While I wait for it to toast, I put on a playlist from my phone. I select the most recent album from my favorite female pop star and turn it up loud.
See, I tell myself as I spread chocolate spread on my toast. When you live alone, you can put on whatever music you want and eat whatever the fuck you want.
I shake my booty half-heartedly to the music as I carry my toast to the table.
I pull my laptop out of my bag and fire it up. I re-read the email inviting me for a job interview and reply to it, telling them I’d be thrilled to meet them over a video call on Thursday afternoon, then hit send.
“There you go,” I say out loud to my empty house, although it doesn’t thrill me as much as it usually does when I get an interview.
There’s also an email from the Hope High School principal requesting me in his office at 8am tomorrow morning to discuss what happened at camp.
I drop the toast onto my plate and bring my hand to my mouth, before realizing he doesn’t mean the fact that I slept with the parent helper. He’s talking about Justin going missing for an hour.
I type back a quick response.
I’ve only eaten half my toast, but I’m suddenly not hungry. I take my plate into the kitchen and dump the unfinished toast into the trash.
21
JOEL
Four weeks later…
Islide my mug under the coffee machine a moment too late, and hot coffee splashes over my knuckles.
“Fuck.”
“Watch your language, Dad.”
Dana’s leaning on the door frame of my office, her school bag hanging from her shoulder.
“Shouldn’t you be at school?” I suck the coffee off my knuckles and glare at the red burn mark there.
Dana ignores my question and throws her bag down by the desk. She shunts me out of the way to get to the cupboard under the coffee machine and pulls out the first aid kit.
“Are you injured?” I ask.
She gives me a stare as if I’m the child and she’s the adult. “No. You are.”
“This?” I wave my red knuckles around, the skin fiery hot from the coffee. “This is nothing.”
She raises her eyebrows at me. I fix her with a stare, and we’re having a standoff like I remember having when she was an impossible toddler.
Finally, she shrugs and puts the first aid kit back in the cupboard.
One point to me.
Damn, I am being a child.
My mug has trails of coffee streaking down the sides, and when I pick it up from the coffee dispenser, one dark droplet falls off the bottom of the mug and onto my white t-shirt.
“Fuck.”
“Dad.” Dana gives me a pointed look. “There are children in here.”
She pretends to be mock offended by putting a hand over her chest.
“Only for another month,” I mutter.
