Page 35 of Petals and Plot Twists
“Oh that’s great news,” I say.
“Is it?” he asks dryly. “Because even though they cut out half my walls, ripped out insulation, and replaced the wiring in the entire apartment, the lights are still flickering.”
“You’re kidding,” I say.
“I wish I was.”
“Peter. That doesn’t make any sense.”
“Steve’s last piece of advice was that the building usually chills after someone falls in love, so maybe I should amp up my dating life.”
“You could join Operation Soulmate,” I say, though the thought of Peter taking women up on the rooftop to see if the flower blooms makes me immediately stabby. “I’m sure the flower would work for you, too.”
“I don’t think Steve was serious, Soph,” Peter says, and a weird sense of relief washes over me. I should not hate the idea of Peter dating someone else.
I shouldn’t.
But I absolutely do.
“So what are you going to do?” I ask.
“I have no idea,” he says. “I just know I can’t sleep on your couch forever. But I also can’t live in an apartment that’s somehow both disco night at the dance club and a hallucinogenic fever dream, all at the same time.”
I’m not sure where the laugh comes from, but hearing Peter talk about his finicky electricity suddenly sends me into a fit of giggles. Once I start, I have a really hard time stopping.
Peter looks at me, his expression annoyed, but the longer I laugh, the more he smiles.
“Stop laughing,” he finally says, his shoulders shaking because now, he’s laughing too. “It’s not funny.”
“Then why are you laughing?”
“Becauseyou’relaughing.”
I don’t stop until my phone buzzes with a text that I do not expect. “Whoa,” I say, and Peter frowns, the traces of his laughter gone right along with mine.
“What is it?” he asks.
I hold up my phone. “A text from my dad.”
“But it isn’t Christmas or your birthday,” Peter says.
“I know, right?” I turn and sit down on the bumper of Peter’s SUV and open the text thread, and Peter sits down beside me.
Dad
Hi, Sophie. Quick question for you. Do you remember that box of your grandmother’s journals I gave you? Callie is working on a family history project for her history class, and I think it would be great for her to read them. Do you still have them? I’d love to swing by and pick them up.
“What does it say?” Peter asks, and I hand my phone over. He’s quiet while he reads, then he hands it back. “That’s not too bad, is it?”
It isn’t, but it still leaves me feeling hollow. “Not really. But…”
When my words trail off, he nudges my shoulder with his. “But what?”
“I don’t know. It’s just…weird to see him being a dad, I guess?”
It’s not like I think my dad is a terrible person. He’s not—not like Charles Crooksley is. He’s just always been absent, at least when it comes to me. He checks the boxes, sends two hundred dollars every birthday, and I get the family e-greeting his wife sends out every Christmas. But that’s it. We’ve never been close, and I’ve never felt like more than an obligation.
Which is fine with me, honestly. I don’t want to be close to him, because I know how badly his leaving broke my mom.
