Chapter 41
Even though I’d overheard Michael say that me and my daddy issues were temporary in Elijah’s life, I still found myself at his door an hour after dropping off the meds and groceries back at home.
I still wasn’t sure if he knew that Dr. Franklin was a fake, but the longer he had to prepare a lie, the better that lie would be.
Maybe my mom had always been right, Elijah and Michael were just like my father.
Michael had probably immediately warned Elijah. I should’ve instantly told Tara too. Giving Michael twenty-four hours to perfect his story wasn’t a good idea. But I was still reeling.
I took a deep breath and knocked on his door.
Elijah opened the door with a smile, shirtless and wearing a pair of athletic shorts. “You changed your mind.” I could feel every emotion—anger, shock, sadness, fury—written on my face and his smile disappeared. “What’s wrong? Is your mom okay?”
“She’s fine. Can I come in?”
He held open the door. “Of course, come in. I wasn’t expecting you, so don’t judge me.
” He picked up a few cups from the coffee table and a shirt from the back of the couch and walked to the connecting kitchen.
The room was dim, the paused television providing a hazy glow.
He flipped on a few lights as he walked back toward me, pulling on his shirt. “Do you want to sit?”
The room was nice, cozy—a large couch and an oversized chair in warm colors. Big, beautiful nature photographs hung on the walls. Unlike the black-and-white at his parents’ house, these were in vibrant color.
“Yes,” I said, sinking into the couch. He sat next to me, but then I popped right back up, unable to sit. My chest hurt, and it felt like I needed to keep moving or I would implode.
“Talk to me,” he said. “Does this have to do with your text? I responded. You never wrote back.”
He’d responded? I hadn’t even looked at my phone since hanging up with my dad. Where was my phone? Still in the car?
I shook my head. “I saw Michael at the store. Did he tell you?”
“No,” Elijah said, a wariness in his voice. “Was he being stupid?”
I thought about the things he and Fake Dr. Franklin were talking about.
How I was temporary. That’s what Elijah had told him, obviously, if Michael was repeating it.
I was temporary. He didn’t want a long-distance, scheduled relationship with me.
What was I even doing here? “He was with Dr. Franklin.”
Elijah’s brows went down, his eyes squinting in thought. “What do you mean? He decided to do therapy?”
Was he trying to come up with an excuse? I wouldn’t let him think about it any longer. “No, he didn’t. She wasn’t actually Dr. Franklin.”
“What?” He was confused.
“Dr. Franklin, the person we know as Dr. Franklin, isn’t actually a doctor. She was posing as her sister and Michael was hanging out with her, talking about us.”
He was silent for a moment, maybe trying to piece together what I had just said.
“Did you know all this? Did you know she wasn’t a therapist?”
“What? No.”
“Did you know Michael knew her?”
“Michael knew her?”
“Yes,” I said. “They were hanging out like friends. Just now.”
“I didn’t know. I swear.”
“He wanted to win the bet. He knew her sister was a therapist. He somehow convinced this woman to impersonate her own sister.” At least that was my theory. It was a damn good one. Really the only possible one.
He shook his head. “That competitive asshole.”
“I find it hard to believe that you two don’t know the same people.”
“It’s probably one of his college friends. We didn’t go to the same one.” A smirk was coming onto his face as if he found this all funny as well.
“She lied to us,” I said.
“We were lying to her too.”
“I told Michael I’d give him twenty-four hours to tell Tara he lied, but I’m going to tell her now.”
“Wait, what?”
“So he doesn’t have time to spin this.”
“Spin it?”
“Use his pretty words and his charm to make it seem less serious than it is.”
Elijah stood up and walked to where I was pacing on the far side of the coffee table. He grabbed my arm as I passed him and pulled me against his chest. “I thought we were going to stay out of their relationship from now on.”
I narrowed my eyes at him. “You don’t want to tell Tara at all? You want to let your brother get away with this?”
“Get away with what exactly?”
“Making us go to therapy so he could get out of it. He obviously needs some serious therapy. Why aren’t you mad about this?”
“His prank is what brought us together, so it’s hard for me to be mad.”
“I talked about some really personal things there. To someone not even qualified to hear them. And now she’s telling Michael about them.”
He smoothed some hair away from my face. “What makes you think she’s telling other people?”
