Page 130 of Lilly

"Easier said than done. You don't live here." His excitement is gone, replaced by his sadness. His hopelessness.

"I'm sorry, Conner. I should've come out there to see you this summer. I guess I still could, but there's a lot of stuff going on here right now so I don't know if I can."

"You don't have to. You two would just fight if you were here. I know you don't want to see her. I wouldn't make you do that for me."

"My dad said maybe you could come here."

"I already suggested it to Mother and she said no."

"Did she say why?" I already know the reason but I want to know what she said.

"She doesn't like Rachel. Or Jade. She said they'd be a bad influence on me."

"You know that's not true, right?"

"Yes, but I still can't convince her to let me go."

"Maybe my dad can convince her."

"Maybe." His voice returns to a happier tone. "I really like your father. He's nice. He actually talked to me, and listened, and asked me questions."

Conner is used to being ignored by his parents so being shown even a little bit of attention is a huge deal to him.

"And he got me a hat!" His excitement is back. "He got me a baseball hat at the game! I hid it in my closet. If Mom finds it, she'll throw it out."

"Did he get you anything else?"

"A hotdog. And a soda."

He's not allowed to have either one of those things. If our mom found out, she'd call up my dad and yell at him.

"It was the best day ever," he says.

God, I feel so bad for him. It was just a baseball game. That shouldn't have been his best day ever. He should be doing fun things every day, not stuck in his room studying French all summer.

"I sent your father a note, thanking him for taking me."

"You didn't have to do that."

"Mother told me to, but I would've done it anyway. I wanted to make sure I thanked him properly. I'm sure I won't see him again. Or talk to him."

"Conner, you can talk to him whenever you want. You don't need Mom's permission."

Conner craves a father figure because he doesn't have much of a dad. My stepdad is always at work and when he's not, he hides in his study, trading stocks on his computer, or that's what he tells my mom. He's probably just hiding in there to get away from her. The two of them don't get along. He only married her because she got pregnant with Conner when they were dating.

"I can't call your father," Conner says. "He's busy."

"He's not that busy. He's only works part-time. And if you ever want to talk you can always call me."

"But you don't like sports," he says very seriously.

I laugh. "That's why you want to talk to my dad? Because he knows about sports? Because if that's the case, you should talk to Garret. He can talk sports for hours. He knows way more about them than my dad."

"Lilly?" My dad knocks on my door.

"Come in," I tell him.

He opens the door. "Dinner will be in a few minutes." He sees the phone by my ear. "Oh, sorry, I didn't know you were on the phone."

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