My phone buzzed again. I grabbed it, expecting another message from Tanner.
It was my father.
We need to talk tomorrow. About your future. This nonsense has gone on long enough.
I stared at the message until the screen went dark, then turned my phone face down on the nightstand and pulled the covers over my head.
Thanksgiving morning arrivedgray and cold.
I woke to the sound of my mother moving around downstairs, the familiar rhythm of her morning routine—coffee brewing, pans clattering, the low murmur of NPR from the kitchen radio. For a moment, lying there in the half-light, I could pretend I was twelve again, and none of this mattered yet.
Then I remembered where I was and why, and the illusion shattered.
My phone showed three messages from Emily—complaints about Mark’s family, questions about when I’d be down, and a photo of their kids that I didn’t open. Nothing from Tanner. It was early still. He was probably helping his mother cook.
I forced myself out of bed and into the shower, letting the water run hotter than comfortable, using up all the hot water the way I used to do as a teenager just to be petty. Some habits were too satisfying to break.
Downstairs, Mom had transformed the kitchen into something from a magazine spread. The turkey was already in the oven, sides prepped and waiting, the good china laid out on the dining room table. She moved through the space with practiced efficiency, and I watched her from the doorway, trying to remember the last time I’d seen her this focused on something that wasn’t managing Dad’s moods.
“Morning,” I said.
She turned, startled, then smiled. “Morning, honey. I didn’t hear you come down.”
“Need help with anything?”
“You can set out the serving dishes. They’re in the hutch.” She gestured toward the dining room. “And maybe…check on your father? He’s been in his study since six.”
I didn’t want to check on my father. Didn’t want to have the conversation his text had promised. But Mom’s expression was pleading, and I’d never been good at telling her no.
I found him exactly where she’d said, sitting behind his desk with papers spread in front of him. He looked up when I knocked, his reading glasses perched on his nose.
“Shut the door.”
I shut the door.
“Sit.”
I sat.
Dad took off his glasses, set them aside with deliberate care. The silence stretched, a tactic I recognized from every lecture he’d ever given me.
“I’ve been thinking,” he said finally. “About your situation.”
“My situation.”
“This athletic training path you’re insisting on pursuing.” He leaned back in his chair. “I’ve done some research. The job market is saturated. Starting salaries are barely livable. And the career ceiling is…limited.”
“I know the statistics.”
“Do you? Because from where I’m sitting, it looks like you’re making decisions based on some juvenile fantasy instead of reality.”
The anger I’d been tamping down since yesterday flared hot. “It’s not a fantasy. I’ve thought about this. I’ve done the work.”
“You’ve done the bare minimum to convince yourself this is viable.” Dad’s voice was cold, clinical. “But you’re young. You still have time to correct course.”
“Correct course to what? Business school? Law school? Becoming you?”
“Watch your tone.”
