I shouldn’t have gone the first time. I knew I shouldn’t have. But once I’d made the decision, it was done. It’s kind of like telling yourself you’re only going to have one potato chip and then the next thing you know the bag is empty. That’s how it started. Just one peek, I promised myself. I mean, Josie Dunn had invited me there herself initially. Before. When things were so good, I had to cancel. Before Grant Dunn was too busy to return a simple text.

The other night I sat outside their house for hours. I watched the Dunns come and go. I had to. I needed to see for myself. Grant says he’s busy this time of year. It wasn’t a lie.

He has been busy.

Busy buying his wife earrings, and taking her to dinner. Busy throwing parties. But not busy keeping the promises he made to me. He said he wanted to get to know everything about me. He said he wanted to take care of me. Only he isn’t busy doing any of that.

I feel like you’re forgetting what you promised, I texted him.

How could I forget someone so beautiful? He wrote back six hours later. Six hours.

At first, I was relieved to see his name light up my screen. Then I remembered flattery is his currency. He doles it out like breadcrumbs. It isn’t genuine. I can’t believe him. He lies about everything.

Josie Dunn is grocery shopping. She posted a pic of flowers in her cart on Instalook three minutes ago. This means I don’t have long. I tell myself it’s fine being here. I was invited. Maybe not this time but if anything, I’ll just say there was a mix up. I’ll say I thought we’d rescheduled the dance lesson. Everyone knows teenagers get things wrong.

I check my reflection in the rearview mirror. My phone rings startling me. My heart races every time I hear that sound. It might be Grant.

It isn’t. It’s Tyler. I want to slam it into a million pieces. What good is it if the person you want to call isn’t? Not much.

I send the call to voicemail. I know what he wants. He wants his car back. I’ve been gone too long again. The last time I got by with a blow job. This time, I had to go through with the whole thing and then wait until he was asleep. It’s not even a nice car.

But you do what you have to do. Josh taught me that. Anyway, it was worth it, I realize, being here. I can breathe again knowing I’m one step closer. I’ve been suffocating under the weight of Grant’s absence, and then there were the Instalook posts of the kid’s birthday party. I didn’t know what to do, looking at them. I drove over. I wanted to be a part of things. I wanted Grant to welcome me inside. He had no reservations about setting up shop inside me, coming inside me. Making me erase his baby before it even had a chance. That’s okay. I didn’t want ‘maybe baby’ either.

What I want is him. What I want is for Josie to understand. I’m not stupid. I realize it will take some time. I know women don’t just let go of their men like it’s nothing. Believe me, I know.

But this time it could be different. We could be friends. Times have changed. We could do that thing everyone is doing these days where we co-parent. They could consciously uncouple. We could celebrate holidays together, take a vacation or two. It always works out in the end. And if it hasn’t worked out, it isn’t the end.

I mean, I don’t really like kids. But hey, like they say, you can’t help who you fall in love with.

In any case, I can see that things will need some sorting out. Maybe it isn’t that Grant is busy. Maybe he isn’t good at logistics. And why would he be? He has people to work all that out for him. Also, they say transitions are the hardest part. Maybe he just hasn’t grown into himself yet.

Me, I’m changing. I apply lip-gloss to drive home the point. It’s the kind I saw Josie tag on Instalook. I got a manicure, too. Midnight blue. Now, I just have to make her understand. It’s not that I want her out of the picture. I think there’s room for all of us.

“James?” I cock my head, narrow my eyes. He opens the door a little wider when I say his name.

He’s studying me intently trying to place my face. “I’m Izzy,” I say extending my hand. He’s Grant, only younger. We shake on it. He’s polite. Maybe all kids aren’t as bad as I’ve made them out to be. Maybe it won’t be as hard as I think to accept this kind of baggage. “I’m here to give Avery her dance lesson.”

