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Olivia squeezes my hand one last time before opening the door, and I stand there until she disappears down the front walk. The instinct to follow her is ridiculous, but it still takes me a second to close the door because once I do, there’s nothing left between me and the conversation Dad promised we would have.
When I turn around, he’s watching me from the kitchen table. “You want coffee?”
“Is it finally time to talk this out?”
“Good morning to you too.”
I should probably appreciate that he’s trying to make this normal, but knowing why he’s still here makes it impossible to pretend this is any other morning. Dad pushes back from the table and takes his mug with him when he heads into the kitchen. I follow, leaning against the counter while he reaches into the cabinet for the same faded Valor mug I always use. He fills it, adds my cream without asking, and hands it to me.
“Thanks.”
I follow him back to the table. “Sit down, Bug.”
The nickname gets me moving when my feet suddenly don’t want to. I take the chair across from him and wait for him to speak. Dad doesn’t start talking right away. The longer the silence stretches, the harder it becomes not to search his face for some clue about what I'm about to get. He looks tired, every part of him pulled tight around everything he was trying not to say.
He takes a slow drink of coffee before setting the mug down. “I’m still angry, Calliope. I’m probably going to be angry for a while.”
I knew he was because two days isn’t enough to undo months of keeping something this important from him. I don’t expect it to be, but knowing that doesn’t stop the words from landing somewhere tender. The coffee is still too hot, but I take a sip anyway because it gives me something to do besides start apologizing again.
Dad’s eyes drop to my hands before coming back to my face. “Stop looking at me like you’re trying to figure out what my being angry means before I’ve even finished talking.”
“Can you blame me?”
“No, but you don’t have to wait for me to tell you we’re okay, Bug. I’m angry with you. I’m hurt that you didn’t tell me. But neither of those things changes the fact that you’re my daughter, and I love you.”
My eyes burn because I know he loves me. Dad has never made me earn that from him, but I’ve still spent the last two days braced for whatever his anger would take with it. Hearing him say it doesn’t take away what I did or make him less hurt, but something in my chest finally loosens enough for me to breathe.
“I don’t know how long it’s going to take me to get over the fact that you didn’t trust me with this.” His mouth pulls tight for a second. “I also know being scared and trusting someone aren’t mutually exclusive. I can understand and still wish you’d given me the chance to handle it better than you thought I would.”
Guilt presses beneath my ribs because that’s the part I can’t fix with another explanation. “I wish I had too.”
Dad nods, but he doesn’t tell me it’s okay. I want to ask anyway, to reach for the reassurance I’ve been waiting for since he found us outside, but I stop myself.
“You can still be mad at me,” I say, and my voice wobbles enough that I hate how much it costs to say it. “I won’t keep trying to make you be okay before you’re ready.”
“I’m not going anywhere, Bug.”
My throat closes around the breath I try to take, but this time I believe him. Dad holds my gaze for another second before reaching for his coffee, the tightness still lingering around his mouth even as he sits here with me.
“There was something else I wanted to ask you about.” He takes a drink, then sets his mug down. “How did you do on the MCAT?”
“I failed again.”
His face changes before I can look away, and the disappointment I expect to find isn’t there. It somehow makes my eyes burn worse. Dad’s hand moves across the table until his fingers close around mine. “I’m sorry, Bug.”
The pressure behind my eyes builds so fast I blink hard against it. “That’s it?”
“What else do you want me to say?”
“I don’t know.” A shaky laugh catches in my throat. “Maybe that’s the problem.”
His thumb moves once across my knuckles, but he doesn’t interrupt.
“I knew what happened after the first two times. I came home and changed how I was studying. I did everything I knew how to do differently, and I still failed.”
“I don’t know what I’m supposed to change this time.”
Dad watches me for a moment. “What do you want me to tell you, Bug?”
