Letter Twenty #2
“What about that girl who looked like my mom?” I asked. “The one Libby said you used to flirt with at the bar? Did you ever hook up with her?”
“Elliot,” Nic said sternly. “These questions are extremely invasive—not to mention none of your business.”
“Actually, Nic,” Libby said, gripping my dad on the shoulder so he’d stop talking, “I’d also like to know the answer to this question. That girl was absolutely gorgeous. Did you ever do more than flirt with her, John?”
John folded his arms over a navy robe and heather blue t-shirt. “She and I might’ve hung out some that summer before sophomore year of college.”
“Oh, really?” Libby said. “And by hanging out, you mean…”
John smiled. “Libby, you’d just broken up with me, and Nic had run off to Europe with Victoria for the summer. I was all alone. I got bored.”
“I bet you did,” Libby said, narrowing her gaze at him. Then she leaned back, eyes big. “Wait a minute. So you hung out with this girl—for an entire summer—and you don’t remember her name?”
“I never said that,” John said.
“You did, actually,” I said, more than happy to remind him. “Last summer, you said you didn’t remember her name.”
John smiled tightly, rubbing at his jaw.
“Look, I don’t see why it matters now, but her name was Cassandra, okay?
Sweet girl. Easy to talk to. We had a good time, but it wasn’t”—he paused, rubbed his face again, cleared his throat—“it wasn’t all that serious.
” Or so he claimed, but I definitely caught a wistful expression flash across his face as he lifted his coffee cup. “Can we drop this, please?”
But I couldn’t. Something about that conversation niggled at me, long after my dad had changed the subject. And, anyway, it did matter. Because you mattered. You were the six-foot-two consequence who sat near him at brunch on Sundays and longed to be recognized as his son.
After breakfast, I texted you: Wish you were here.
You responded quickly. So do I.
Heart pounding, I typed: Do you have any idea how much you matter to me?
You replied, Oh, no. What’s happened? Have you suffered a concussion already?
I rolled my eyes. Can a girl not tell a guy how much he matters to her without him thinking she has a head injury?
You said, Not this girl. This girl only strokes my ego after one of us has done something bad.
I smiled at that. I really miss you.
Your reply brought tears to my eyes: I miss you more.
I texted Michael next: I miss you.
He replied: I miss you, too.
What’s his family like? I asked.
The sister’s pretty cool, Michael replied. But the dad’s a piece of shit. I hate the guy.
Why? I asked.
The way he talks to Casey, Michael said. The way he looks at him. Casey’s constantly doing nice stuff for him and he’s a total dick about it.
I felt my blood boil. Is he being nice to you?
Michael replied: Not really. He asked if I was Casey’s boyfriend. Like the idea repulsed him.
I pressed my lips together, eyebrows lifting at that. What about Rhys?
Michael typed back: He’s pretty cute. Smart and funny for someone so tiny. He loves Casey. You’d die if you saw them together. He added a rolling eyes emoji to the end, which made me smile.
It wasn’t until much later—as I lay awake in bed that night, thinking about John’s summer fling with the dark-haired girl who looked like my mom—that it finally hit me. You know what’s short for Cassandra?
Your name.
Casey.
Plus: I found a pregnancy conception calculator online, typed in your birthday, and guess what else? You were conceived in the summer. In my birth month, actually. In July.
And that’s when I knew: the dark-haired girl in the picture with my mom was definitely your mother.
A few days later, I’d come in from the beach when Bree stopped me in the hallway between our rooms.
“Hey,” she said. “You want to go shopping with me, Amber, and my mom?”
“No, thanks.” I tried slipping past her, but she stepped in my path.
“Why are you being like this?”
“Like what?”
“You’ve been avoiding us since we got here. You never want to hang out. Amber thinks you don’t like her.”
“So? She’s going to Stanford in the fall, and you’ll never see her again.”
“It’s not like I’ll never see her. Her parents live in Boston.”
“But this relationship ends when she leaves, right?”
“So?”
“So, again, why do you care what she thinks?”
“She thinks you’re jealous of her.”
I laughed. “Of Amber? No. But I don’t appreciate having to hear you two together at night, so if you could keep it down from now on? That would be nice.”
Finally free of Bree, I showered and dressed and braided my hair, then walked down to the kitchen for a snack.
By that time, Libby and the girls had left, leaving me alone with my dad and John.
They’d been kicked back on the couch all morning, sitting close, lingering over their second cups of coffee.
My dad flipped through issues of The Economist and Harvard Business Review while John started a new book I hadn’t sliced the pages out of yet.
