“I have to go pee,” I mutter, about to stand up. I can imagine the sheer horror on my father’s face. On my mother’s. I don’t think I can ever confront them.
Lo grabs my wrist before I rise from the couch. “You shouldn’t be alone right now.”
“I just have to pee,” I tell him again, tugging his hand off me.
He gives me a look like do you really?
No, I don’t. I want to cry in solitude. I guess he knows this, and I understand his fear that I’ll avoid my emotions with self-love like I’ve done in the past.
It’s tempting.
I stay put and stuff my face into a pillow. The news replays in my head again, and I’m on the verge of tears once more.
“Hey, Lily.” Ryke comes over and nudges my side. “I don’t want to talk to my mom, so how about we play cards?” He glances to Lo. “And you need to talk to your therapist.”
“I can stay here.”
Ryke gives him a firm look.
He sighs, resigning more easily than normal. I must have drained him of energy. Lo rises and disappears to the bathroom.
“Lily? Cards?” He pulls out the deck from his pocket and shuffles.
I lower my pillow, sensing his tactics to distract me. “What kind of card game?”
“Whatever you want.”
“Go Fish.”
He looks like I’ve almost stabbed his soul.
“You said whatever I want,” I remind him, trying to wipe silent tears that keep falling against my will. I need permanent tissues stuck to my tear ducts. Like when you staunch a bloody nose. Would it work?
“That’s not even a two-person game,” Ryke tells me.
“But it’s still possible to play with two people.” I want the distraction without having to bust my brain learning a new game.
“Fine,” he says, relenting when I sit on the floor since there’s no coffee table. He deals the cards on the carpet, and I try not to dampen them with my tears.
“We’re flying over Georgia right now,” I hear Daisy say. “We shouldn’t be long.” Her voice shakes really badly. I don’t like that she’s talking to our parents first.
Ryke’s concerned gaze flits between Daisy and his cards. “Do you have a king?”
“Go Fish.”
“Lily’s taking a nap,” Daisy says.
Ryke picks up a card and then kicks my knee. “Your turn.” Right.
“Do you have a…” I stare at my cards. “An eight?” I look at the bathroom door, not hearing a peep from Lo. But he leaves the door cracked so we know he’s not doing something rash, like chugging alcohol or…worse. My chest hurts, like someone decided to stand on my diaphragm.
Ryke hands me his eight and grumbles under his breath about how this is the stupidest fucking game. But he’s partially concentrated on my sister in the corner.
“I can’t wake her up,” Daisy says, her voice growing more frantic and low. “Wait, please…I don’t want to…Mom.”
Ryke stands up before I can find the strength to put weight on my gelatin legs. He goes over to the four-chair alcove. He has to lean over a glowering Melissa to reach Daisy. “Give me the phone,” he whispers, but I can still hear his hostile voice.
“Mom,” Daisy says. “I have to go…But…I…Wait…I…”
Ryke grabs the phone from her before she has a breakdown. And at the same time, Rose is halfway across the plane aisle, her eyes dead-set on me with so much confidence and power that I immediately wish I was her. Strong and built like a fortress—able to withstand anything that’s thrown at me.
I meet her gaze, but I point to Ryke who now clutches my mother—or the phone that contains my mother. Rose understands. She grabs Daisy’s cell from him and immediately goes into crisis management mode.
“Mother, calm down. No,” she snaps. “No.” And that’s all I hear as she struts back to the cabin to talk in private. She said the one word that Daisy couldn’t.
I’m not sure I could either.
Daisy stares out the window. Ryke whispers something to her, and she just nods and gestures to me.
Ryke comes back to the floor, collecting his cards and fanning them in his hands. “It’s my turn, I think,” he says. “Do you have a ten?”
“Ryke?”
“Yeah?”
“Whatever happens, you’ll take care of him, right?”
He goes rigid. “I don’t know what that fucking means.”