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He had a smile on to keep it lighthearted, but I could tell he was genuinely concerned.
“I’m good,” I said, and it was the truth. I was good.
Better than good.
I was just doing my best to leave my assistant alone on a Sunday.
“Your name is Adam? I’m Bella,” Crop Top said as she tipped her chair as far back as she could to extend her hand. I shook it.
“Nice to meet you,” I said directly before excusing myself.
I didn’t have anywhere to go. I just didn’t feel like faking interest in what my friends were doing, which they were definitely becoming aware of, judging by the one-word text Sully shot me.
SULLY: Bro
I snorted before I sent back a convincing lie.
ME: Dad’s asking me to call
SULLY: Ah ok tell Brad hi. Hope everything’s ok
I frowned.
Goddammit. Did he really need to add that second part?
It made me wonder myself if everything was okay. Rather, less okay than usual. I wouldn’t know because now that I was forced to think about it, I hadn’t called my dad in probably two weeks. Actually, I had no idea how long it had been. Long enough that I had to throw out an arbitrary guess.
“Fuck you, Sully,” I muttered to my unsuspecting friend, because without even realizing, he’d officially guilted me into calling my dad.
So dipping inside, I found an unoccupied seat at the end of the bar where I quickly dialed my dad’s number before I decided not to.
He picked up in one ring.
“Hey!”
A smile quirked on my lips, because he sounded good. “What’s up.”
“What’s up yourself! I’m surprised to hear from you.”
I grimaced as I looked off in the distance. Man, everyone was unintentionally guilting me today. “Sorry I’ve been so busy. Figured I’d just call to see how it’s going.”
“Oh, you know. It’s going.”
I snorted. That was what Holland and I called Brad-isms. Basically good-natured filler words. Non-answers to try to paint things as fine when they weren’t. Oh, it’s going. It is what it is. What can you do. That kind of thing. When there wasn’t an active flare-up of mom craziness, we tried not to talk about her or the Holland drama. But that was what made our conversations so strained these days.
There was really nothing else to talk about, especially when we all knew that Dad missed Holland and me. He hadn’t seen Holland since she moved out eight months ago. He’d seen me for a lunch in January, when I had a business trip to New York. But other than that, full-day visits were a no-go, because there was no leaving for long
without setting off Mom. And since Holland and I wouldn’t see her, and Dad felt bad seeing us alone, we were basically trapped in this limbo from now till forever.
It sucked. It wasn’t fun.
But it was just our reality.
“So, what are you up to?” I asked.
“Uhh, actually, we’re cleaning out Holland’s bedroom,” Dad said somewhat awkwardly as I raised my eyebrows. Damn. That meant Mom was finally getting it. She wasn’t going to come home. “Not fully, but just moving some stuff to the basement.”
“Well, that’s… good,” I said.
