I walked into Dad’s room that night feeling a bit more refreshed after my six-period nap in Mrs. Tate’s office. She woke me up a few times to see if I wanted to go home, but I refused, telling her that my house was too quiet. She seemed to understand and left me alone until the final bell rang.

I tried not to think about all the schoolwork I was missing. I was banking on the fact that most of the teachers would have heard about Dad and would cut me some slack.

Dad was sitting in his wheelchair with a cast on his leg. He was dressed in sweatpants with one leg cut off. He had a t-shirt on and was watching a basketball game. I reveled in the sound of him yelling at the screen. He was back to his normal self.

“Hey, Dad,” I said, dumping my backpack on the floor and collapsing on the chair that had become my bed.

“Hey, Tiny,” he said, waving toward me.

He was fixated on the game, so I stood and wandered around the room. People had sent flowers and cards, and I picked up a few to read them. They were from fellow teachers or parents of players.

When I found a box of chocolates, I grabbed them and made my way back to the chair. Just as I sat down, the commercials started up.

That broke Dad’s concentration, and he turned to smile at me. “How was school?”

“Good,” I mumbled through a bite of caramel-filled chocolate.

“Find the chocolate Mrs. Benson sent?”

“Yep. It’s delicious,” I said, popping another one in my mouth.

He laughed. “Glad my broken leg can bring happiness to someone.” Then his expression grew serious. “Was Ms. Swallow there today?”

Frustration rose up in my chest. Why was he asking about her? I wanted to say that he’d betrayed me by asking Ms. Swallow to take him home tomorrow. “Why? I thought we’d decided that you were done with her.”

He furrowed his brow. “I never decided that.”

I scoffed and shoved another chocolate into my mouth. “Yes, you did.”

He studied me. “What’s with you?”

It angered me that he couldn’t figure out what was happening. I had to give up the one guy that cared about me because of his ridiculous rules, and yet he could go gallivanting around with my chemistry teacher like it was no big deal.

Out of annoyance, I grabbed the remote and changed the channel.

“Hey!” Dad said, glancing over at me. “I was watching that.”

I shrugged. Before he retorted, a news anchor appeared on the screen.

“This weekend, a contest was held at Disneyland. They were celebrating the fact that the park has now served eight hundred million guests. To commemorate this amazing feat, they were giving away year-long passes to the eight hundred millionth guest.”

The screen flashed to the picture of Tyson, Cori…and me.

I swallowed so hard that a piece of chocolate got lodged in my throat. I coughed and coughed. Dad glanced over at me, and I couldn’t quite read his reaction.

“You okay?” he asked.

I nodded as tears formed. Finally, the chocolate worked its way down, and I was able to drink away the tickle. The news anchor talked about how we won the passes and to contact the park for more information. Then she moved on to a shooting that happened earlier that day.

Dad and I had stopped listening. Instead, I was focused on Dad and what he was thinking.

He was quiet before he turned and focused his attention on me. “Wanna explain to me why you were in a picture with Tyson and his sister this weekend?”

Anger and shame coursed through me. I was hurt that he had the gall to accuse me when he himself was seeing someone behind my back. But I also knew that I’d made a mistake. I had lied, and no amount of blame was going to cover up that fact.

“I’ve been seeing Tyson,” I blurted out. Well, that was one way of addressing the issue.

Dad’s eyes widened. “You’ve what?”

I swallowed. “I’ve been seeing Tyson. Ms. Swallow put us together as lab partners, and he needed help, so he asked me if I would tutor him. I knew how you felt, but I also didn’t want to say no.” I let out my remaining breath, trying to gauge his reaction.

“You were studying chemistry at Disneyland?”

I shook my head. “No. It started out me helping him, and then we picked up his mom at a bar.” Dad’s mouth dropped open. Crap, I probably wasn’t supposed to say anything. “He probably doesn’t want you to know that,” I muttered under my breath.

Too late. I was already this far in, I might as well finish it. “We started hanging out, and he was at the party I went to with Rebecca. He has to take care of his little sister, so we left the party and went to his house so he could put her to bed.” Why couldn’t I shut up? Dad didn’t ask for every single detail.

I suppose I’d been holding so much of this in that it felt good to finally get it all out. Thankfully I had enough control to keep from spilling about the kiss.

“He asked me to go along with him and his sister to Disneyland. I guess their mom is a piece of work, and she’s more drunk than anything and couldn’t go with them. And you know, since Mom…” My voice trailed off.

Exhaustion overcame me, and I flopped back on the chair, unable to look at Dad anymore. I hated the dissapointment that was written all over his face. I hated that I’d lied. I hated all of this.

“Destiny,” he said, taking the time to say every syllable in my name.

I covered my eyes with my elbow. “Yeah?”

“I’m sorry.”

I sat up. What did he just say? I glanced over at him, and he had an apologetic look on his face. I studied him. Was this a joke? “For what?” I’d been the one to break his rule. I’d been the one to lie.

He sighed and fiddled with the fraying hem of his pants turned shorts. “For not being the dad you needed.”

A lump formed in my throat. “Don’t say that. You’re the best kind of dad. You take care of me. You’re there for me. You never abandoned me.” My voice broke and trailed off to a whisper.

