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“What’s this about—”
“You’ve gotta swear, Dad.”
His face falls hearing me call him dad. Then he says, “What’d I tell you? You can trust me and only me in our family. I won’t say shit to anyone.”
I nod a few times. Here it goes. “I’m dating his daughter—that’s why they won’t fire me.”
Realization sobers his face. “The girl.” He thinks this over, eyeing me again and his lip rises in a faraway smile. “How long have you been with her?”
“Not long enough,” I mutter.
He stretches an arm out and touches the back of my head, like I’m his kid. Then he pulls away and lights a cigarette. “So you’re scared your cousins are gonna pull some stupid shit if they know you’re with her?”
My stomach roils. “Something like that, yeah.”
“They’re locked up. They’re not gonna sneeze on her. You don’t need to worry about ‘em.”
“I know how it looks though,” I say to him. “I get my job back. I’m dating Luna. Like you said, it stinks, and I don’t want them thinking I turned on them. What will happen? You tell me.”
His face darkens. He sucks harder on the cigarette. He doesn’t paint that picture. “Quit your job then. Don’t date the girl.”
I rotate more to him. “What if you tell ‘em I’m using her just to keep my job? That it’s not real. Me and her. That I don’t even like her, really.” It hurts less saying this with the worse alternatives on the table. “You can tell them that.”
He considers this with a tip of his head. “Eh, maybe…they might buy it.” He pauses. “Only if you prove it down the line.”
This is the only way. “You’ll help cover for me?” I ask him. “When Ollie and all of them start asking questions…?”
He says nothing at first.
Desperation claws at my back. “I just want them out of my life. Out of her life. Nowhere near us or her family.”
“What about me?” he asks. “You want me out of your life too?”
I go eerily still. Before all of this, my honest answer woulda been yeah. Now, though, I’m questioning what a life would look like with him in it. For real. And it’s terrifying that I’d even want it.
My unoiled joints loosen, and I motion to him. “You’re the one I’m coming to. No one else. I only want to talk to you. You get that?”
He starts nodding. “Yeah, I do.” One last drag, he asks, “Loren Hale isn’t gonna be pissed you’re hanging around me? In your fancy ass car.”
“Boss’s car,” I say, on edge. “Is that a yes?”
“Yeah, I’ll help you.” His lips gradually rise in another smile. “You’re my son.” He pats my shoulder. “This is what dads are for.”
Wouldn’t know. He hasn’t been much of one, but he’s trying now. What I’m asking isn’t small, and this is the second time he’s coming through for me when I really need him.
Relief eases my muscles, a sense of safety washing down me like plunging into a lagoon. Coming out clean, anew. And I know I’m going to be okay. I wonder if this is what it feels like to have a father.
43
LUNA HALE
“It’s your interpretation. It’s not a fact, Luna.”
That’s what my therapist told me after I rehashed my new findings—that I used to love Donnelly. She said, “You’re assuming you wrote the human with Donnelly in mind. You could possibly just be seeing exactly what you want to see.”
I reread Human Him, Cosmic Her five times, and there is some margin of error on my part. It’s not like Original Luna ever mentioned Donnelly in the text or in a footnote.
“Why don’t you concentrate on your life at the present moment and less about him?” she posed.
Dr. Raven didn’t get it. Understanding the past three years isn’t just about Donnelly. It’s about who I am, the person I became and the relationships I’ve made, and with so many varying perspectives and voices, the only one I can really trust is Original Luna. And I. Can’t. Find. Her.
I’ve gone from being jealous of the OG Luna to being desperate for her. I’m terrified of the next stage of grief I’m headed for. Because this one really sucks.
Next mode of action: a TV marathon. If anything will surface a memory or help piece together the missing years, it’s this.
Only, I didn’t expect half of what I’ve seen. In the Cobalt brothers’ Hell’s Kitchen apartment, a lump is lodged in my throat as I stare at the TV. A Twizzler hangs half out of my mouth, and my arms wrap around a tub of popcorn, kernels beneath my butt on the leather couch.
Wreckage of a car crash smolders on-screen, and I picture my older brother, cousins, and Farrow in the carnage. Not that any cameras caught the actual crash—but they captured the aftermath. And that’s enough to knot my stomach into a figure-eight.
