She forced a smile into her voice. “Yep! Just fine.”
“You always call on Sunday afternoons. I’m surprised to hear from you today.”
Oh. So that was why. She frowned. It was one thing to have a routine, but…that just made her sound…rigid.
She never regretted calling her parents, but for the first time, she found herself wishing she hadn’t picked up the phone. The realization made her feel slightly ill. Was this feeling another result of Chris’s influence?
No. That’s not fair. You did this all on your own.
But there was still the way that Chris made her feel with just a look…liquid and breathless. That was why she still needed to be careful around him.
She forced her voice to remain calm. “No, that’s okay. I just called to—” To get my bearings. To stop this questioning that I’ve been alone with for the past few hours. “To say hi. Nothing in particular.”
There was a weird beat of silence, but then Dad spoke again. “Well. It’s a really nice surprise. I’m always happy when you call. We haven’t heard from Kieu in a while, though. Have you talked to her recently?”
Minh seized on the topic with relief. Hadn’t she just been thinking that she didn’t need to add to Mom and Dad’s troubles about their kids? “No. It’s been a few weeks.”
Thinking about her last conversation with her sister reminded Minh why she kept all those lists and followed all those rules, in the first place. One misstep, and look what she had done to Kieu. Now her baby sister spent her time strung out, hanging around with the wrong kind of guys…
Wrong, just like Chris. Why did you say you’d audition for his movie? You’re making a mistake.
She pushed the thought away. She’d be fine. She’d been controlling herself for six years. She could withstand a temporary attraction to a guy who wasn’t even her type. Because temporary was all it was.
“Mom wants to go to New York and see if she can talk some sense into Kieu. Get her back on track.”
Sense. Of course. Getting out of that toxic lifestyle made sense. The only way to do that was to get back on the straight and narrow track that Kieu had fallen off of. The one that Minh had pushed her off of.
“I’m sorry, Dad. I’m sorry for you and Mom. And for Kieu too.”
Dad’s sigh came through the phone, heavy and tired. “I am, too. But I’m proud of you. I don’t have to worry about you, and I’m-I’m really grateful for that. You’ve done well for yourself.”
Guilt rose up, trying to close up Minh’s throat. She’d never told her Dad about that night, when she’d snuck Kieu into one of Richard’s parties. That had been the beginning of everything bad. And yet, she couldn’t bring herself to confess it. Not now.
“Listen, your mom is calling me to come help her move some bush or something. I’ll talk to you tomorrow afternoon, right? Two o’clock?”
Minh gripped the phone tightly and nodded. “On the dot. Love you, Dad.”
“I love you too, Minh.”
The line went silent, then, and Minh dropped the phone on her bed, feeling even more confused than before. She felt heartsick over her baby sister and still uncertain about her own life. Wasn’t this how her rebellion had started, all those years ago? In confusion and doubt? Richard had come from a conservative, well-to-do family. They’d met in a music theory class at the conservatory where she’d gone after high school, and she’d fallen hard for his preppy boy looks and reserved manner.
But she’d let those things blind her to how hard he pushed her out of her comfort zone. She’d spent her entire childhood trying to conform so that at first, it had been thrilling, having someone encourage her to be different and wild. He did it so quietly and expertly that didn’t even notice how brash she was becoming. Ignoring instructions, composing whatever she wanted instead of what she was supposed to be handing in for her assignments. When one professor warned her that she’d fail his class if she didn’t follow directions, Richard had told her that the entire faculty was just jealous of how gifted she was, and that he knew a famous movie producer who’d love to hear her work, who was going to be at a party one weekend. If she got in to the industry, she wouldn’t even need school anymore.
She’d been too far off the path by then to realize what a fool she’d been. She’d been crazy about Richard and the way he’d inspired her, and she thumbed her nose at everything her parents had taught her about the dangers of risk.
When Kieu had begged Minh to take her along to the party, she hadn’t thought twice. That was the night everything had fell apart.
That was the night Minh learned that her parents had been right all along.