I’d almost escaped to the sunroom with my snack when John lowered his book and said, “Elliot, can we talk?”
Clutching a bag of salt-and-vinegar chips, I paused in front of the coffee table. “I’d rather not, actually.”
Nic tossed his magazine aside. “We need to have another conversation about this Michael stuff.”
“You mean where I innocently made out with a guy, then you two shipped him off to a different country to put him as far away from me as possible?”
“Listen,” John said, removing his reading glasses. “Casey needs Michael more than we do right now. You understand that, right?”
“Of course,” I said. “I just want you to admit Casey’s family issues worked to your advantage—and you seized the opportunity to separate us.”
John leaned over his lap, hands folded in front of his mouth. “I think you and Michael could use some time apart, yes. I don’t approve of what went on here last summer.”
“Because I’m not good enough for your son.”
“I never said that. I said you aren’t good for each other.”
“You said, ‘This one’s a hard no. There are hundreds of eligible girls in this city, but this one’s off limits.’ And what you obviously meant by that was: this one’s a hard no because she stabbed you. Because she’s dangerous. Because she’s crazy.”
John’s expression softened. “Elliot, I didn’t mean it that way at all.”
“Then why would you say it like that?” I demanded, voice wobbling around the words.
“Elliot,” Nic said, eyeing me warily.
“You think I’m crazy, too, Dad. That’s why I’m almost nineteen, and you’ve never allowed me to have a boyfriend.
Bree gets to have her girlfriend here, and they’re up there going at it every night—I have to hear it.
If Michael were here, and he wanted to bring his bitch ex-girlfriend for the summer, that would be allowed, too. ”
“No, it wouldn’t,” Nic rushed to say, gaze flashing. “Sienna isn’t allowed on any property of mine.”
“Fine. If Michael wanted to bring a girl other than Sienna here, it would be allowed. If Casey were here, and he wanted to bring someone different back to his room every night? Also allowed. But me? I’m not allowed dating privileges at all. Because I’m too messed up, right?”
John said, “Elliot—”
“Can’t let Elliot have anyone. Have to keep Elliot locked up tight. Everyone’s in on it. Everyone agrees.”
“Honey,” Nic said softly. “No one thinks you’re crazy.”
“Dad, you threatened to send me to a psychiatric hospital after what I did to Sienna, then you talked me into putting off college this fall. And I just want to know why. I want an honest answer—not some bullshit about me needing a break or having a rough year. The actual reason.”
I glanced between my dad and John, both of whom gazed back at me with twin expressions of undisguised sympathy on their faces. Expressions that, quite frankly, destroyed me. With those looks, it felt like they were saying, I know it’s hard, but it has to be this way.
It felt like they were too afraid to say the truth out loud: It has to be this way, because you are crazy. You are dangerous.
My voice broke as I said, “No one wants to say it. No one’s brave enough to come out and say it.”
“Elliot,” John said gently. “Sometimes, parents make decisions for their children that don’t seem fair or make sense. Someday, you’ll understand your dad’s just trying to do what’s best for you.”
“What a bullshit thing to say, John. What a complete dismissal of my feelings. What—you, too? You don’t see anything wrong with my life? I don’t see you locking up your children or preventing them from having anything—unless what they want is me. Admit it already: you think I’m crazy.”
John shook his head. “I don’t think that.”
“I’ve been messing with you since we got here.”
“I know you have, Elliot.”
“And you don’t think that’s crazy?”
“You’re angry. I get it. I can see how the words I chose that night were hurtful to you, and I definitely could’ve chosen a better way to get my point across.”
“But you didn’t,” I said. “You chose the harshest words possible, and the worst part is, you didn’t bother to check on me afterward to see if I was okay.
Typically, you’re one of the few people I can count on to take my feelings into consideration, but this time, it seemed like you didn’t care how I felt at all. ”
“You’re right,” John said. “I never apologized for hurting your feelings, and there’s no excuse for that. I never meant to imply you’re unworthy of Michael. What I meant was: there are better people out there for both of you, and you’re better off as friends.”
John’s attempt to smooth things over had come too late. I was far too angry. I’d grown used to my dad making me feel bad about myself, but not John. It had hurt more coming from him, and I couldn’t let it go.
“We were snowed in for days,” I reminded him. “You had plenty of opportunities to take me aside and say this stuff then, and you chose not to. It feels like you’re only saying it now to keep me from losing it.”
I tossed the bag of chips on the table, not hungry anymore, already walking away.
“Where are you going?” Nic asked.