He raises his brow and removes an earbud from his ear. He wasn’t even listening. I could be anyone. They’re those new cordless kind; I hardly noticed. “Avery’s out back,” he tells me, stepping aside. I guess he reads lips. He points. “In the studio.”

“Ah,” I say following him in. “I guess she got a head start.”

I follow him through the house to the back door. I could probably find my way if I wanted to. I know it from Instalook, I know every room. I’ve studied it. Designed the layout in my mind. I wasn’t far off. Except the kitchen—it’s bigger than I thought. I have lived and breathed these rooms. I have imagined myself sitting, loving, sleeping beneath this roof, and now here I am. I follow him onto the patio.

He points. “In there.”

“Thanks,” I say. I take a deep breath in and let it out. Gosh. This is so much easier than I thought. All you have to do is act like you belong. Like you’re meant to be. So long as you look and act the part they want you to play, people are much more accepting than you imagine. This is why I’m wearing the workout gear I’m wearing. It’s why I got eyelash extensions and a blow out. I maxed out my credit card. But here I am, standing in the center of the Dunns’ world. Who knew it would be as simple as that?

She sits cross-legged on the floor with headphones over her ears. I watch as she bobs her head to the beat. She looks different in her own environment. More sure of herself when she doesn’t know anyone’s watching. Most of us are. You could be my step-child.

I lean against the wall, placing one foot up behind me. She senses movement and she looks up. Unlike her brother, she knows my face. She lifts the headphones. I watch as she places them on the floor. There’s something in her expression that reminds me of Josie. I can’t place exactly what that something is. “Did you forget?” I ask, checking my new watch. It’s the kind everyone is posting on Instalook. It’s expensive and edgy. Seems like something a girl like her would appreciate.

She shrugs. “My mom probably forgot to tell me.”

I roll my eyes. “Moms.”

She almost snickers, and her youth shows. We talk about dance stuff for a bit and then I work with her on technique. Once we’re both properly sweating, me more than her, I go in for the kill. “So—” I say, careful to choose the right words. Kids are better than adults at picking up on deception. That’s why I don’t like them. “What exactly happened with the dance team? You seem pretty good. It doesn’t make sense why they would cut you.”

She looks away.

When she doesn’t answer, I plop down on the hardwood floor. I don’t really know anything about dance. I lied. My mom never owned a studio. What I do know is how the click of a few tabs on the internet can open up whole new worlds. “Show me your latest routine.”

After several moments she complies.

“Yeah,” I say again. “It makes no sense why they’d cut you. At my school—with your talent—you would have been captain.”

“Exactly,” she says rolling her eyes. “Someone wanted the lead. I guess that someone found a way to get it…”

“That happens sometimes.”

She looks at me then as though she and I share a secret, some unspoken portal into the workings of the universe.

She stops after practicing several turns. “They expelled me over it.”

My eyes grow wide. I hadn’t realized that part. Maybe I should cut Grant some slack. His kid is a delinquent. “Like kicked out of school—expelled?”

“Yeah, for something I didn’t even do.”

I lean back on my palms and scan the room. Then I look at her directly. “Wow…”

She studies herself in the mirror. I can tell she doesn’t like what she sees. Girls her age never do. “What should I do about it?”

“What does your mom say?”

She scoffs. “My mom. I haven’t told her.”

“Surely, she knows you were expelled?”

“Oh, she knows.”

“Really.”

She moves closer to the mirror and studies her face. “Yeah, she knows about that. But the rest of it—” she says, picking at something she’d be better off leaving alone. I would tell her, but sometimes it’s nice to hold back. People rarely listen to warnings anyway. “She doesn’t know about the rest of it.”

“Oh.” I consider what to say next. I can’t tell her I know about the messages, even if I do. I especially can’t tell her it was me who sent them. I chew at my bottom lip trying to find a way around it.

“Why don’t you tell her?”

“The truth?” She eyes me like I’m an alien that’s just landed in her studio. She thought she knew me. Now she realizes she doesn’t know me at all. “God, no,” she says. “That would cause all kinds of problems.”

