“I just went to my first AA meeting tonight.” He rubs a hand over the scruff on his chin. “I want to do this, Addie.” His eyes find mine again. “For you. For her. For all of us.”
There’s a second I can’t inhale. That’s the last thing I ever expected him to say. “Dad, that’s…I don’t even know what to say.”
Dad gets up and retrieves his soup from the microwave, then takes it back to the table with a spoon. I find my senses enough to bring him his bread and the glass of water.
“How did the meeting go?” I ask as he slurps.
He looks at me. “It’s going to be hard, but I have to get my life back.”
“Thank you, Dad.”
He tears off a hunk of bread and dips it in his soup. “This is just like Maggie’s.”
My heart dies a little more at the sound of Mom’s name. I sink into my seat and watch him devour his dinner.
When he’s done, he looks up at me. “Do you have any idea how much like your mother you are?”
I shake my head because it’s not true. I never would have been strong enough to survive what she went through.
“You remind me so much of her,” he says, reaching across the table and tugging on one of my corkscrew curls. It springs back when he lets go and brings his hand to his face. I realize it’s to wipe away the tear that rolls down his cheek. “I miss her so much.”
That’s all I can take. As hard as it was when he blamed me, this is harder.
I stand and move toward the door. “I need to run out for milk,” I say. Honestly, I don’t remember for sure whether or not there’s milk in the fridge, but I doubt Becky forgot it when she shopped. I back toward the door. “Is there anything you need?”
“Just my family back, Addie.” He pulls himself to his feet and scrubs his sleeve under his eyes. “Just you.”
I bolt out the door without even taking a minute to slip on my flip flops. My heart is pounding like I’ve swum a mile, and my head spins from lack of oxygen. Once I’m around the corner, I support myself from falling over with my hands on my knees and suck in a few deep breaths.
When I’ve got my legs again, I walk with no real clue where I mean to go. Where I end up is school. It’s after nine and I expect the gate to the pool to be locked, but it’s not. There’s a lone figure, cutting at a fish-like pace through the water.
Marcus.
I go to my locker and change, and when I come out, if anything, Marcus’s pace has quickened. I dive into the lane next to him as he’s making the flip on the other end. When I pass him near the midpoint of the pool, I see him breathe my direction.
I turn and swim back to the blocks and find he’s pulled himself out of the water and sits at the end of my lane. I hear him yell something, but I don’t slow down.
I can’t.
But as I reach for the wall on my next lap, preparing to flip turn, his hand brushes along my side. His touch rips through me like white-hot lightning and I inhale a lungful of water.
Marcus hooks his arms under mine and moves me to the edge, pressing my back against the cool tile as I cough. “You all right?”
When I can finally speak, I glare at him. “I was okay right up until you tried to drown me!”
“I was hoping to keep you from drowning, actually. You’re not cleared by your doctor to be in the pool yet.”
“I’m fine.” Between the swimming, the coughing, and the fact that Marcus still has me in his arms, I’m so winded I can’t get any breath behind it, so the lie doesn’t come out sounding anywhere near as convincing as I mean it to.
He cocks his head and one dark eyebrow raises. “Is it something you want to talk about?”
“What?”
His expression softens and his gaze sinks through mine as he lifts his hand and pushes the wet hair off my forehead. “Whatever demon it is you’re trying to out-swim.”
The water is suddenly electrified. His knee presses between my thighs, his hand rests on my ribcage, his fingers still caress my forehead, and everywhere he’s touching me buzzes with the current.
“No,” I say. I don’t even know where I’d start if I did. I’m still trying to process everything Dad told me.
“Okay.” He lets me go, and I feel as though I’ve been thrown in an ice bath, all the electric heat instantly gone. “I’ll respect that. All I’ll add is, if it’s about your dad, I totally get it.”
I want to press into his arms again, but I feel something black and ugly rising up from my core. So I do what I always do when I feel like this. I lash out.
“You don’t get anything.”
“I get drunk dads.” His voice is low, and I feel his gaze penetrating my armor.
“It’s not that.” I shake my head to free myself from his eyes. “I don’t want to talk about it.”
His full lips press into a line as he bobs a small nod. “Okay. I’ll leave it alone.”
I dip under the water to wash the hair back from my face, then pull myself up to sit on the edge. “Why are you here so late?”
“Didn’t need to be at the gym tonight, and this is where I come when I need to blow off some steam.”
“I thought you had a date.”