Page 194 of Mad Girl

He didn’t say yes, but the wretched expression on his face certainly did.

As I studied his profile—shoulders slumped, soft green polo rippling in the breeze—I deeply regretted my behavior over the last couple of months. But then I remembered how my behavior was often tied to all the ways he prevented me from being happy. And how, still, he hadn’t acknowledged that.

“Maybe I’d care more about your happiness,” I said, “if you cared more about mine.”

“I do care about your happiness,” he said, briefly squeezing his eyes shut.

“Until I start asking the wrong questions. Start asking for normal things. Start telling you what I need in order to be happier.”

For the next few seconds, he stared at the horizon, silent, jaw working hard.

So I added, “I didn’t cut myself on purpose, but let’s say I did. Rather than talk to me about it—rather than ask why I need to hurt myself, why it makes me feel better—you decide to ship me off to some fancy institution in Arizona, so someone else can ask me why, and you don’t have to face the answer.”

“The answer’s me!” he yelled, snapping his gaze back to mine. “I’m the reason. Years of sitting in therapy with you have made me well aware of the fact, and believe me, I have faced it. But it still isn’t okay”—his voice shook, each word sharp and measured—“for you to do it.”

I turned away, the words slicing deep, like he’d peeled back my skin, exposing everything wrong with me. I might’ve burst into tears if he hadn’t filled the silence.

“And by the way,” he whispered, “I’m not sending you to Arizona.”

“I found the papers in your desk,” I whispered back.

Nic leaned against my shoulder. “I’m not sending you there—as long as you stop hurting yourself. Not just around your birthday, like you promised Michael, but all the time.” He grabbed my arm. “Promise me. Promise you won’t do anything to get back at Bree for letting us believe you hurt yourself on purpose.”

These were big promises for me to make, but if they kept me from being sent to Arizona, then of course I had to agree. “I promise.”

“I also want you to go back to therapy this fall. It’s important with the one-year anniversary of your assault coming up—and I want Casey to go back, too, after spending his whole summer with that asshole.”

“Okay.” I might’ve agreed to anything right then, so long as I didn’t have to be checked into a psychiatric hospital. Then I thought of something. “Hey, Dad. Casey’s mom is the girl John spent the summer with after Libby broke up with him, right? Cassandra?”

Nic hesitated, and I worried it’d be like all the other times—when he avoided, deflected, and shut me down. “Dad, please. I’d like it if you could be honest with me about this.”

“I believe so, yes,” he finally said with a nod.

“Casey said you offered to find her, but he told you not to.” When he didn’t immediately respond, I added, “But you found her, anyway, didn’t you?”

“Of course.” He’d said it like duh.

“Well?” I asked, eager to know everything. “Where is she?”

“New York City. She’s a successful artist featured by a prominent art gallery there.”

“Wow.” I couldn’t believe this—but it fit. Somehow, it made a whole lot of sense. Your biological mother was an artist. A creative, like you. “Wait. The art gallery!” I leaned back, gaping at him. “You took Casey there to see her art.”

He smiled.

I narrowed my eyes. “I knew there was something weird about you wanting to visit an art gallery.”

“What do you mean? I like art.”

“Sure,” I said. “Must be why you chose to sit at that coffee shop answering emails while Casey and I walked through the Met.”

“Elliot, I’ve been to the Met fifty times.”

“But what if Casey’s mom had been there? What if we’d run into her?”

“She only comes in on Thursdays.”

I drew back. “Have you been stalking Casey’s mom?”