“And your dad?”

She gives me a funny look. God, I have so much to teach her. More than dance I learned on the internet, that much is clear. In the meantime, it’s good to let people think they’re smarter than you. That way, they drop their guard. “What kind of problems? Maybe I can help.”

“You mean like you’ll tell my parents? Um… yeah. No. Thank you.”

“No, I mean like give you advice. I’m not a parent. Thank God.” I make sure my eyes bulge for good measure. Teenagers appreciate drama. So do grown women for that matter. “I don’t even like kids, really.”

She accepts the truth in my lie. “There’s nothing I can do…” she confesses sadly. “They let me back in school. But now everyone treats me differently.”

“There’s always murder,” I say. I should be careful. The power of suggestion is far-reaching.

She laughs. I do too.

“My friends abandoned me. I mean—” she starts and then she pauses. Her breath catches, and I can see Grant Dunn really does have his hands full. It’s no wonder it takes him six hours to respond to a text. It takes half as long to get the truth out of his kid. He’s still working at it.

It looks like she might cry, and God— I do hate kids. Finally, she takes a breath. “I can tell they think I did it.”

I shrug. “Anyway. Who needs friends?”

She studies my face carefully. She can’t tell if I’m serious. Eventually, she offers a tight smile.

“Anyway—you have me now.”

I watch her eyes. They always give it away. I’ve said too much. Sometimes I like to apply a little pressure just to see how far I can get.

She turns toward the door. “My mom will be back soon.”

“From work?” I ask, although I know Josie doesn’t know real work.

She shakes her head. “No, from church.”

“Your mom goes to church?” I already know the answer but details would be nice.

She furrows her brow. “She invited you. Remember?”

Shit. I bite my lip. Now, I’ve made her suspicious. “Yeah, I don’t really like church.”

“That’s too bad,” she says. “You might not want to mention that to my mom. She practically is the church.”

That, I didn’t know. “And your dad? Does he go too?”

“Are you kidding? He created religion.”

I assume this is the teenager in her coming out. I don’t know what to make of it. I recall the way her father bent me over in the woods. I remember the way he laid into me on the hood of his car, the way he pushed my head down in the kitchen at Lucky’s, further and further, until there was no more give. Nothing seemed particularly religious about that. Maybe I don’t know religion like I thought. That reminds me, I never took Josie up on her offer to get me to church. Now, I realize I need to rectify that.

Avery leads me through the house. She’s taking me straight through to the front door, I realize a tad too late.

“Say,” I whisper. “Can I get a water for the road?”

She turns on her heel, like a ballerina and beckons me to follow.

Josie is in the kitchen putting away groceries. We catch her off guard. “Oh,” she says, shoving a carton of OJ in their sub-zero fridge. “You.”

She looks from her daughter to me and back. I can see she’s wondering if she’s forgotten something. “I didn’t know you were coming—”

I jut my bottom lip out. Avery hands me the water. “Hmm, I—”

The door closes in another part of the house. I hear footsteps I can’t see. Josie glances toward the front door. “It must have slipped my mind,” she says. She presses her hand to her chest. She’s not sure of herself. I can tell by the way she rolls her eyes. “Thank God you’re not an axe murderer.”

I narrow my gaze. “Me a murderer? No,” I say. “Seems like a lot of work. ”

She laughs. Avery stares at her mother, her mouth open. She looks like most teenagers look when their parents have overstayed their welcome in their presence. “What?” Josie laughs. “It was a joke.”

I want to tell her, her joke isn’t funny, but then Grant walks in. He has his phone in his hand. He’s punching at the screen. I wait for him to look up. One Mississippi. Two Mississippi. Three Missi—.

I watch in amusement as he lets the phone go. Just like that, his fingers release it, and it goes crashing to the floor. Suddenly, all eyes are on me. But it’s only Josie’s expression that gives anything away.