“Well, that would be too easy. He’s not an easy guy.”
She cut me a look and I dug my fingernails into my palm in an effort to keep my face composed. “Maybe it’s, like, a hole-in-the-wall place. We should ask around. Someone must know.”
“Yeah,” I agreed. She charged forward with renewed purpose, head held high.
I’d been confused since she shook me awake for a mission: finding Dex’s favorite pastry, something Sicilian calledgranita con brioche. Apparently his grandmother used to make them. When I’d asked how she managed to coax the information out of him, she rolled her eyes and reminded me they were friends.
Maybe if I wasn’t so busy blowing past the flimsy boundaries we set, I could’ve been friends with him too.
We made our way down the sidewalk of a Main Street on the outskirts of Rock Spring, Wyoming. After driving for nearly eight hours yesterday, Dex was exhausted and grumpy, so I’d suggested stopping for the night instead of trying to make it to Idaho. The motel we ended up at only had one room available—two queens—so Phoebe and I shared a bed while Dex crashed in the other, everyone out before seven.
I didn’t mind the extra stop. It bought more time before the inevitable.
Phoebe and I asked several locals about the alleged Italian bakery and none of them knew what we were talking about. She grew more frustrated, growling under her breath in a way that would make Dex proud.
“I don’t understand,” she grumbled, tapping her phone furiously. “It says it’s here. It says it’s open. So where is it? Where the fuck is it?”
“Maybe we should just…” I trailed off when she shot me her dirtiest look. “Sorry.”
“It’sannoying.”
“It is, yeah.”
She rolled her eyes. “Of course.”
“Of course what?”
“Nothing. What were you gonna say? ‘Let’s just get something from the regular bakery and go back to the motel’? Sure. Whatever.” She brushed past me, stomping down the sidewalk. Flummoxed, I jogged to catch up.
“What was that?” I asked. She ignored me, cheeks flushed. “Phoebe.”
“Nothing.”
“What is going on?”
“I’m mad!” she yelled, wheeling around. I stumbled to a stop, my stomach lurching at the return of her glower, her raised voice, the apparent derision she felt toward me. “Oh, wait, that’s right. That’s an unfamiliar emotion to you.”
I blinked several times in quick succession, a preemptive stinging sensation radiating through my body. “What does that mean?”
“Nothing bothers you these days. Everything is A-fucking-plus all the time.” She sniffed and glanced away to hide the glassiness in her eyes. “You’re not you anymore. And not even in, like, the ‘dad died so we’re different’ way. From the second you had to take me in, it’s been different. You and me. It’s wrong.”
I took a shaky breath, ignoring the looks we’d begun to garner from strangers moving around us on the sidewalk. “I’m trying, Phoebe,” I said. “What is it you want from me? What are the magic words you want me to say? Because I’ve been searching for months, and I give up. Nothing I say is ever the right thing for you.”
“Because it’s bullshit!” she shouted, and a tear slipped downher cheek. “It’s all fake bullshit you pulled from a parenting book you shouldn’t have even had to read. I want to know what you think, not fucking Wanda Knows Fuck All M.D.”
“Okay, fair enough.” I swallowed hard, taking a small step closer to her. “But can’t you just say that to me instead of yelling it on a public sidewalk?”
She kept glaring. The tears in her eyes sparkled under the sun. “This is what I’m talking about. A year ago, you wouldn’t be asking me not to yell in public, you’d fight back. Yell at me! Call me a bitch! Punch me in the face! I deserve it!”
“Stop.” I moved in closer but she took two big steps backward, bumping into the brick building behind us. “Phoebe, talk to me. Please talk to me. I know I always say the wrong thing, but I am begging you to just talk to me.”
“You wanna know why I talk to Dex?” She raised her chin, swallowing hard. “He’s real with me. He doesn’t bother trying to spare my feelings. He says what he means, all the time.”
“I’m real with you.”
“On this trip, yeah. You have been. Because you get to act like a normal twenty-six-year-old instead of being cooped up in that stupid apartment with me.”
I rubbed my burning eyes. “What’s wrong with the apartment?”
