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Jess shoots me a genuine smile, and I plaster on a fake one. “Happy Thanksgiving. You look great.”
“Thanks. So do you.” I walk over and grab a couple of the dishes. “Dad asked me to start setting the table.”
“Have at it. The stuff right there is ready, too.”
I nod and walk into the dining room, where Heath is already slumped in a chair, looking bored. “Hi,” I say quietly, and he nods at me sullenly. I make several trips from the kitchen to the dining room and back, each time avoiding his eyes and awkwardly muttering apologies whenever I have to reach around him.
I’m setting out silverware when a phone on the table begins to vibrate with a Facetime call. “Mom,” Heath calls, picking up the phone, “it’s Penelope.”
Jess hurries in from the other room, all smiles as she takes the phone from him. “I’m going to duck outside,” she says, looking at me for some reason. “It won’t be long.”
“Okay,” I mumble.
Dad comes back into the kitchen. I try to enjoy the more familiar feeling of him and I working together to finish laying out the place setting, but it’s difficult with Heath sitting there sulking. I’m tense, pulled taut like a rubber band about to snap.
As it turns out, my rubber band is not built to withstand much more.
Dad and I are sitting down in our regular places when Jess comes back through the back door, bringing a gust of cold air in with her. “Here,” she says to Heath, handing him the phone. “Talk to your sister.”
I stare at them as he takes the phone and saunters into the other room. Jess looks between Dad and I, wiping her hands on the front of her dark jeans. “Where should I sit?”
Dad pulls out the chair beside him and gives her a tender smile. “Here’s good, sweetie.”
“I didn’t know you had a daughter,” I blurt out.
“Oh, I do. Penelope. She’s sixteen.” Jess takes her seat beside Dad. She grabs a paper napkin off the table—we’ve never had cloth ones, even for holidays—and flattens it in her lap. “She lives in Florida with their dad.”
I know I shouldn’t say it. Even before a single sound passes my lips, IknowI need to stop, but my brain doesn’t relay the message to my mouth in time. “Why isn’t she with you?” I ask, and it comes out accusatory.
Jess recoils in surprise as Dad barks, “Azalea Jane!” in a tone I’ve only heard a handful of times in my life.
I stutter, trying to explain myself. “I—I don’t—I’m sorry. I’m only wondering because my moth—”
“Azalea,” Dad snaps again. “This is not the time.”
He’s right. I know that. It’s the holidays, and we have company.
But I’m at the end of my rope. With him.
“It’s never the time,” I shoot back. “I’m twenty-two years old and you’re still hiding my past from me.”
He pushes his glasses up on his head, something he’s always done when he wants me to receive the full effect of his facial expression. Right now, it’s a stern glare. “There’s nothing you need to know that I haven’t already told you.”
“I deserve to knoweverything.” I swallow against the lump in my throat. The steaming dishes on the table don’t look nearly as appetizing as they did a few minutes ago. “I don’t know why you’re hiding it. Unless you did something you shouldn’t have.”
His face pales, and my stomach turns over. I never wanted to believe it, but it’s true: he did something. Something he’s not proud of, something he doesn’t want me to know.
I feel like I’m going to be sick.
The three of us sit in heavy silence for a long moment. Distantly, I hear the low grumble of Heath’s voice and someone substantially more cheerful replying.
It’s Jess who speaks next. “I’m not speaking on what happened with Julian and your mom, Azalea,” she says quietly, “but I want you to know that Idowant my daughter with me, desperately, and I wish she were here every single day. There are several reasons why she’s with her dad and Heath is with me. I won’t go into the whole thing, but let me just tell you that this is the arrangement we—my ex and I—decided on after months and months of discussion. I believe it’s been the best thing for both of them to be where they are. But I promise you, they are very, very loved by both of us.” She glances at Dad, who’s staring at the table. “Whatever the reason for your parents’ arrangement—and I don’t know the whole story—I wouldn’t assume that there was a lack of want or a lack of love involved.”
I’m overcome with guilt at the sincerity in her tone. She doesn’t know what I know about Marie, of course—that I’m not exactly making assumptions here. But Jess’s love for her own daughter is clear as day, and I wonder why Marie couldn’t love me from a distance, too. “I’m so sorry, Jess. It was completely out of line for me to say that.”
She gives me a small smile and nod, signaling her forgiveness, and I feel my heart softening toward her a bit. Then I look at my dad and I feel…something unfamiliar. Something unpleasant. Like I can’t trust him anymore. “Daddy.”
He nudges his glasses off the top of his head so they fall back onto his nose.
