I pressed my panic button, and Daddy came running.
“What?” he said.
“I just wanted to say goodbye,” I said. “I’m leaving.” I pointed at my packed bags.
“Well,” said Daddy. “Good luck with everything.” He turned to go.
Mia was at my bedside. Noodles was on my lap. Betty and Rain and Dakota and a handful of other Bunnies were there too. There was a hole in the room where Ginger was meant to be. She still hadn’t been found. The other person missing was Willa’s cameraman. Daddy couldn’t know he was being seen, so instead of using Dennis and his big camera, Willa was recording the interaction on her phone, uploading the footage in real time to Big Fans Live. The whole world, for the first time, was watching him, instead.
“Kicking a pregnant woman to the curb,” I said, and Daddy turned back. “A real classy move.”
“You can see why I have to let you go, though, can’t you?”
“Because I can’t work.”
“Right.”
“Because I’m pregnant.”
“Right.”
Daddy was already halfway out the door when I said, “Daddy? The baby, this baby—it’s yours, you know.”
He didn’t even turn around. Didn’t even look back. I was no longer the body he needed me to be. And despite everything, despite myself and the way I felt about Daddy, despite Daddy, and despite all of it, it hurt. Mia squeezed my hand. She’d been outside the frame during filming, but it suddenly felt wrong that she wasn’t in the picture. Mia, who loved me, all of me, entirely. I pulled her up to sit beside me, and she did. She kissed the tears from my cheeks.