Of course, as I grew older I became resentful. Sleepovers weren’t allowed. Sleepaway camp wasn’t either. We didn’t take a proper vacation until I was thirteen, to Lisbon, and even then I was forced to tag along sulkily after him on every museum tour, every church, up and down those hilly streets. “Do you know how lucky you are?” he said to me, as I refused to eat cabeça de peixe, my arms crossed, my shoulders slumped. “How many kids get to go to Portugal? Get to eat so many amazing meals? One day you’ll thank me.” I won’t, I won’t, I thought to myself. All I wanted to do was lie in the air-conditioned hotel room, scroll through my new Razr phone, rack up the hotel internet bill and instant message my friends, prank call a teacher, look up how-to’s on shaving my newly grown pubic hair. All I wanted was to be away from him. The funny thing is, he didn’t seem to enjoy the trip a whole lot either.

Sometimes, during those adolescent years, I wished he’d die. Then I’d have all the time in the world to be alone. Other times, in my vainest moments, I wished I’d die so he’d feel guilty. Guilty in knowing that even with such a short leash, he couldn’t prevent me from succumbing to certain death.

Once, when I was seventeen, I came home past curfew. I’d been with Gavin, who I dated in high school. My dad liked Gavin, liked that his parents called to ensure permission before he took me on our first date, even though we’d been sixteen. He probably liked how nonthreatening Gavin seemed, no trace of a mustache, his lashes thick and baby-like, his voice soft, his earlobes giant next to his tiny head. Gavin was a safe zone for my father, a green light that we used to our advantage.

What adults don’t understand, or maybe choose to forget, is that even the gawkiest, nerdiest, most metal-mouthed teens are experimenting. We’re also taking sips from the vodka bottle, replacing the alcohol with water. We’re also smoking poorly rolled joints procured from dealers we meet on the sidewalk, who overcharge for nugs packaged in those round plastic containers you’d find fifty-cent rings in at the grocery store. We’re also fumbling around in a bed somewhere, telling our parents our boyfriend or girlfriend has gone home, when in fact they’re waiting in a building’s stairwell for a text to come: Parents are asleep.

I came in that night, my makeup smeared, my stomach jostling with peach schnapps, gooey and dazed from a night of almost, not quite, going all the way. I was floating.