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“What, so you just sacrificed Lola instead? Or did you just think she’d pay it—again—and you’d all move on? That once again, she could bail you out of a tight spot?” The blood drains from my father’s face. “After draining herself dry, she told you she was done. And fuck, Turner. It’s one thing to have her pay your hidden horse bets off. It’s another to send thefucking New Jersey Mobto her business.”
“You don’t understand. She was—”
“Oh, I understand. I understand that Lola has spent her life sacrificing so you could be a child and do whatever the fuck you wanted. I understand that she was your scapegoat, that you used your dead wife and the secrets you both held to keep Lola loyal to you. I understand that she worked her fucking ass off to build herself a business, and you saw it as another source of money for yourself. I understand that while Lilah got to follow her dreams, go to school, and live her life, Lola was stuck making sure that things went smoothly because her mother asked her to, and she took that to heart.” My dad doesn’t even blink at his words while I feel Lilah’s eyes burning on me.
This, she also didn’t know.
The sacrifices I made so she wouldn’t be touched by it.
There was no need for us both to suffer.
“But you knew that, didn’t you? You knew about your wife’s request? That she begged Lola to make sure you didn’t fall too deep, to make sure that she kept her sister safe.”
The floor falls out from under me as I watch my dad’s Adam’s apple bob with a swallow.
I want to cry.
A part of me, a quiet, hidden part, thought it was a valiant effort on my end. Honorable, something I should sit with in peace but never let out. I thought I was doing this for my mom, that it was our secret. I thought Dad didn’t know and that if he did, if he knew I was doing all of this for Mom, he’d have stopped it.
I never told him about that conversation because I didn’t want him to feel that guilt.
But heknew.
He knew all along what I was doing and used it to his benefit. Drained me dry, sold me out, and let me think I was doing it for her.
“But most of all, I understand that sacrifice is over.” Part of me is excited at his words. Part of me is absolutely horrified. Pretty on-brand, to be honest. Then he turns to Lilah and my stomach drops.
“And you,” he says, crossing his arms on his chest.
“Ben—”
“Me?” Lilah says, an eyebrow raised in defiance. Pure princess Lilah coming into formation.
“Yeah, you.”
“Me what?”
“You let your sister take this shit on all alone?”
“She didn’t tell me, not about all of this,” Lilah says. “And I didn’t know . . . all of it. Or how far it went.”
“But you didn’t talk to your father about it?”
“No, but—” Lilah tries to explain.
“Ben, stop.”
“When I called you, you didn’t seem surprised it went this far, that she was in the hospital,” he says, and before Lilah can even start to respond, I jump in.
“Youcalled Lilah?” I ask, confused. He’s never evenmetLilah.
“Yes.” Ben’s eyes stay locked on my sister.
“How? You don’t even have her number.”
“Your phone is unlocked, like every other fuckin’ in thing in your life.” I glare at the back of his head, and he turns his face to me.
Part of me will probably find this funny one day, getting annoyed with Ben in the middle of a hospital room while I’m having a come to Jesus moment with my family, much less that we’re fighting about things being locked.
