“I’m here. I’ve brought help.” I glance at Carrson. His eyes aren’t on my father. They’re locked on me. I give the faintest nod. “You’re going to get better, okay? No more drinking. There are places that can fix this.”
“We can’t afford anything like that.” My dad struggles to sit up and fails.
“It’s okay.” I’m crying harder now, understanding the deal I’m about to make. The bargain. My father’s soul for mine, but what other choice do I have? What other decision can I make? Love is sacrifice, giving away parts of yourself so those you care about are safe and happy. That’s all I want. For my father to have a chance to thrive. If I have to make a deal with the devil to get that, then so be it.
It's one year.
How bad can it be?
Chapter nine
Laurel
Carrson helps get my father out of bed and onto the couch, where he sits, listing to one side like a ship that’s been wrecked and is slowly taking on water. I prop open the front door to let in some light and to let out the worst of the stink. A few phone calls from Carrson and the next thing I know I’m bundling my father into the back of a Lincoln Town Car with heavily tinted windows.
“I love you,” I tell Dad.
He lifts a trembling hand to my cheek and casts a worried glance at Carrson, who stands a few feet away. “Are you sure you’re going to be okay? I don’t haveto go.”
I want to tell him no. That I’m not okay at all. That I’m so scared I’m shaking inside, but that’s not what he needs to hear. I take his hand and press a kiss to his palm like I used to when I was little and he was still my hero.
“I’ll be fine, I promise.” It’s a lie, but at this point I need him to go. The quicker I pull off this bandage, the less it’ll hurt.
“I’ll talk to you later,” I say, then wonder how that’s going to work. Will Carrson let me call the rehab facility? Will visiting be allowed? I’m so far away from the world I once knew, I don’t understand how any of this works. The actual logistics of it. Before I can ask, the car pulls away, leaving me in a cloud of dust waving furiously. Wondering if my dad is waving back.
“You did the right thing,” Carrson says.
“Did I?” I quirk my brow at him.
He kicks a rock, then watches as it skitters out into the road. “Of course, what other choice was there?”
“Exactly.”
We walk slowly back to Ashford House, with me avoiding all the cracks in the sidewalk. Wouldn’t want to break my dead mother’s back.
“Do you love him?” Carrson asks, catching me off guard.
“Who? My father?”
He nods yes.
“Of course.” I wrinkle my forehead, perplexed he’s even asking. Didn’t I just give up my entire life for my dad? Throw myself to the wolves to save him.
“But he failed you.” Carrson frowns, deep lines bracketing the corners of his mouth into hard parentheses, like he genuinely can’t understand. “A father is supposed to provide, to guide, to make sure you succeed—”
“I’m a grown woman,” I cut in. “I can do all that, make my own choices, fight my own battles.”
“That’s not how it’s meant to be.” He shakes his head. “If he can’t fulfill his role, what good is he?”
I stop dodging cracks and look at him. “Love isn’t a transaction, Carrson. My dad’s sick, not evil. Am I disappointed? Yes. Do I wish things were different? Also yes, but that doesn’t change my love for him. Nothing can.”
Jaw tight, he stares at the pavement, hands tucked behind his back. His words sound rehearsed, almost like scripture. “A father who can’t control his house forfeits it.”
“I don’t know what that means.”
He huffs a breath. “Never mind.”
We walk on in tense silence as the landscape shifts around us. The rundown two- and three-story apartments give way to brick homes pressed shoulder to shoulder. Then the lawns stretch wider, and the houses grow grander, smug in their symmetry. Gleaming white columns rise like teeth along Greek Row, where the fraternities and sororities sit in proud formation, Ashford House presiding over them all from its perch at the top of the hill.
