“What is this shit?”

My dad’s voice jolts me out of sleep as my door bangs open the next morning. I bolt up in bed, clutching the sheet to my pounding heart.

“What?”

He shakes the paper in his hand so I can’t make anything out on the flapping newsprint. “I told you that none of those celebrity assholes were setting foot in this bar, and you did it anyway.”

Caught off guard, the only argument I can offer is the first one that comes to mind. “Why? What do you care? You never come here. You should be happy money was coming in last night instead of nothing, like a normal Friday night! You’re the one who used the bar as collateral, and now I have to find a way to pay off a hundred grand that I don’t have so we don’t lose everything!”

My dad jerks back. “Who told you about the loan?”

“The freaking accountant, after he got off the phone with the lenders. I was trying to get a line of credit to keep this place afloat while I figure something out.”

“You’re going behind my back now? Fucking some guy like your whore mother, and you’re trying to get money out of this place when it’s not even yours,” he yells. “I should’ve let the bar close years ago.”

I’m still smarting from his comment about my mama, but I recover quickly. I have no choice. “Why didn’t you?”

He glares at me. “I don’t owe you an explanation for shit, but this is where it happened. Until I know who put her in the ground, I’m not gonna rest.”

Realization strikes with the subtlety of a hit and run. “That’s what the loan was for, wasn’t it? I give you enough money to drink yourself into the grave, but not enough to pay a private investigator.”

“So what if it was? You should want to know too.”

I throw my hands in the air. “Of course I want to know. She was my mother!” We stare at each other for a full minute before I ask, “What do you think you’re going to do when you find out? Get some kind of revenge?”

“You leave that to me.” He tosses the paper onto the bed, and I grab it.

It’s a tabloid. The front page is a still shot from the video that Vandy kid sold of Boone onstage. Not the one of us together. Beside Boone is a picture of Amber Fleet, her eyes downcast and still looking way too gorgeous.

“This is total bullshit.” I scan through the article. It paints me as a home-wrecker, drawing comparisons to my mother and Gil Green twenty years ago.

The sick feeling that never completely left my stomach last night is back in full force. I glance up to see Pop staring down at me like I’m a stranger rather than his only child.

“Who gave this to you?” I don’t know why I bother to ask. I already know. “Brandy, right?”

“I’d be in the dark if she didn’t. You don’t tell me a goddamned thing.”

I meet his gaze, gray like mine but dark and full of fury. “No, I just keep your bills paid and your beer stocked. You’ve never asked questions before, so maybe you should quit asking them now.”

His eyes narrow and his face twists with rage as his fingers clench by his side. For a second, I wonder if he’s going to graduate from backhanding to a closed-fist punch. The anger stamped on his features says he’d like nothing more than to hit me, but something holds him back.

“Ungrateful little bitch. When’s the last time you thanked me for making sure you have a job or a place to live? You want to be jobless and homeless? I can make that happen.”

I refuse to cower. Holding the sheet to my chest, I glare at him with years of resentment and disgust.

“Do it. I dare you. You’ll be out on the street right behind me because no one’s gonna pay your bills when I stop.”

“Brandy could run this bar.” He sneers, going for the low blow. “In fact, I bet she’d do a better job than you.”

I snap back in bed, feeling the force of those words more than I ever felt the back of his hand.

Tears of rage burn behind my eyes, but I won’t let a single one fall in front of him. I’m done with this shit. Done being his punching bag. Done working myself into the ground without a single shred of gratitude for everything I’ve sacrificed in the name of family loyalty.

It’s time for me to stand up for myself for once and prove my backbone hasn’t disappeared from my body. It’s the only choice I have left.

“Then she can start today. I quit.”

Pop’s face takes on a mottled red shade as wrath and alcoholism collide.

“You can’t quit because you’re fired! I want your shit out of here by noon. Leave the keys on the bar. I’m done with you. You’re as dead to me as your whore of a mother.”

He turns and stomps out of the room, leaving me sitting up in bed, frozen in place, a lump in my throat choking off my air supply.

When the door to the apartment slams and his footsteps thud unevenly down the stairs, I finally move, but only to blink as the tears come, along with gut-wrenching sobs.

What did I just do? And what am I going to do now?

* * *

Four hundred forty-seven dollars and thirty-seven cents. That’s how much money I have to my name. My jobless, homeless name.

It would have been three hundred forty-seven dollars and thirty-seven cents, but I remembered the emergency Ben Franklin I folded up in my wallet what seemed like a million years ago and haven’t touched under any circumstances. Now it has been painstakingly flattened and makes up almost a quarter of my life savings.

Ten years of hard work, and this is what I have to show for it. When I think of every dollar of my own I used . . .

I shake my head. It’s water under the bridge. I can’t get any of it back now.

The final burn? I didn’t even get a chance to pay myself anything from last night’s take—which is gone from the safe, even though the stack of citations still sits on the scarred wood surface that has been a part of my life for so long.

I feed and water Esteban while he preens on his perch, hoping like hell Brandy and Pop will take care of him. Somehow, I can’t picture Brandy changing the newspaper at the bottom of his cage on a daily basis. And what about his bird treats? They might be few and far between, but he appreciates them all the same. I ruffle his feathers one last time.

“If I could take you with me right now, I would. But it’s not like I can stuff your cage in my car.”

“You’re fired!”

Another tear rolls down my cheek. “I’m so sorry, buddy. I’ll come back for you. I swear it.”

“You’re fired!” he repeats as I shut the cage door and lock it.

If anything happens to that bird, heads will roll.

Shoving the back door open with my hip, I cart the last sad load of my stuff out to my car.

“Looks like it might be you and me for a while,” I tell my Javelin as I stuff a duffel bag with the rest of my clothes inside. “Please don’t let me down. I’m not sure I could handle it.”

The old AMC’s engine fires up roughly, but at least it’s running.

As I drive away from the Fishbowl, my chest feels like it’s crumpling under the pressure.

I failed.

Somewhere along the line, keeping the Fishbowl open became the same as keeping my mama’s memory alive, regardless of how tarnished it was.

But I failed.

The harsh truth drags another tear from my eye.

I drive in the direction of Hope’s apartment building, praying that she’s there. Honestly, I have nowhere else to go.

I’m so stupid. I should have had a backup plan. Never in my wildest imaginings did I ever think I’d be leaving the Fishbowl. I’ve never lived anywhere else. I don’t know anything else.

The sky opens with a rumble of thunder, and buckets of rain pour down.

Isn’t this just the cherry on top of a shit sundae? My Javelin’s wiper blades work only sporadically, and today just isn’t my day. Squinting through the windshield, I pull up to a stoplight and look over at the car next to me.

It’s a minivan. A man is driving, and a little boy presses his face against the window and points at my car. The dad turns and gives me a nod, and then says something to the little boy, who peels his cheek off the glass before the light changes and they pull forward.

Arkansas plates. Probably tourists coming to enjoy the city on a family vacation.

I wonder what that would have been like.

A family who went places together. Spent time together. Outside of a bar.

I’ll never know. It’s not in the cards for me. Never has been.

I press down on the gas pedal and my car lurches forward, only for the resistance on the pedal to go slack a quarter mile from Hope’s place. I coast to the side of the road.

“You can’t do this to me! Not now.” I slap my hands on the steering wheel before apologizing like my car truly does have feelings. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to yell. Just a little further.” I look down at the instrument cluster . . . and the fuel gauge rests on empty.

With a sinking feeling in my stomach, I drop my forehead to the steering wheel. This day officially can’t get any worse.