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I stifle a chuckle, but not at ine she’s theup his hat” They’ve been married since I was five, but they’ve never been overly wild about each other It always seeement My father was a lonely ith money and Odette wanted soetting soure out of the deal for my benefit, but motherhood was never on Odette’s bucket list The woman doesn’t have a maternal bone in her body, but at least she was always real about it She’s never been fake or pretended to care when she didn’t She’s always kept th and it’s been no skin off my back

We have an understanding

We all do

“Blaire, are you still there?” Odette asks

“Yeah Yes I’ot an audition next week … and we’re short at work …”

“Need I re about?” Her voice is cutting and curt

I bury ht Over the years, I’ve gotten aith giving them a million excuses as to why I can’t come home But now that my father is laid up, all of those excuses are null and void

It isn’t that I don’t want to see him or that I don’t want to come home—it’s that I don’t want to see the other him

Wyatt Buchanan

For ten years, I’ve avoided the ue

But to be fair, he avoided me first

2

Blaire

I kill the engine of my rental car and stare into the diine it still smells like the cinnamon Odette uses to cover up the tell-tale scents of her three Persian cats I iback chair is still covered in those frilly white doilies Odette knits when she’s bored If it intertiiven that it’s June, there’s likely a few cracked s letting a warh the house