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There it was. He would never view my current situation as a “real job.” To him, my work couldn’t possibly be that serious if I was merely drawing on my iPad. I swallowed a bite of my pizza and attempted to ignore his comment. “So Fin, did that boy you were doing the puzzle with ever start talking?”
“Yup,” she said, sucking a spaghetti noodle between her lips. “Except he only whispers. His name is Elijah, and his favorite dinosaur is a stegosaurus.”
“Awesome. Did you and Elijah—”
“Is he your boyfriend?” my mom blurted, completely unprompted, as though this kind of unhinged assumption was normal.
“Mom,” I snapped, my eyes widening at her. “She’s five. Can you not?”
Thankfully, Finley stuck her tongue out in disgust and wiggled in a melodramatic shudder. “Ew, no,” she protested, with spaghetti sauce in the corners of her mouth. “Boys are disgusting.”
“Damn straight,” I said, taking another bite. Finley gasped at the word choice, and I made a goofy face at her. Now I was feeling the judgment from both of my parents, but I didn’t care. She was my daughter, not theirs.
The bells above the door of the restaurant jingled and Finley jumped to her feet, closely watching the group of people who stepped inside Moretti’s. Her face went pale and I followed her gaze, trying to figure out how she might recognize these people.
“Is that someone from your school, Finley?”
Finley slowly sat back down and picked up her fork. “No, I thought I saw my mom. But it was somebody else.”
I felt a sudden heaviness in my chest as I eyed the brunette woman standing by the hostess stand. She did resemble Whitney, in some ways—they were around the same size. I cleared my throat, catching both of my parents staring at me in my peripheral vision. “Finley, she’s—you know your mom is in Florida, right?”
“I know. I just forgot,” she said, forcing out a laugh to downplay her mistake.
I no longer felt like eating. Instead, I rested my chin on my hand and watched Finley finish her meal, not stopping her when she put a heaping mound of parmesan cheese on top of her spaghetti. I just let her go.
I swallowed, imagining what might happen if Whitney ever did decide to come back to Woodvale. What would I do then? How could I prevent Finley from seeing her? Would that even be the right thing to do?
When our meal was finished and my dad took Finley over to the claw machine to try to win a stuffed jellyfish, I brought up Whitney’s Instagram profile on my phone. I liked keeping tabs on her just to make sure she was still in Florida, often scouring her captions and comments for any indication she might be visiting Indiana soon. I might not have a plan for her return, but I at least needed to be aware.
“Mason,” my mom said, her voice low. I glanced up. “Does her teacher know about her situation? I mean, do you think Owen’s fiancée filled her in on it?”
“Not that I know of. She’s probably not allowed to, Mom. They have confidentiality rules about that sort of thing.” I was fully aware I had nothing to base this on, but it sounded right.
“Maybe. But did you think to mention it in her registration papers?”
“No.” I shifted in my seat, feeling like I’d screwed up yet again. “I didn’t think it was anyone else’s business. Too many people in this damn town already know her history.”
“Well, her teacher probably needs to be aware. They do Muffins with Moms and all that stuff, you know. That woman needs to know Finley doesn’t have one around.”
I nodded, watching my dad stick another dollar in the claw machine for Finley, who clapped in delight. “Yeah. I’ll mention it to her.”
chapter nine
kendall
On the second Monday morning of the school year, I was surprised to see Daya was awake just as early as me. She shuffled into the kitchen and brewed herself a cup of coffee while I was packing my lunch. “You’re up early,” I noted.
“A beagle got hit by a car,” she mumbled.
I clenched my eyes shut as I opened the fridge, trying not to picture it. Daya wasn’t usually so blunt when it came to emergencies at the animal hospital, where she worked as a vet tech. Something was up. “Well—besides that, is everything okay?”
Despite living here for the last several weeks, she and I hadn’t had many one-on-one conversations. And when we did, they were pretty casual in nature. To expect her to open up to me was a long shot. But to my surprise, she sat the package of coffee filters on the counter and looked up at the ceiling with a sigh. “Your sister.”
“Oh no, what did Jamie do?”
She turned to face me. “She told me last night that I’m insecure.”
“Oh,” I said, pulling my aluminum water bottle out of the cabinet. “I’m sorry she said that.”
