So many ghosts.
If I fight Dad to stay with Marcus, Dad could have him arrested. He could go to jail like his brother-in-law. If I go with Dad, Marcus will be safe. So, there’s really only one road. One choice. No fork after all.
I manage to make it through my shift without cutting off a finger and go looking for Vicky after I clock out. I find her behind the bar.
“You off?” she asks, topping off the drink she’s making with soda water.
“I just clocked out.” My feet shuffle of their own accord and I pick at a fingernail. “I really appreciate you giving me this chance, Vicky, but I won’t be in tomorrow.”
Her eyebrows go up. “Saturday is our busiest night. I need a little more notice if you’re going to miss a shift.”
“It’s not just tomorrow,” I say with a cringe. “I won’t be back. I’m really sorry.”
She drops her rag on the bar. “You’re quitting?”
I nod. “My dad and I are going back to the Bay Area. I didn’t know until just before I got here.”
“He’s out of rehab?” she asks, her voice softer.
“Just this afternoon. He seems…okay mostly. Just a little on edge.”
Carol comes by and Vicky hands her the tray of drinks she was preparing. “You were learning the ropes quickly. The kitchen staff’s going to be sorry to hear you’re going.”
“I’m really sorry.”
She pulls the pen out from behind her ear and grabs her order pad. “Do you have an address? I’ll send your check.”
“Not yet,” I say with a shake of my head. “I’ll call you when I know where we’re going to be.”
She gives me a sad little nod then holds out her hand. “Good luck.”
I take it and shake. “Thanks.”
I push out the door onto the sidewalk and look down the street in the direction of Marcus’s apartment. I could go and tell him I’m leaving. We could have this one night. But would I ever be able to walk away then? And if I couldn’t…if I stayed with him, I don’t even want to imagine how ugly that would get.
So I turn for home.
Becky is mopping the kitchen floor when I walk in the door. I’ve discovered in the last few weeks she’s a stress cleaner. And she’s obviously stressed, because she’s in the process of scrubbing a hole in the tile.
“I’m going to pack,” I say, heading straight to my room.
Becky looks up at me, then goes back to mopping.
Dad’s bedroom door is closed when I pass, and I think about knocking. But what would I say? I’m not ready to confront him about Becky yet, so I head to my room.
I don’t have much, just my clothes, Mom’s laptop, and a few books, and a small box full of random things, so it doesn’t take long to shove most of it in Mom’s old roll-away. When she was alive, it was always open on the floor in the corner of the bedroom. When she wasn’t writing, she was traveling on book tour, so she kept some basic things packed. Dad drank more when she was gone. I remember hating that.
I schlep to the bathroom and get in the shower. I’m drying off when a fist pounding on the front door sends my heart leaping into my throat.
Chapter 23
Marcus
I race up to the bar, a little out of breath, and am disappointed to find Vicky there instead of Bran. It just means I’ll have to be more subtle.
I’d planned to give Addie some space and not lurk at Sam Hill while she worked tonight, but in the end, I couldn’t do it. I sprinted down here, hoping to catch her before she leaves.
“Hey, Vicky,” I say, sliding onto a stool. I look through the window in the door to the kitchen, but don’t see Addie. “Kitchen still open?”
She sets a bar napkin down in front of me and starts pouring my beer. “Jeff’s still back there. I’ll have him pull together a burger for you.”
“Thanks,” I say as she thunks my beer down in front of me. “Bran wasn’t home. Thought he’d be here.”
She gives her head a shake. “Don’t know where he is. He just said he needed tonight off.”
“Just so you know,” I say, my eyes migrating back to the kitchen door, “you probably cost Oak Crest a water polo State Championship this year.”
“How could I possibly have done that?”
I bring my gaze back to her when I still don’t see Addie, frustration rising inside me like a wave. “Bruce’s daughter. You hired her off my team. She’s the best right wing I’ve ever seen.”
She huffs out a laugh. “I don’t know why you’d care, considering the way they’re treating you. And besides, the team would have been short their right wing either way. She just quit cold. Left me scrambling to cover tomorrow night.”
A stone drops in my stomach and my eyes shoot back to the kitchen door. “What?”
“I guess Bruce just got cleaned up and decided to move them back where they came from.”
Everything in me erupts in a fountain of need and I bound off the stool. “She’s already gone?”