Page 49 of The Off-Limits Play

“It’s not…” Mom shakes her head with a sigh, looking at Dad for support.

“We just want you to be careful.” His voice is a soft rumble, but I still bristle at his warning.

“What’s the point of surviving if you won’t let me live?”

“We want you to live!” Dad gives me a desperate frown. “That’s the whole point. We can’t lose you, Nylah.” His voice cracks, and I can tell he’s reliving that awful moment when he answered the phone and found out that his daughter hadn’t made it home the way she was supposed to. Instead, she was missing.

The torture he must have gone through that night as he tried to get back to Kelsey… only to discover that I was trapped down an embankment in a crumpled car and barely breathing.

They had to resuscitate me on the way to the hospital, and when my parents finally made it, I was already in surgery.

My body was a broken wreck, and they spent that summer sitting by my bedside in the ICU while I battled an infection, then had to go in for another surgery. It took weeks before I finally made it home, and then it was a slow journey back to my feet. And they were with me every step of the way.

My siblings had to put up with me being front and center of every decision.

And I am over it.

“I get that it was a really hard time, Dad. I get it. You love us, and you don’t want to lose any of us.” I swallow. “But I’m here, okay? I’m attending a college nearby so we don’t have this distance between us anymore. I’m going to classes. I’m doing my exercises. And all I’m asking in return is that you trust me tolive. And if that means going to a party or going on a date, or doing something that you think I’m not ready for… well, you’re just gonna have to deal with it.”

There’s a long, uncomfortable pause as my family all exchange worried glances, and then Mom goes and ruins my epic speech with a concerned frown. “Are you going to a party? Which one?”

“Ugh! Mom!”

“What? I’m just trying to be interested.”

I give her a skeptical frown, but she hides her disquiet behind a fake smile and forces me to tell her that the Sigma Beta Mu sorority is throwing a party, and because I sit next to one of them in my anthropology class, I’m invited to go.

“Well, that’s sounds… lovely.” Mom looks at Dad, giving him a silent warning.

He clears his throat and eventually nods. “Yeah. Great. Just remember that you’re only nineteen, so?—”

“Nearly twenty,” I interrupt.

He points his fork at me. “So no drinking, and make sure you’re armed with pepper spray. The one I gave you hasn’t expired, right?”

“No,” I mutter.

“And also make sure you’ve got a way of getting there and back to the dorm safely. In fact, what night is it? I can be your ride if you like. There’s no game the weekend after next. I’m free to be your personal Uber.”

Denzel snorts, laughing and pointing at me while I pick up the last of my bread roll and throw it at my father.

“If you even dare to show your face at that party, I will never speak to you again.” I laugh as the bread roll bounces off his forehead, then lands on the floor.

Mom, of course, tells me off for throwing food while Amina starts to giggle and Eli hassles Dad.

“Nice reflexes, old man.”

“Harrison, if you throw that bread roll at your son, you’re on kitchen duty for the rest of the month,” Mom warns her husband with a stern look before clicking her fingers at each of us. “Eat your food. All of you.”

“Nylah didn’t get kitchen duty threats,” Dad grumbles as he drops the offending roll next to his plate, then picks up his fork and winks at me.

Mom laughs and shakes her head. “She’s gonna be too busy. She’s got classes and parties to go to.”

I flash my mother a grateful smile, which Dad kills when he murmurs, “It’s just one party, though, right?”

Shaking my head, I refuse to answer him, stabbing my carrots with my fork and forcing another mouthful down.

If only he knew what else I’ve been up to.

---