“You wanted to hear about it … Anyway, the longer we were married, the less we’d make up and the more of a toll it was probably taking on you girls.”

“And Siri?” I croak out.

“And Siri was so much like your mother. She looks just like her, was a natural dancer, you know.”

I turn my face out toward the window. “I know, I remember.”

I look back over when Dad remains silent. He’s set his jaw.

“Just say it,” I tell him.

“Your mother was shopping for a replacement while we were still married.”

I couldn’t have heard that right. “What—”

“Your mom was seeing another man for at least three weeks before I told her I was going to leave her. I hired a private investigator, because I couldn’t believe that after all we’d been through, she was out spending her minimal free time toward the end of our relationship with a guy she danced with.

“The investigator got pictures, and when I pulled them out, she lost the ability to speak, as she often does. Your mother cannot admit when she’s wrong. She likes to pretend she’s a perfect human specimen.

“I had already started to talk to you about moving to California. I could tell you weren’t happy with your mom’s mandated ballet schedule. I told her that if she tried to stop me taking you, I would make a play for full custody of both of you and win. She wasn’t around enough. She wasn’t present enough. And she was cheating.”

I’m internally gagging.

“So we split things fifty-fifty. Siri lives with her mother, you live with me. A clean break. A healthy break where you two didn’t have to oscillate from coast to coast.”

I am seething. I am seeing red. “You abandoned one of your daughters over there.”

My dad makes a face like I’m being absurd. “I didn’t abandon her. She’s with her mother! We have it in writing, Jamie. We have an official divorce. We weren’t to contact each other or our respective kids. A clean break.”

He keeps repeating that phrase like it means something. Like it’s applicable to human relationships.

“Your mother and I didn’t agree on much, but miraculously, we both thought this was the easiest way to move forward.”

I can’t look at this man.

“Siri’s not a kid anymore; she’s almost nineteen now,” I mutter.

“I hope she’s doing well,” Dad says.

“Are you going to reach out to her? Don’t you love her?”

“Of course I love her, but I’m a stranger to her. Your mother has a new family, did you know that? Siri has a father figure. She doesn’t need me.”

“You should have tried to co-parent both of us,” I whisper.