I nodded, and Mom’s face shuttered.
“So, Elana’s family is now more important than your sister and Chevelle?”
“Jesus Christ, Mom!”
“Don’t talk to your mom that way,” Dad said, coming in, reaching for two beers and handing one off to me as if it were a peace offering. Then, he said, “Have a seat.”
I did. Like I was sixteen all over again and had been caught playing my guitar out back while Cassidy had slipped in the kitchen on a tiny droplet of water.
“Your mom and I need to leave on Wednesday for Ireland.”
I just stared, trying to keep back the “Thank God” threatening to come out of my lips.
“You promised you’d be here for Cassidy while we finished up the term,” Dad continued the conversation, but I knew it was really Mom speaking through him. They’d probably had an entire conversation about who was going to have “the talk” with me, easily concluding I’d react better to Dad than Mom.
“And I am. I’m here,” I said, tugging at the leather straps around my wrist. The ones I’d first given myself as a promise to go after my dreams no matter what. The ones I’d worn since leaving for Juilliard on the bus because Mom and Dad hadn’t been able to take me. They’d gone with Cassidy to a specialist appointment while I’d headed off to college on my own.
“But you’re not really here,” Mom said.
“Arlene,” Dad said her name in warning. She huffed, and Dad turned back to me. “Cassidy’s body has been through a lot. She’s already fallen three times since getting out of the hospital. We need to know you’re going to be here the moment she needs you.”
They were good at making me feel guilty, even when I knew Cassidy would hate everything about this conversation. She didn’t want them, or me, hovering over her like she was still eight years old. She wanted to be treated like the grown-up she was. She was taking precautions. She was making sure her hypotonia didn’t result in harm to the baby. She was as protective of Chevelle as they were of her.
“You were both here today. She didn’t need me on top of the two of you. I’ll be here when she needs me,” I told them, meaning every word of it.
They both looked at me doubtfully. I’d earned the doubt from years of my head being in my music. Long before I’d left to go to school, music had been my life, just like I’d told Tristan earlier in the studio. I got what she said about the art causing everything else to disappear.
“Until you get a call from?” Mom started, only to have Dad cut her off again.
“Brady’s right. He didn’t need to be here today. And he’s promised to stay while we’re gone.”
The argument from the night before that had left Dad sleeping on the couch was still warring with them. I hated the lack of trust between Mom and I was now causing a rift between them. But it also made me wonder if she’d even trust Dad to take care of Cass. Was there anyone who could do it as well as her?
I stood up from the table, leaving the beer behind. “Go to Ireland. Everything will be fine.”
I wanted to let the screen door slam behind me like I had as a teen, but I didn’t. I shut it softly, and Mom’s voice trailed after me even though she’d lowered it.
“She needs us…him…more than she’ll ever admit.”
“Sometimes we’re so focused on Cassidy we forget he needs us too.”
The words hit me hard, stalling my feet as they started to walk away from the house.
Mom snorted, and my heart tightened right back up.
“We didn’t even know what country he was in last, Arlene. Jesus. What kind of parents don’t even know where their kids are at?”
He must have walked away, because Mom called after him, her voice fading as she followed him until I couldn’t hear her anymore, “Don’t you dare toss that at me, Petri, and walk…”
I swallowed hard. Uncomfortable with all of it. The demands. The regrets. The fact I was causing division in a relationship that I’d always seen as unbreakable. My parents had been there for each other every single step of the way with Cassidy and with their careers. I stormed up the stairs and into my apartment, causing Marco to stand in a rush of movements from the sofa.
When he realized it was just me, in a bad mood, he relaxed.
“Lee and Garner are going to fire me if you keep running off without telling me where you’re going and then don’t answer anyone’s calls,” he said.
I brushed a hand through the hair that still needed to be fixed. More people I’d let down today. I pulled out my phone to see that it was dead. When I’d used it hours ago to call for Japanese food, the battery had been low, but I hadn’t thought much about it. I’d seen the texts from both Lee and Marco but had ignored them while I allowed myself to linger in the bubble I’d built around Tristan and Hannah.
The bubble that had lasted until it had been burst by a sharp hook from my mother.
