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“Of what? That I’ll embarrass her at church? That her daughter isn’t the perfect little trophy anymore?”
“She’s scared you’ll break,” he says, and I swear the words hit harder than anything Mom’s ever thrown at me. “That you’re doing this alone. That we failed you.”
That we failed you.
God. That one sneaks past my defenses like smoke under a locked door.
“I’m not alone,” I lie. Because saying I am would make it too real. Too raw. And I’ve already cried enough this week.
Dad watches me for a long moment. “She’s mad that I’m here. That I’m supporting you.”
“You’re supporting me?”
His eyes soften. “Of course I am.”
“But it’s caused issues between you two.”
Another slow nod. “She thinks I’m encouraging you. That I’m making it easier for you to live in sin or whatever bullshit phrase she’s clinging to these days.”
“And you’re okay with that?”
“No,” he says honestly. “But I’m more okay with being your dad than I am with pretending I’m not.”
A lump forms in my throat, thick and scratchy, like I’ve swallowed the sun and it’s burning its way out. I sip my tea to keep it down, but it doesn’t help.
“Thanks for coming,” I whisper, voice cracking.
He reaches across the counter, his hand warm over mine. “You’re not alone, Mya. You’ve got me. No matter what.”
And maybe that’s the thing that breaks me.
Not the silence. Not the empty apartment. Not the memory of Fletch walking out.
It’s this—my dad, sitting across from me in a penthouse I don’t belong in, telling me I’m not alone while everything in me feels like it’s unraveling.
Because sometimes, love doesn’t sound like promises.
Sometimes it sounds like a coffee cup clinking against marble and a father saying ‘I’m here.’
“How long are you planning to stay in the city?” I ask, even though I’m not sure I want the answer.
Dad exhales hard through his nose, the kind of breath that sounds like it’s carrying more than just oxygen. Like it’s hauling guilt and grief and a thousand unsaid things.
“I don’t know,” he admits, scratching the back of his neck like the motion might buy him some courage. “A few days. A week. Longer if I have to.”
“If you have to?” I echo, my stomach lurching like I just missed a step on a staircase I thought was solid. “Why would you have to?”
He doesn’t meet my eyes. Instead, he looks past me, toward the rain smearing the window glass like watercolors left out in a storm. “Because I gave your mom an ultimatum.”
My mouth goes dry. “What kind of ultimatum?”
“She either apologizes to you and starts acting like a damn parent, or I move out.”
His words drop like stones in a still lake, rippling out, distorting everything I thought I knew about my parents and their perfect little bubble.
“Wait—what?”
“I’m serious, Mya.” He finally meets my eyes, and the sadness in his expression guts me like a fish. “I can’t sit back and pretend everything’s okay while she tears you down for something she doesn’t even try to understand.”
