“But you weren’t going to deal with it,” I said. “Did you see how angry he got? He knows he’s not her real father. Maybe that has something to do with—”
“He is her real father,” Nicholas said, “in every way that matters. You’re still here so that I can find out what happened to Danny. That’s it. Leave Mia out of it.”
“You can’t assume the two things aren’t related,” I said. “Two huge secrets like that.”
“Everyone has secrets,” he said, “and neither of my parents would kill their son over something like that. It doesn’t make any sense.”
I thought Nicholas was wrong—people were capable of darker stuff than he imagined when pushed—but I also thought Jessica and Robert were probably innocent and didn’t want to risk provoking him any further, so I dropped it.
We climbed back into the car, which was sweltering after baking under the sun for an hour. Nicholas rolled down the windows and blasted the AC, and soon we were on the freeway headed south to Hidden Hills. I replayed the visit in my head as we drove, looking for any clues I might have missed. We were nearly home when I remembered an odd moment in the conversation. I turned to Nicholas, who had spent most of the drive staring silently out at the road in front of him.
“Hey, what did your dad mean about being excited for next year?” I asked.
Nicholas didn’t look at me. “Nothing.”
“Oh, come on,” I said. “I know it was something.”
He sighed. “Fine. But you can’t tell anyone.”
I gave him a look. “I can keep a secret.”
“I’m going away to college,” he said.
I frowned. “Yeah, but that’s not until—”
“Next fall,” he said. “I’m graduating early. I’ll have all my credits by the end of the semester, and I already got into NYU.”
“I didn’t know that,” I said.
“No one does. Just my dad,” he said. “And I only told him so that he’d have the accountant unlock my trust early so I can pay for it.”
“Why?” I asked.
“Because I’m sick of that school and my family and this place,” he said, “and I didn’t want to argue with anyone about it. It’s my life. It’s my decision.”
“When are you going to tell them?” I asked.
He shrugged. “Whenever I absolutely have to.”
I imagined what a bombshell it would be for everyone. The Tates were fucked up on a lot of levels, but they were also close-knit. For them to suddenly lose another person—even if it was only in a temporary way, just to the other side of the country—would rock them.
“You . . . don’t think that’s a little selfish?” I asked. I knew it was stupid to antagonize him when he held my life in his hands, but I didn’t care.
He turned his head and stared at me.
“I mean, it’s your life, do whatever you want,” I said, “but I don’t get why you’d want to hurt your family on purpose like that.”
“I don’t think you get to criticize me for hurting my family with a straight face. What the hell does it even matter to you?” he said.
“I care about them.” I saw a brief flash of my mother as she was the last moment I saw her, with a phone pressed to her ear, dry-eyed and stone-faced. “You have no idea how lucky you are, to have a family like yours.”
Nicholas laughed and his fingers dug into the steering wheel. “A family like mine? If you and I are right, one of them murdered my brother. A little boy who, yeah, was a pain in the ass but was just a little boy. More are lying to cover up for that person with no regard for how much it hurts the rest of us. How’s my dad going to feel when he finds out the truth? Or Mia? They’ll have to go through losing Danny all over again. This family is poisonous, and I’m just trying to get out while I still can.”
“But you didn’t know any of that when you decided to leave without telling them,” I said.
“I didn’t need to. They’ve done plenty of other things.”
“But they love you,” I said.
“It’s not enough.” He gave me a dumbfounded look. “Where can you be from that you think some ingrained, biological imperative to ‘love’ me is enough to excuse what they’ve done?”
“It’s not an imperative.” Something inside of me was cracking and breaking loose, like a calving glacier. “Maybe it seems like it to you, but not everyone loves their family.”
He was quiet for a moment. Then he said, “They didn’t love you?”
“It was only really my mother,” I said, “and no.”
“I guess I knew that,” he said. “Otherwise you wouldn’t have ended up here, would you?”
I thought about the first time I ran away from home, how they’d put me into a temporary care home until they could locate my family. The adults fed me and patted me on the arm and talked to me in kind tones. A kid there taught me a card game and another lent me an extra pair of socks when my feet got cold. When my mother finally came to collect me, I screamed my throat raw and broke two fingers punching a wall. That was the day I learned: Don’t give them your name, because then they can’t call anyone to come take you away.
“I guess not,” I said.
“How bad was it?” he asked.
I shifted in my seat. It was weird, talking about myself. “Pretty bad.”
Nicholas cocked his head at me.
“I think that’s the first time I’ve ever completely believed anything that’s come out of your mouth,” he said.
? ? ?
At dinner that night, over Vietnamese takeout, Lex asked us how school had been.
Nicholas shrugged. “It was okay.”
“Danny?” Lex asked.
“Yeah,” I said. “Fine.”
“So, nothing unusual?”
Nicholas sighed and lowered his chopsticks. “They called you.”
“Yes, they did,” she said. “Where the hell were you two?”
“Nowhere special,” Nicholas said. “We just didn’t feel like school. You gonna ground us, Mom?”
“Just don’t take off like that without telling anyone, okay?” Lex said. “I was worried.”
“Well, we’re fine,” he said.
“Why can’t I skip school when I don’t feel like it?” Mia asked.
I vaguely registered the sound of the front door opening.
“You want to answer that one?” Lex asked Nicholas.
“Because, Mimi,” he said, “your school isn’t an exercise in pointless, torturous futility.”
“Hey, guys,” Patrick said as he entered the dining room.
“Hey,” Lex replied with the surprise we all felt. It was Monday; Patrick never came over on Mondays.
“Lexi, can I talk to you for a sec?” he said. He sounded weird. Overly casual.
“Yeah, okay, just let me—”
“What is futility?” Mia asked.
“High school. Eat your pho.” Nicholas turned to Patrick. “What’s going on?”
“It’s nothing,” Patrick said.
Nicholas’s phone started to ring.
“Do I have to eat this?” Mia asked Lex. “I just want some cereal.”
“Hey, can I call you later?” Nicholas said into the phone.
“Try three bites,” Lex said.
“Lexi,” Patrick said. “I really need—”