak’s house, but after her “family only” time last night, she’s spending the day at Jayla and Nikki’s away game, leaving me to fend for myself. I’m trying hard not to bother her, but trying not to text her just makes me want to text her more.
“Are you even listening to me?” he asks, the corner of his eye twitching.
I tug my hoodie lower over my head, shoveling in another bite of cereal. “There wasn’t anything to put in it this week.”
That’s technically true, only because I didn’t have the energy to make up any new lies to cover for the whole conservatory thing, so I just . . . didn’t. I know I have to keep it up. I know I gave Peak my word, but I’m so exhausted. I’ve been lying for so long now, and to so many different people, I’m starting to doubt I even know the truth anymore.
“You barely even pay me anyway,” I say, because I’m a masochist. Because I’m pouting. Because I just want to see Peak.
My father leans forward, jabbing his finger at me. “I pay for this house, I pay for this food, I pay for your ridiculous online classes. Everything you have, I pay for. And for what?”
“Cuz you’re my dad?”
He leans back in his chair, glaring at me. I chew the inside of my lip. My brain—hopelessly hopeful as it can sometimes be about this family—thinks for half a second that maybe those words meant something to him, that maybe he’s going to apologize and say it’s great having me around. Follow it up with a “hey, kid, let’s toss the ball around or get ice cream” or anything else those sitcom dads do.
He does not.
He’s abandoned even the slightest performance of fatherly pride lately. I think I’d take him misremembering everything about me like he did in the beginning over the cold indifference that’s settled back between us.
I stare down at my cereal until he slides his chair across the tile floor. “I should send you back to your mother.”
And then he’s gone.
I carry my bowl to the sink and pour the rest down the drain. I’m not hungry anymore.
I tried not to text her. I really did. I don’t want to mess up her life or pull her from her friends or get in the way, but everything hurts, and I just don’t want to be alone.
I should send you back.
I’ve been hyperventilating since he said that. I can’t go back. I won’t. I can’t go from all of this to sitting alone again in that giant fucking house. My father left with Allison for the weekend right after our argument. I called Gray first—but she’s on the West Coast with Mom—and then finally texted Peak. I’ve been pacing ever since.
I wasn’t even sure she would actually come, but here she is, smiling on my doorstep, holding two hot cocoas and a bag of what I can only assume is some kind of breakfast food. I look behind her and wave to Vera, who was nice enough to give her a ride. I smile when she waves back, trying to do my best impression of someone holding it together. Inside, I feel like broken glass. She backs out of the driveway with a little honk, and I usher Peak into the house.
“Are you safe?” Gray asked when I called her.
Yes. Now.
I take everything from Peak, setting the drinks on the table, and she pulls her coat off, hanging it on one of the hooks near the door. She looks around, taking in the house—it’s a lot, I know, too much—before looking at me, really looking at me, and sighing.
“I hate your father,” she says, coming closer and running her hands through my hair.
“I don’t,” I say, shutting my eyes.
“That’s more than half the problem.”
It’s barely scratching the surface, actually, but it’s probably best not to say that out loud.
“I don’t want to go.”
“You’re not.” She takes the bag from my hand. “Can you eat? I brought bagels and butter and cream cheese. It always settles my stomach when I’m nerved up before a big performance or something. I thought it might—”
Her words cut off in a whoosh when I pull her into a hug and hold on too tight, shaking my head. The bag crinkles between us until it falls to the floor, a stray bagel rolling out, and I bury my forehead into her shoulder, breathing her in, letting her hold me together.
“Let’s go lie down for a while,” she says, and I nod against her neck before leading her up the stairs, the bagels abandoned on the floor where she dropped them.
I perch on my bed, watching her catalog the contents of my room. It only takes a minute; there’s not much. My mom never got around to sending most of the things I asked for, and I threw out half of what she did send because of bad memories.
“Where’s all your stuff?”
I shrug, suddenly feeling a little embarrassed. “I travel light,” I say, because that’s easier than explaining that nothing really feels like mine.
She glances in the empty closet, the doors wide open. “Really light, I guess.”
I reach over the side of the bed and rummage through my duffel bag, searching underneath the wrinkled clothes and the boxer briefs and about a dozen Sharpies that I somehow collected, until I feel the pointy plastic of the mask and curl my fingers around it.
“Still have this, though,” I say, holding it up.
She takes a step closer, pulling the Batman mask out of my hand and running her fingers over it. “Awww, Bats.”
“And this,” I say as she watches me snap the back of the case off my phone and pull out her feather. It’s a little wrinkled, sure, but still hanging in there.
“You kept that this whole time?”
She says it like it’s been an eternity instead of a month and a half. It kind of does feel like that with everything we’ve been through, and are going through, and hopefully will keep going through, together.
“Is that weird?” I ask, twirling the feather. Because maybe holding on to it is a little stalkery or whatever, but it feels right.
“No, I think it’s sweet,” she says. “But—”
“But what?”
“But if you get to keep my feather, then I should get to keep the mask. Fair is fair.”
I glance at the mask, wishing the idea of giving it away didn’t come with such heavy regret.
“It was a joke,” she says, trying to hand it back, but we both know it wasn’t.
“No, no, keep it.” I push it back toward her. “I want you to have it.”
“You look like I broke all your crayons,” she says, studying my face, “and then ran over your puppy.”
“No, it’s just—it’s good memories. But maybe I don’t need it anymore.”
“Why?”
“Because you’re here.”
She smiles at me, genuine but cautious. She’s smart to be like that—I know she is—but I wish that she wasn’t. Because that’s the truth under the lie. She can say it’s going to be okay as much as she wants, but one phone call and my dad could have me on a flight back to Seattle. One slip-up and Vera could learn everything and keep us apart.
“I am,” she says. It feels like she means more, but I don’t want to think about real life for now. I just want to get lost in this girl, in this moment, and forget everything else.
I pull her closer, resting my forehead against her chest and running my arms up and down her sides. She laces her fingers through my hair, humming a song I don’t know, and for a second, I let myself believe it’s enough.