Chapter 5 - We Can't Go Home
His hand was still closed around the ring.
He wasn't wearing it anymore. He'd pulled it off and he hadn't put it in his pocket. He just held it, tight, like if he opened his fingers everybody would see what it meant. His other hand was on my shoulder. Not pulling. Just there.
"We're going home," he said.
It wasn't loud. It was the way he'd said it before, when Claire started crying at the front. You had six months, we're going home. He'd looked at me when he said it. Not at her.
The flowers were too white. That was all I could think about. The arch behind them was covered in white roses and the lights were warm and bright on them, and water was drying cold on the back of my neck. My top stuck to my shoulders. I could feel every breath shake going in.
Dad shifted his weight. He was going to step down from the platform. I felt it in his hand first.
I didn't move.
Claire saw it. Her mouth opened a little. She glanced from him to me and back, like she wanted to fix it before he noticed.
I heard my own voice before I meant to talk.
"We can't."
Dad stopped. He looked down at me. His eyebrows pulled together, but not mad. Just trying to understand.
"Why?"
I swallowed. My throat hurt. The veil on Claire's hair moved when the air kicked on. I stared at the lace on her sleeves because I didn't want to look at her face.
"She told us you sold our house."
Nobody talked for a second. The room was so quiet I could hear the lights buzzing. Somebody coughed in the back rows and then stopped, like they were embarrassed to make noise.
Dad's hand got heavier on my shoulder. Not hard. Heavy.
"What?" he said.
Claire made a small sound. "Daniel, you don't understand."
"Don't," he said, without looking at her. His eyes stayed on me. "Sophie. Look at me. Who told you that?"
I did look. I had to. His face was close and his jaw was tight and there was sweat at his temple under the stage lights. He wasn't wearing the ring and his finger had a pale line where it had been.
"Claire," I whispered. "She said — she said you sold it after we left. She said that's why we couldn't go back."
He breathed out through his nose. Slow. I felt his thumb move once against my damp sleeve, like he'd just realized how wet I was.
"When did she tell you that?" he asked.
I tried to think. It wasn't one time. It was a lot of times, in the kitchen of the place where we'd been staying. The apartment with the parking lot outside. My sister on the couch with her legs tucked up. Claire standing by the counter with her phone.
"When we asked," I said. "When we asked when we were going home."
Claire stepped forward. Her shoes made a soft noise on the platform. "I was trying to protect them," she said fast. "They kept asking, Daniel. They were upset. I had to tell them something."
Dad finally turned his head toward her. "You told my kids they didn't have a home?"
"I told them things changed," she said. Her hands were shaking. She pressed them together in front of her dress. "You were gone. You weren't answering. What was I supposed to —"
"You told them I didn't want them," he said. "You told them I sold our house."
My sister's name was stuck in my head. She wasn't here. She was still where Claire had left us that morning. I kept thinking if Dad let go of my shoulder to argue with Claire, I'd be alone up there.
Dad must have felt me lean in, because he stopped talking and looked back down. He crouched a little so his face was level with mine. The tuxedo jacket pulled across his shoulders.
"Hey," he said, quieter. "Listen to me. Did you believe you couldn't go home? Is that why you didn't —" He stopped. Started again. "Did you think we didn't have one?"
I nodded. My hair fell forward, wet against my cheek. I didn't wipe it.
"Yes," I said.
Behind us, Claire whispered, "Daniel, please, not here."
He didn't answer her. He just kept looking at me, and I could see him getting it — not all at once, but piece by piece. Portugal. The messages. The house. How each lie had kept us still.
His hand opened. The gold ring sat in his palm for a second. Then he closed his fingers around it again and slipped it into his pants pocket, out of sight.
"You're cold," he said.
I nodded again.
He stood up straight and pulled me a little closer to his side, away from the arch, away from her. I could feel the heat coming off his jacket.
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"We're not staying here," he said.
But my feet still wouldn't move. Because if there was no house, I didn't know where home was supposed to be.
