When We Were Magic by Sarah Gailey (novels to read txt) 📗

the phone at midnight when one of the girls is having a crisis. They’ve both told me a few times that they think it’s great that I have such a strong “support network,” whatever that means. This lie should make everything better, should make Pop’s heavy brows do a dance of sympathetic approval. But for some reason, they’re both looking at me like I just told them I skipped fifth period to enjoy a late picnic lunch on the surface of the moon.

“Try again,” Pop says, and he holds up his phone. He angles the screen toward me, and I see a text message.

From Iris.

Hey sorry to bother you but is Alexis ok?

My father’s response: Yeah, how come?

Oh just haven’t seen her since lunch and didn’t know if she was sick or something, sorry, thanks

“I called the school to find out if you’d been in class, and they said you were absent for fifth and sixth period.” Dad sits on the edge of my bed and I feel completely trapped. He runs a hand through his thick hair, leaving it all on end. “Why weren’t you in class?”

I shrug, which is the direst mistake I could possibly make.

“What does that mean?” Pop asks.

“It means … I don’t know,” I say.

“You don’t know what you were doing during fifth period?” Dad asks, leaning toward me. He’s close enough that I can see the patchy places where his new beard isn’t filling in yet. Pop rests a hand on his shoulder and he leans back again. I wonder if they’ve been talking about strategies for dealing with their wayward children.

“I mean … I know what I was doing, I just don’t want to talk about it,” I mutter. This isn’t going well, and I don’t know how to fix it. I look up at Pop, desperately hoping that he’ll smooth things over somehow. He’s good at smoothing things over. But he looks concerned, and I realize that he’s not an avenue of rescue at all. Concerned-Pop is way more of a problem for me than Angry-Pop would have been. He never stays angry for long, but if he’s worried about me? He won’t let up until he’s figured out the problem and engineered a solution.

“What’s going on here?” Dad asks. He fidgets with a loose thread on my comforter. “You know you can tell us anything, right? Even if you’re in some kind of trouble? But we can’t help you if we don’t know what the problem is.”

Sudden anger flares in my chest—a pure, hot weightlessness that makes me feel like I’m ten feet tall. I don’t even know what I’m angry at—my dads aren’t saying anything that’s wrong. They’re trying their best. But I’m furious. It’s not fair, but I’m angry with them for not knowing me like they think they do. I want to yell, and slam doors, and kick things. I want to tell them that I can’t tell them everything because there are some things that are just too much to tell. I want to tell them that they can’t help, period.

Instead, I take a deep breath. I let them see that I’m taking a deep breath. I let them see that I’m calming myself down, so that maybe they’ll give me a little room to exist before they start trying to fix my life for me.

“Alexis,” Pop says softly, his hand still resting on Dad’s shoulder. “Your dad told me about the party you went to on prom night.”

I feel my brow knit and try to smooth it out but fail. I’m not surprised that Dad told Pop. Not exactly. But part of me feels betrayed, like when Dad and I talked about the party, things were fine and it shouldn’t ever have come up again.

“O … kay?” I say it in the shittiest teenager voice ever. I want to slap myself at the sound of my own voice. I don’t talk like this, especially not to my dads. They always do their best to listen to me, to let me be whoever I am and let me feel whatever I’m feeling, and in exchange I try not to be an asshole to them even when I’m feeling like an asshole. It’s a deal we’ve never discussed, but I know that’s the trade: I try not to be awful, and they try to let me figure myself out. But that weightless anger is still expanding in my chest, and it’s hard not to let it out. That snide tone I just used with him is the best I can do right now. Pop gives me a look that says he’s letting me get away with it this once. For a soft-faced bald guy, he’s really good at expressing “don’t try that again” with a single glance.

“We know what kinds of things go on when you’re a teenager and you’re about to leave for college and … everything,” Dad says, reaching up to rest his long fingers over Pop’s short, blunt ones. My heart sinks. This isn’t the talk I was expecting. “And we get it. We do.”

No you don’t, I don’t say.

“But if you’re sneaking off with some boy—” Pop starts, and I can’t help it. I burst out laughing. Technically, I am sneaking off with some boy. Not a whole boy, but … some of him. My laughter comes out bright and mean. They both look startled, and I suck the laughter back in. “Or girl,” Pop adds slowly, an edge to his voice. “Either way. If you’re sneaking off with someone …” He trails off, and he and Dad both look at me expectantly.

“If I’m sneaking off with someone, what?” I ask.

“So you are?”

“No, Dad, I’m—look, it was a nice day and I wanted to be outside, okay? It’s not a big deal, it’s not like I missed anything important.” I’m talking too loud and too fast. The balloon behind my sternum is still expanding, and I feel like I’m made of sharp edges and