I pushed a laugh through my lips. “Yeah, I’ve been sleeping.” And when I wasn’t sleeping, I was drinking myself to sleep.
Her eyes danced over my face, the smile falling from her lips entirely. “When … when was the last time you ate anything? Or … I don’t know … showered?”
“You saying I smell?”
I was teasing her, yet I couldn’t tell her when the last time had been. Maybe a few days ago. Could’ve been a week. I had thought about it when I knew I’d be coming over, but … I didn’t know I was coming, did I? I’d reconsidered so many times over the last week. I’d picked up the phone to cancel at least ten times since I’d woken upthis morning—or was it the afternoon? There just wasn’t time to jump in the shower, but … it’d been at least a few days ago. Maybe a week. A week and a half at most.
She shook her head, and then her bottom lip began to wriggle, like she was about to cry. “No, no … sorry. I’m sorry. I’m just … I worry about you, you know? We all do. And …”
To my horror, tears began to trickle down her cheeks, and I hurried to pull a crumpled-up napkin from the pocket of my coat.
She laughed, her cheeks pinking with embarrassment. “God, I’m ridiculous. It’s the hormones. I cry about everything. Come inside. It’s freezing out there.”
I should’ve said something or reassured her that I was fine, that I’d been fine, but I said nothing, not wanting to perpetuate the topic. The less focus on me, the better.
I walked inside and closed the door behind me, now able to see just how different my parents’ house was since I’d last been there. The furniture had changed. The carpet had been ripped out and replaced, no longer a murky beige, stained with dog shit.
My eyes landed on the wall behind the couch I didn’t recognize to look over the framed pictures. My parents had never kept pictures of the family in the living room before—or anywhere in the house, for that matter. I’d always figured the pictures had never been, well, picturesque enough for my father, so they’d kept them elsewhere, places I didn’t know of, hidden away from anyone who might come over. But now, looking at these … a few shots from Lucy’s wedding, a photograph of my father and sisters and Ricky and Sid at what looked like a restaurant on the water, a picture of my sisters standing in front of a Christmas tree …
“I’m not in any of these,” I said out loud.
“What?” Lucy asked, pulling on a cardigan and wrapping it around her belly. She came to stand next to me, scanning her eyes over the wall. “I’m sure you’re … no, you have to be in at least …”
I looked down at her. “I’m not.”
She swallowed and chewed on her bottom lip before saying, “Maybe, um … maybe they just didn’t realize …”
I barked a laugh. “Yeah. Sure.”
Grace, Sid, and Ricky came together from the kitchen, laughing about something. They seemed excited to see me as they all at once came at me with hugs and outstretched hands. But it was Sid who realized first that I wasn’t smiling as I greeted them.
“Hey, what’s up?” he asked. “This ratty-lookin’ beard got you down? Listen, I’ll let you borrow my razor. We’ll get that—"
I pointed at the wall. “Have you noticed this shit?”
Ricky glanced in the direction I was pointing. “What?”
Grace followed his gaze, but said nothing as Sid replied in a gruff, low voice, “Yeah, I know. But don’t worry about that. Let’s just … let’s just have a nice night, okay? We’ll deal with that—"
“I don’t exist in this house,” I hissed at him, now ignoring the others. My eyes bored into his. “Why does he want to erase me?”
I knew Sid had less answers than me. He knew next to nothing about my childhood and my relationship with my father, outside of what he’d seen firsthand at the wedding and whatever Grace might’ve told him. Still, I looked to him now for reasons, for an explanation, and why the hell had I become so dependent on him?
“I don’t know,” he replied honestly. “But that’s notus, Serg—you know that. That doesn’t represent us. So, fuck it.”
“Why should I be here at all? Why should I want to be in a place I’m obviously not welcome?”
I sounded frantic.
I need to leave.
No, I need a drink.
“No, no, no,” Grace said, grabbing my arm. “Youarewelcome. Daddy … he just … he needs to warm up to—"
“Warm up tome?” I nearly shouted, wrenching my arm from her grasp. “Are you seriously making excuses for him? Are you—"
“What’s going on in here?”
