I drop the phone and look around at Jamie’s room. I’m sitting on a sparkly fluffy pink carpet that matches the peach canopy bed in the center of the space. A full-length gilded mirror leans against the wall directly across the way. Mirror Jamie stares back at me. The weird glamour magic adapted to the salon chemicals. Mirror Jamie’s new hair bears a striking resemblance to Albert Einstein’s.

I can’t fully see how the bleach affected my actual hair as a whole, but I can look down and pull the strands in front of my face to confirm that they too now have a gray-blond hue.

Movie posters are scattered about Jamie’s walls, a vintage one from Grease, one from Shrek 2, and a third from Men in Black. There’s a white desk against the wall next to the bed. On top of it sits an ancient Mac desktop with orange accents from the mid-2000s. A groan escapes me.

That can’t be her actual computer.

Ugh. I have to call Jamie. But I’m so tired.

There’s a knock on the door behind me. I scurry away from it on all fours and stand to perch on the edge of the bed as Grams peeks in.

“Dawn left looking very upset, Jamie.”

“I’m going to make it up to her,” I say quietly.

She puts her hands on her hips. “Your father’s home. He wants to talk to you, and we have to decide on dinner. Should I make something or do you want takeout?”

“I could help make something,” I offer. Good god, let me cook something. I need to turn off my brain.

Grams’s eyebrows raise. “You realize I mean food?”

I nod.

She stares at me for a moment before shrugging. “Okay, get your ass downstairs, let’s food, and then let’s Runaway Bride. It’s been too long since we rom-com’d.”

42. Angst and Dad

SIRI

September 3, Thursday Evening

California

It doesn’t really hit me until I reach the bottom of the staircase and see him in the kitchen. I’m about to meet my dad. Sitting at a rustic-looking kitchen table, drinking from a cheesy Iron Throne–themed mug, and scrolling on his phone is my greedy, selfish, abandoning jerk-and-a-half father.

His hair is dark. He must dye it. He’s wearing a button-up light blue shirt with khaki pants.

He glances up.

“Jame!” His voice sends a shock wave through me. It still sounds familiar.

“Hi,” I whisper, like he’s not twenty feet away.

“Welcome back!” He puts down his mug. “Come take a seat, kiddo.”

Mom boycotts all of Dad’s films.