“But I dragged you along with the pain I’ve held onto ever since your mom left. You didn’t deserve that. You needed someone to teach you how to forgive. How to move on. And I didn’t do any of that.” He blew out his breath as if what he’d said had been weighing on him for a long time.

I sat up, trying to digest what he was saying. Did he understand why I’d lied to him? And he wasn’t mad? Who took my dad, and what did they replace him with? Because the man sitting in a wheelchair over by the window certainly wasn’t him.

And then it all became clear. He liked Ms. Swallow. And he knew that he was being hypocritical by telling me I couldn’t date Tyson. He was changing his tune so he could date Ms. Swallow.

A brick weight sat on my chest. I’d never felt so betrayed and angry before. This had nothing to do with me or how he had failed me. It had everything to do with the fact that he wanted something and I was standing in his way.

Why couldn’t he have had this revelation days ago? Before Tyson broke up with me, saying that he couldn’t be with me because of the liability I brought? Just my luck, it happened after I might have had a chance with a guy I cared about. Because right now, there was no way Tyson would touch me with a ten-foot pole.

I’d broken his heart.

“Is this because of Ms. Swallow?” I asked, narrowing my eyes. “Because no matter how you feel about me dating, I will never feel right about you dating my chemistry teacher.”

Dad’s eyes widened, but I didn’t let him talk. Truth was, I needed to get out of this room and away from my two-faced dad. The person who claimed to want to protect me, but then changed his mind the minute it became inconvenient for him.

“I have to go,” I said, grabbing my backpack and heading toward the door.

“Wait. Where are you going?” he called after me.

I tried to shove away the guilt I felt when I saw him struggle to push his wheelchair over to me. I couldn’t feel sorry for him right now. My anger toward him and Tyson was the only thing keeping me sane. If I let it go, I just might crumble into a pile of ash.

“Away from you,” I said and headed out into the hall. I didn’t need him or want him to follow after me. I needed some time to myself to just think.

I rounded the corner and ran smack-dab into Tyson’s chest. His hands wrapped around my arms as he glanced down at me. A look of concern passed over his face. I forced the tears to retreat. He couldn’t see me cry.

“He’s in there.” I waved behind me as I passed by the entire football team.

I heard Tyson mumble something that sounded like “I’ll catch up with you,” but I didn’t wait to see if I’d heard right. Instead, I got to the stairs and pushed open the door. I didn’t want to wait for the elevator.

Tyson must have not realized my escape route because I found myself alone when I got outside. Which I was grateful for. Right?

Shaking off my ridiculous thoughts, I headed straight to the place where I’d parked Dad’s car. His beat-up, blue Chevy sat between two white BMWs. I clicked the key fob that I carried around in my backpack and heard the beep as the car doors unlocked.

“Hey, Tiny. Wait up.”

I heard Tyson call my name from across the parking lot, but I didn’t want to wait. I needed to get out of there.

I pulled open the driver’s door but stopped when Tyson’s hand reached out and caught it. I growled and pushed against his arm. When he didn’t budge, I pushed away from him and met him with the full extent of my anger.

“Why won’t you just leave me alone?” I asked. Crap. I couldn’t keep my tears in check. One escaped and slid down my cheek.

When he didn’t say anything, I glanced up to see him studying me.

I wiped at my cheeks, cursing the fact that he was so calm and I was such a mess. Well, apparently, he wasn’t as devastated by our sort-of-not-really breakup as I was.

“Is that what you want?” he finally asked.

Was it wrong that I hated how caring he looked at this moment? Like the only thing that mattered to him was my happiness. It was something that I longed for and hated at the same time.

“Yes,” I said, but it didn’t come out as confident as I had hoped. Instead, my voice sounded small. A little like the lies I’d been telling since school started.

He dipped down to meet my gaze. “Really?”

Oh, he wanted the real answer. Well, if he wanted honesty, then no, I didn’t want him to leave me alone. As corny as it sounded, he was a part of me and leaving would create a giant, Tyson-sized hole in my heart.

I blew out my breath and folded my arms. “What do you want?”

Good, Destiny. Turn the question on him. Make him as vulnerable as he made you.

Tyson leaned forward, and I could feel his presence wash over me. Despite my efforts, my heart pounded harder.

“The truth?” he asked.

Heat raced to my cheeks, but I kept my cool as I nodded. “Sure. ‘Cause I’m not really sure how things have changed since two days ago when you told me that we couldn’t be together.”

Except they had. Dad pretty much gave me his blessing to date Tyson so he could date Ms. Swallow. But Tyson didn’t know that, and I wasn’t sure I wanted to know what he’d do with that information.

As if the mention of our time together at Disneyland was the key to my release, he pulled back.

“I…” His voice trailed off as if he wasn’t sure what to say.

Instead of waiting for his answer, I took this moment, when his guard was down, to get into the car.

“I thought so,” I said as I shut the door and started the engine.

He stepped to the side as I pulled out of the parking spot and drove away. Just as I turned onto the main road, the dam broke and tears fell in huge droplets down my cheeks.

I hated how I felt. I hated how I left things with Dad. And now, I hated how I left things with Tyson.

But what I had done was necessary if I was going to protect myself. There was no way I could allow another person into my life who could hurt me. I just needed to survive.