Page 57

Tobie

The first three days of spring break I spend in bed watching movies on my laptop.

I can’t stop shivering, my joints ache, my body is heavy, and no matter how much sleep I have, it never feels like it’s enough.

All I brought with me to Lawrenceburg was my laptop, phone, the important chargers, and, thankfully, my thyroid medication. That’s it. So I also spend those days as a scruffpants, digging into all the sweatpants and PJs I didn’t love enough to bring with me to college.

“You hungry, Junebug?” Dad calls up the stairs, our familiar pattern over the last three days.

I stretch and sit up in bed, telling myself it’s okay that I slept until eleven.

Rest when my body needs it doesn’t make me lazy. I mentally repeat a chant my old therapist taught me soon after my diagnosis.

“Only if you’re making something for yourself.”

“I am.”

I’m not sure I believe him. If I said I was hungry, and Dad had a meeting, he would cancel it to make me food and deny there was any such meeting if I asked about it.

Twenty minutes later, he knocks and walks in with a tray. “An omelet with spinach and feta,” he says. “And juice.”

He made the same omelet the day before—it’s one of my favorites.

“What happened to making yourself food?” I ask as he places the tray in my lap and crosses the room to pull back the drapes and open the window.

“Just decided I wasn’t hungry after all.” He sticks his head out.

“What are you doing?”

“Chasing away any doves you have out there before they make a mess on my car.”

I laugh, and he flashes me a smile on his way to settling on the green velvet armchair I’d snuggle up in on winter nights with a blanket and a book. It sits between two large bookcases bursting at the seams.

My room is exactly how it was when I moved out. The books were too heavy for me to take to college, so I brought a handful of my favorites and bought more in Lamont.

At the bottom of my bed is the knitted throw that belonged to my grandma who passed before I was born. My room is in natural shades of brown, green, and beige. I loved this bedroom before I moved away for college, and I still do.

For the next several minutes, I dig into my savory breakfast as Dad flicks through one of my books.

“We broke up weeks ago,” I tell Dad when I’ve finished eating.

“I guessed as much,” Dad says, returning my book on Greek heroes to the shelf.

“How?”

“Marc told his parents that you were having some problems.”

I smile wryly at him. “Small towns, huh?”

He returns my smile. “Small towns.”

I put my fork down to play with my glass. Dad doesn’t demand to know more or ask.

He just waits.

“I didn’t want to tell you because I was embarrassed,” I admit. “I told myself it was because I didn’t want you to come to Lamont and punch him in the face, but it wasn’t.”

He gets up and crosses over to settle on the bed beside me. “You have nothing to be embarrassed about.”

“You and Mom had this amazing relationship, and you weren’t even together a year before you got married. Everyone expected me and Marc to get married and stay together for the next thirty years.”

“What matters is what you want, Junebug, and what makes you happy. Not what Lawrenceburg expects.” He moves my tray to the side table and wraps his arm around my shoulder.

“And your mom and I didn’t have a perfect marriage.

Our relationship had its dips and peaks, Tobie.

Just because you didn’t see those moments doesn’t mean they didn’t happen. ”

“I know that. No relationship is perfect.” I shoot him a rapid glance. “And I met someone.”

He aims a smile down at me. “I had an inkling that if it wasn’t Marc making you happy, then someone else must be.”

I hold my breath and then say, “Except it isn’t just someone. It’s three guys.”

He blinks.

“It’s a long story,” I say, watching him closely.

“From the top, Junebug. I’m listening.”

I tell him about catching Marc cheating on our sixth anniversary.

Dad is as furious as I thought he would be.

He squeezes my arm to comfort me when I tell him about getting locked in the bathroom stall and laughs when I reveal the scare I gave the Magic Three.

He’s surprised, then pleased when he learns about how Reid, Caleb, and Javier looked out for me, protected me, and made me laugh more than Marc ever did.

I tell him all about a fake relationship that I entered into to get revenge on Marc for hurting me, which turned into something I never expected.

I don’t tell him about all the sex. There are some things Dad needs to know and others that will give him a coronary.

“So you love these guys?”

“I don’t know.”

He raises an eyebrow.

I nod, acknowledging something I haven’t wanted to admit to myself. “What if they hurt me like Marc did, or I lose them the way you lost Mom?”

“Junebug…”

“I know I shouldn’t be afraid to love and that it’s better to have loved and lost and all those other sayings from fortune cookies. But when it’s happening to you, it’s not as easy to shrug off.”