“I overheard her.”
He kissed my cheek. “I’m sure she didn’t mean to.”
I pulled back, creating space between us. “Why would you be sure about that?”
“I guess I just like to think the best of people.”
“Even when they’ve done something completely wrong?”
“Babe, babe, babe.” He widened his stance so he could be closer to my level and looked me in the eyes. He ran his hands over my shoulders. His charming smile was on his face as though trying to appease me. “You’re taking this so seriously.”
God, those words felt so patronizing.
“You’re right, why would I take anything about us seriously? We’re just short term, right? I can’t believe I let myself fall for a sweet talker.” I whirled around and marched for the door. “I’m telling Tara.”
“Fine, tell her,” he snapped. “Because why not destroy everything in your wake on your way out of town?”
I grabbed the door handle but didn’t open the door. “It’s important to go into a relationship with your eyes wide open. She deserves that.”
“Maybe she’s not constantly looking for reasons not to trust people, like you are. She probably won’t even care about this as much as you do.”
“If she doesn’t, it’s only because she didn’t just waste a month of her life!” Something feral came over me, and I reached into my purse, fished out the dirty napkin, and flung it at him. Then I threw open the door and left.
I felt crazy, mad with rage or grief or something, as I pulled back into the driveway at home. When I walked in the front door, the first thing I saw was my mom slumped over on the couch. As if she’d been sitting, but now her head was at an uncomfortable angle on the armrest.
“Mom,” I said. “Are you okay?”
There was no response. I rushed forward and shook her shoulder. “Mom.”
She moaned. “Cold.”
“You’re cold?” I pulled the blanket off the back of the couch and wrapped it around her shoulders. As I did, my hand brushed the back of her neck, which was burning hot. I felt her forehead. Also hot.
“Hold on to me. I’m going to make you more comfortable, then call the doctor.”
“You shouldn’t have left me,” she said. “I wouldn’t be sick if you hadn’t left me for so long with nobody.”
“I’m sorry,” I said, guilt pouring through me.
I’d placed a cold compress on my mom’s head and given her some ibuprofen per the doctor’s instructions.
If the fever didn’t break by the morning or rose over one hundred three, I was supposed to take her to the hospital.
Right now, several hours later, it was still hanging steady at one hundred two.
“Does anything specific hurt?” I asked her now as she blinked awake from a short nap.
“My leg,” she said.
I inspected her leg, which was still in a cast, but her foot and the skin around her knee all seemed to be the right color.
No signs of an infection or anything. I took the cloth off her forehead to rewet it.
I brought it back and draped it onto her hot skin.
Her hand reached up and grabbed hold of my wrist. I sat down on the floor next to the couch, allowing her to hold my wrist in her grip. “Do you need water? Or some food?”
“No,” she said. “Your father called yesterday.”
I took in a shallow breath. I wasn’t going to tell her Dad called. Not after our conversation that went nowhere. I hadn’t realized he’d called her too, however. “Oh, yeah?” I asked.
“He said he might come,” she said.
I closed my eyes. I wanted to kill him. “And … do you think he will?” I asked softly.
“No,” she said. A tear escaped from the corner of her eye and ran down her temple.
“I think you were right about Elijah,” I said in response.
“He says whatever it takes to make everyone happy, even if he doesn’t mean it.
” Like Dad, I didn’t add. I still wondered how much of what Elijah had said was a lie.
Had he known the woman pretending to be Dr. Franklin before our sessions? Had he known Michael knew her?
“I told you,” Mom said.
I laid my head on a small patch of cushion next to her arm. “You did.”
I’d dimmed the lights during her nap, and an overhead fan spun on its lowest setting above us. The breeze tickled the small hairs on the back of my neck that had escaped the ponytail I’d pulled my hair into earlier. The cushion smelled of the lavender laundry detergent we used.
After several moments of silence, Mom drew in a breath. “I’m angry all the time.”
“I know,” I said. Maybe it was taking until now to realize that’s exactly what it was, this distance between my mom and me.
She’d been angry for fifteen years, and I’d been the nearest target.
I wondered if this was the closest thing I’d ever get to an apology from her.
“I’m mad at him too.” And by him, in this instance, I meant my father.
She gently patted my head. “You’ll be okay.”
“So will you.”