I don’t know what I would have done if Lin hadn’t been with me. She took me up to my room and threw me a pair of clean jeans as I changed out of my Muppet pajamas. Then she called Jay. I heard her explain that his mom was on her way. She would take me to the station.
Don’t worry,she kept repeating.
How could I not?
Jay’s mom didn’t pry as she drove. When I got in she leaned over and squeezed my arm.
“It’ll be okay, sugar.”
I realized these are things people said when there was nothing left to say because they think lies are better than silence.
Even though the entire situation was awful and shameful, I was thankful Jay’s mom stayed to talk to the police with me. My dad had been found standing in the middle of the McCarthy and Jettison intersection—a congested area that was always clogged with traffic as cars merged onto the highway. He was drunk, they told me. Mumbling nonsense. Stumbling to stay upright.
The officer said someone had called in for help. They saw a dog in his arms, a tiny poodle. She was shaking, clawing at my dad’s arms as vehicles whizzed past. That’s the part that sank the knife deep in my heart. I knew the poodle was Millie, who belonged to Mrs. Jenkins next door. But that wasn’t what broke me. It was that this innocent dog couldn’t escape. She must have been so scared—terrified—and the only person she could depend on for her safety was the person who’d carried her into danger in the first place.
The cops had to block the intersection for a few minutes to get my dad and Millie safely to the sidewalk. They’d arrested him for being drunk and disorderly in public. My dad tried to tell them he found Millie in our yard that morning. He was certain he was only trying to return her back to Mrs. Jenkins’s house.
He was two miles from home.
They questioned me about his drinking habits, but I was too shocked by this situation to answer. The last several months I’d told myself that he wasn’t that bad, that it only seemed bad on the outside because no one understood the pain he was going through after losing his mother.
Jay’s mom had sat me down in the two empty chairs in the station’s lobby. “Honey,” she started. “I’ve arranged for you to talk with a social worker. She’ll be here in a few hours.” Her concerned expression was the first of many pitying looks I received after that. “If you want, I can stay with you until she arrives.”
I shook my head. “That’s okay, but thank you.”
She nodded. But before she went home, she gave me a long hug.
Margaret, my social worker, contacted Aunt June once my dad was released. My aunt flew out the next day, but I didn’t go home after I left the station. Lin let me sleep in her room on her trundle bed. She didn’t pressure me with questions. Instead she took my mind off it by talking about Harry Styles and showing me funny YouTube videos.
Even after months of me ignoring her texts, she’s still here for me. She still picked me up with no questions asked.
There’s a hard lump in my throat. I didn’t think it was possible to feel so lousy this early in the morning.
“Are you okay?” she asks me. “I mean… you feel safe at home and everything?”
Even though there are three strangers living in my house,I’mthe one who feels like a stranger. Although it’s ironic, I don’t feel unsafe.
A tiny thought of uncertainty digs its way into my brain: I’m not sure if Margaret would feel the same way.
“Yeah,” I tell her. The letters my dad wrote me during treatment were heavy with apologies. Even though that doesn’t change anything between us, I believe he’s sorry enough to not let anything like that happen again.
“Good.” Lin fiddles with the strap of her lilac book bag. “Are you going to join Earth Club again this year? If we don’t have at least twelve members, Principal Lawrence is pulling the plug.”
Since I was a part of exactly zero clubs at my school in Portland and completed a whopping total of zilch extracurricular activities, rejoining Earth Club will help fluff up my college applications. Besides, I need to spend more time with Lin. It’s clear I’ve knocked her down a few notches on the importance pole.
“Count me in.”
She smiles, and her approval makes me feel good. I think of all the things she used to tell me that she didn’t share with Whitney or Raegan. About liking David Cornwell, who was a red flag in Whitney’s book because he told the faculty they should invest more of the school’s budget in Academic Decathlon versus the dance team. Or about how she actually loves going to engineering conventions with her parents, even though she says otherwise in front of our friends.
I want to get back to the close, unbreakable friendship we used to have. I promise myself I’m going to be a better friend from now on, no matter what it takes.
FIVE
I PART WAYS WITH LINin the auditorium as we line up according to our last names. The plan is to quickly get my schedule so we can continue to catch up before first period. I’m not excessively eager to see Whitney anymore, which sounds horrible, I know. But swiping my boyfriend—ex-boyfriend, whatever—and not telling me is a lot to process first thing in the morning.
“Um,” I say as soon as I’m handed my schedule.SENECA, KIRAis printed neatly at the top, but the classes are definitely not correct. For one thing, English I is a freshman class. I need English III. And Geometry? I took that sophomore year. “This isn’t right.”
The attendant sighs, as if this isn’t the first time she’s heard this today. “Main office. Go talk to your guidance counselor.”
