Chapter One
Lola
Before my alarm goes off, Dad’s in the kitchen already slamming cupboard doors as if they owe him money.
He’s always been loud in the mornings. Sometimes he even has full-blown conversations with himself about absolutely nothing. Other times, he’s busy butchering some old school rock song being blasted at full volume. Off-key. Zero shame. Acting like he’s about to take the stage instead of just making breakfast.
It’s obnoxious.
But it’s home.
It’s the soundtrack of my childhood. The chaotic, comforting noise of two people who lost something important but figured out how to keep going anyway. Just us, surviving on off-key singing and stubborn love after the world handed us a shit deck of cards.
The aroma of bacon hits me before I open my bedroom door.
Which means Dad’s in a good mood. Either that, or the Knights lost last night, and he’s coping the only way he knows how—cholesterol and denial.
I walk barefoot down the hall, tugging the hem of my hoodie lower over my sleep shorts. My hair is piled into a messy knot on top of my head. It’s always messy in the morning. I don’t bother brushing it. Dad once called me his “little tumbleweed.” I think he meant it as a compliment.
“Morning, Button,” he calls without turning around.
Button. The name he gave me when I was small and everything still hurt too much to say out loud.
He’s holding a spatula in one hand and a half-full mug of coffee in the other. The mug reads “World’s Okayest Plumber,” which he claims is a lie because he considers himself at least top-tier mediocre.
“I made bacon,” he announces proudly. “And eggs. And toast. And more bacon.”
Because when Dad loves you, he feeds you until you can’t walk.
“Wow.” I slide onto the barstool and rest my chin in my hand. “You really went full chef today.”
He snorts. “You deserve it. You survived another week of high school hell.”
“It’s Tuesday, Dad.”
He shrugs, totally unfazed. “Every day’s a miracle.”
That’s my dad, Pete Bellamy—the only man I’ve ever trusted with my heart, the one constant in a life that lost its balance early.
My mother died when I was four—ovarian cancer, the quiet kind. The kind that doesn’t scream or warn you; it just creeps in and eats you from the inside until it’s too late to fight back. I don’t remember her face the way I wish I did, mostly I just remember the way she smelled.
But Dad made damn sure I never felt the absence.
Every dance recital, even the ones where I tripped over my own feet. Every scraped knee patched up with too much antiseptic and an even bigger kiss. Every stupid school presentation where I stood there explaining the water cycle with glitter and hot glue.
He was there, sitting in the front row, cheering the loudest and clapping like I’d just cured cancer instead of gluing cotton balls to cardboard.
And I know how rare that is.
He plates a full big breakfast and slides it in front of me with a dramatic flourish. “Your highness.”
I gaze down at the plate. Bacon layered high. Eggs still sizzling. Toast cut into tidy triangles. Beans pushed in the corner. “I’m not gonna finish all this.”
“Well.” He leans a hip against the counter. “What you don’t eat, take to school and give it to that….” His brows knit together. “What’s the boy’s name you take extra food for. Jax? Jack?”
“Jace,” I say. “And I haven’t really seen him lately.”
Something shifts in my chest when I say it. I don’t poke at it. Jace hasn’t been sitting with us. He hasn’t been slouched across from me at lunch, stealing chips off my tray, asking what I’m eating even though he knows damn well. His seat has been empty for weeks now, and every time I look at it, something tight pulls in my chest.
