Page 275 of Mad Girl

I glanced up, catching your gaze—unexpectedly tender after weeks of careful avoidance and near-perfect silence. You looked sad. Troubled. Maybe even regretful. My heart caught in my throat.

But then your phone chimed, breaking the moment. You plucked it off the counter and quickly typed a reply, then slipped the phone into your back pocket.

“Well,” you said, drying your hands on a dish towel. “I’m headed out for a bit. I’ll see you two later.” You cast a look at Michael. “Let it be noted, Michael, that I’m leaving you alone.”

Michael rolled his eyes.

As I watched you grab your coat and walk out the back door, the pumpkin pie churned in my stomach. If you were meeting someone, I had my answer, didn’t I?

Where did we stand? Nowhere.

Hoping to be wrong, I turned to Michael. “Where’s he going?”

Michael’s jaw ticked. “How should I know? He doesn’t tell me much anymore. But if I had to guess? Probably to hook up with someone.”

The thought of you with someone else—kissing them, undressing them, touching them—crushed me. I dropped my fork on the counter.

“Shouldn’t you be heading back home?” I asked Michael, choking back tears. “To be with Sienna?”

“She’s in Connecticut with her family.” Michael pushed the pie away, then turned in his stool to face me. “Why didn’t you tell me you stopped seeing Willoughby?”

“You’ve been busy.”

“Not too busy for you, Elliot. What happened?”

“I asked for things that freaked him out. I gave myself a bruise, and he thought that was messed up. I couldn’t be what he wanted because I’m messed up.”

Michael’s gaze hardened. “You’re not messed up. Willoughby is, for making you think you are.”

I laughed. “Will you please stop lying? You and everyone else?”

“What are you talking about?”

“You want to know the real reason my dad isn’t sending me away? The real reason he’s mad at your parents?” Michael waited. “He feels guilty, Michael. Because I caught him telling your parents how fucked up I am.”

Michael narrowed his eyes. “I’m sure you just misunderstood.”

“I didn’t misunderstand anything. He said, ‘She’s fucked up. My daughter’s broken—and that’s on me.’ He said those exact words.”

Michael reared back in shock. “Well, screw him. If anyone’s fucked up, it’s your dad—the way he’s sheltered you your whole life, all the stuff he hides about your mother, that messed-up apology thing he made you do until Casey overheard and made him ashamed of it. And my parents are fucked up, too, because they’ve done nothing but support Nic all this time. They act like his actions are somehow justified, and my mom—don’t even get me started on my mom.”

“Why not?”

“Because, Elliot. I felt bad for her after you defaced her signs, but when she figured out it was you, she lit into your dad for not sending you to Arizona last summer. Plus, she started asking him all this stuff that didn’t even make sense.”

“Like what?”

“Like: ‘Why wasn’t she stopped? Why didn’t someone clean up after her before it was splashed all over the news? Did you not know it was happening as it was happening, Nic?’ Stuff like that.”

My blood ran cold. “What?”

Michael sighed. “I don’t know. It made me think maybe he had Hal keeping an eye on you that night—because of what happened last year.”

I clutched the countertop. “You think Hal might’ve been following me?”

“Not following you, necessarily,” Michael said. “Just making sure you stayed safe. I don’t know if you realized, but your dad had a hard time getting over what happened at that Halloween party last year. And then a few weeks later—when you ditched Bree after school and went to Willoughby’s without telling anyone?—Nic was not okay. I saw him break down with my parents over it.”

I stopped to consider this. “When I overheard the three of them talking about sending me away? My dad sounded like he was begging your parents not to make him. He made excuses for my behavior, and Libby said he used to do the same thing when it came to my mom. Anyway, you were right. My dad has weird attachment issues where I’m concerned. He can’t let go.”