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In terms of importance, my pink hair that I’d twisted into two buns on top of my head seemed low on the list. “Mom’s selling the house,” I repeated, fighting to keep my voice down. “Did you know?”
“Of course, I did. It’s stillour house, after all. Even though she’s going to get it in the finalized divorce, she technically can’t sell it without my permission.” A waitress—not ours—was walking past the table when Dad waved a hand to flag her down. “Can I have a cup of coffee, please?”
“How long have you known?” The answer to the question probably didn’t matter much—it wasn’t like it changed anything—but I needed to know how deep the betrayal went.
The intensity hadn’t left Dad’s blue gaze as he went from analyzing my hair to looking me in the eye, and the sudden strangeness of seeing him again after so long struck me hard. “We talked about selling it a little before I moved out.”
Ah, the betrayal didn’t go too deep. About six feet, which worked, since his words practically stabbed me in the heart. I reeled in the revelation for a moment that, back when I thought things were okay, they were even more broken than I’d thought. “I’m an adult, you know,” I told him through clenched teeth. “How could neither of you tell me?”
“It’s not something we needed your permission on.”
“Notpermission, but talking it out would’ve been nice.” It was the most I’d gotten to tell either Mom or Dad in ages about the separation. Usually when theSword was used, they shut the conversation down. “Discussing it with me like I’m an adult instead of springing it on me and expecting me to be okay with it.”
In a perfect world, those words would’ve captured Dad’s attention. He would’ve had an epiphany and goneoh, yeah, we should’ve talked it through with you. I needed one of them to hear me.
The waitress chose that moment to stop by our table to drop off Dad’s coffee and to pick up our menus. Dad went with his usual—over-easy eggs, bacon, and toast—whereas I kept it simple with scrambled eggs. I wasn’t sure I could keep anything more down, anyway.
“You know I hate sitting over here,” Dad muttered as he fruitlessly tried to pull his shirtsleeves lower, glaring at the ceiling. “It’s right underneath the air vent.”
“Dad.”
He sighed when dodging the subject didn’t work. “Being an adult means dealing with tough things, even when they aren’t discussed with you first.” He raised his Mexican-flag coffee mug and took a sniff of the black coffee before a long sip. “Have you seen the house she’s looking at?”
“No.” And I didn’t want to. I was sure Mom’s idea of a “dream house” was vastly different than mine, since my dream house was the one we currently lived in. Small enough for our family, close to Brentwood High, and forty steps away from my best friend’s front door. What else could I ask for? “It probably needs a bunch of fixes. It’s my senior year. I don’t want to have to worry about a renovation on top of that.”
I cringed a little hearing my voice, hearing how complaintive it came across. Dad, too, seemed to pick up on it, and tipped his head to the side. “I’m just saying,” Dad said in a distinct way that sounded likelisten to me, because I’m right. “If you don’t go into this with an open mind, nothing’s going to be good enough.”
“Why should I have an open mind? What does it matter what I say, anyway? It’s not like you and Mom value my opinion.”
I’d said the words in hopes of pressing a hot button, to invoke my father’s temper—I wanted someone to feel something other than it being just me—but he looked out the window, calmly letting out a breath. “Can we let this go? I don’t want it to ruin our time together.”
I bit down on my bottom lip to keep from scoffing, slumping into the booth and wishing the food would come faster. Ruin our time together? He had to know that there’d already been a hole blown into this morning, even by him showing up late with no excuse. The disconnect with him didn’t seem to register that this went deeper than them selling the house. “Are you finally going to let me see the apartment after this?”
“It’s not quite ready for you to see yet, Ava. What if you came over and stayed next weekend?”
My tongue ached with suspicions unsaid, and I couldn’t keep quiet anymore. “Do you have a woman there or something?”
Dad closed his eyes a little, almost like aI can’t believe you asked thatsort of face. “Of course not.”
“A man?”
“Ava. No. There’s no one at the apartment. It’s just not ready for guests.”
I grappled for a long moment, staring at him. “I’m your daughter, not aguest.”
I wasn’t a daddy’s girl the way Rachel had been, but in this moment, I was struck with the cruel irony: Rachel’s dad wanted to spend time with her, and my dad viewed me as aguest. A visitor. There had never been a question of whether I’d live with Mom or Dad, and maybe that had to do with them assuming my answer, assuming I wouldn’t want to leave Rachel, but they’d never asked. He’d never asked.
“You know what I meant,” he replied, glancing around the busy diner. I wasn’t sure what was making him so uncomfortable: the topic or me. I could probably count on one hand the amount of times Dad and I fought, and never about anything as serious as this. It felt as if we were on a piece of land breaking apart, me on one side, him on the other. “I promise, next weekend, you can come and stay—”
“Next weekend is homecoming.”
It was crazy to think that Monday kicked off spirit week and then that Friday was the big game. The first three weeks of school had gone by in a whirlwind, all absorbed by everything going on. My parents’ separation, working with Rachel’s dad, the Most Likely To list, kissing Reed. The instances had shaved hours away from the week and probably years off my life.
“Maybe I can come over to see you in your dress, then,” Dad offered, and I could clearly see him struggling to say the right thing. “It’s your last homecoming. We should get a picture together.”
It was the right thing, but that was the only reason he’d said it. He didn’t suggest taking a picture because hewantedto. He said it because it was the right thing to say. Tears burned in my throat, because sitting there in the booth at the Wallflower, I looked at my life laid out in front of me and didn’t recognize a second of it. Not a single second. “You know,” I began slowly, clenching my jaw to stop the sting from building behind my eyes. It didn’t work. “I’m not feeling too good. You can have my eggs.”
“Ava.” The name came out with an annoyed sigh, one that he tried to mask with a softer follow up. “Sit down, okay? Let’s talk about something else.”