“Have you told them how you feel?”

I sigh and shake my head. “That would be too reasonable, Dad. I just turned my phone off and ran back home like an idiot instead of confronting them about the things Marc said at the hotel.”

“Not like an idiot.” He kisses my hair. “Like someone afraid of being hurt.”

The next day, I’m out of bed, driving my dad’s car into town and sinking back into the familiarity of small-town life.

I go to the grocery store with Dad, laugh with the clerks I’ve known all my life, catch up on all the gossip, and remember why I love the town and why I wanted to leave it.

It feels too small for me, like it’s squeezing me and has for years.

In the afternoon, I turn my phone on to discover that I have so many texts and missed calls from Caleb, Reid, and Javier it’s overwhelming.

I reply to a couple of text messages from Max, who missed all the excitement. I’m not brave enough to even read the messages, never mind listening to the voicemails from Caleb, Reid, and Javier.

Instead, I boot up my laptop, click the logo for my email, spot one I wasn’t expecting, and automatically click on it.

Dear Miss Myers,

We are delighted to ? —

I slam the laptop lid and bolt out of the room, nearly falling down the stairs as I sprint for the garage.

Dad has always worked in there because he likes to leave the garage door up. He says it feels like he’s working outside rather than being trapped in his office all day.

I burst into the garage while Dad is standing at the entrance, one hand in his pocket, and the other holding his cell phone to his ear.

I throw myself at him, sending him rocking. “I read the first line, but I couldn’t read the rest in case it was a trick,” I blurt out so fast it would be a mystery if he understood a word I just said.

He apologizes to the person on the other end of the line, telling them he’ll call back, and hangs up. “From the top, Junebug.”

“The college. The master’s. I applied, and I knew they would say no because what do I have to offer? They probably have students who already did a teaching degree.”

A couple of nights ago, when Dad was watching CSI through a gap between his fingers, and I was telling him when the gory parts were over, I finally opened up about my dream job.

A smile blooms on his face. “They accepted you.”

“But maybe they didn’t. The first line said they were delighted. What if they are delighted to tell me that I came so close and they will think of me if a student drops out? Like I’m wait-listed or something?”

His eyebrow rises.

I wring my fingers. “I know it doesn’t make sense, but I’m scared to…” Hope. “Can you read it for me in case it’s bad? I’ll know from your face if it’s terrible, so you won’t need to tell me.”

“It won’t be terrible, Junebug, but go on. Get your laptop.”

I get my laptop and place it on his desk, unlocking it without looking at the screen, which makes him smile. And I perch on the very edge of the La-Z-Boy opposite his desk, chewing on my thumbnail with my eyes glued to his face.

He wears his heart and soul on his sleeve.

Mom said it’s why they were planning their wedding three months after they met.

Everyone said they wouldn’t last. That nothing good could come from getting married when you barely know each other.

Twenty years later, they were the happily married couple everyone wanted to be.

Because he’s so easy to read, I feel like I’m reading the email just by watching him.

When he flicks his eyes up to me, I’m the one who says, “I got in.”

After I’ve stopped crying and laughing, Dad takes me out to dinner to celebrate.

When you live in a small town, news travels fast. Dinner is on the house, and everyone is congratulating me before I’ve walked through the restaurant door because Dad told our neighbor who was out mowing his lawn.

Accepting the grad school offer from the college of my dreams is bittersweet.

If Marc hadn’t cheated, I wouldn’t have done it. I’d have gone along with what he wanted, wound up in a career that might have been okay, but I’d have always wanted something more.

I was always so scared of failing that I never let myself imagine what if I succeed?

The campus is quiet when I return to Lamont after five days with Dad. As I make my way up to my room, I don’t bump into anyone.

Like the coward I am, I still have a million texts and voicemails from Caleb, Reid, and Javier, clogging up my phone that I haven’t read, listened to, or responded to.

I wanted to look them in the eye and ask them if they were seeing other girls behind my back. Not because I like confrontation. I don’t. Never will. I’m absolutely sure about that. But I love them, and some things you do face-to-face, and this feels important enough to be one of those things.

So I’m scared—fucking terrified—but I’ll do it. And if they have been screwing behind my back, the least they deserve is a kick down the nearest staircase.

I’ll crawl into a sleeping bag and cry after that.