Well, leak might be too delicate a word. Something grosser would be more accurate: gush. Spew. There are tears gushing and spewing out of my eyes as I lower myself onto the curb and rest my head on my knees. It started raining while we were in the movie, and now a cold drizzle coats me, probably ruining my hair and my dress.

“Hey.”

I feel his hand on my back before I turn to see him. It’s Nick, of course.

“Sorry I didn’t use our secret hand-squeeze language,” I say through my tears.

He moves his hand in small circles. “It’s okay. You want to talk about it?”

I motion toward the movie theater.

“Maybe in words, instead of vague gestures.”

I shake my head, staring at my knees. “I’ve never walked out of a movie before. Annie and I stayed for the entirety of The Break-Up, even when it became clear that they weren’t going to get back together and would, in fact, break up. Annie was so upset she cried.”

“Chloe.” Nick’s head dips as he tries to meet my eyes. I look back at him.

“This isn’t about The Break-Up,” he says.

I exhale a long, shuddery sigh, looking at my knees again. “Her dad gets better. In Annie’s movie. He has cancer, and his treatment works, and he gets better.”

Nick nods slowly.

I chew on my lip for a moment, then turn toward him. “That’s never going to happen for me. Never, ever, not unless I wake up tomorrow and there’s some magical, Alzheimer’s-reversing drug in the news, which seems pretty unlikely at this point. My dad’s not ever going to get better. He’s only going to get worse, because my life isn’t a movie. My problems can’t be solved in an hour and a half. I can’t have a romantic epiphany that coincides with my dad’s improving health and then, like, walk around the city purposefully while a cover of a ’90s pop song plays. That’s not how life works.”

Nick puts his arm around me and I lean into him.

“I should check my phone,” I say, because even though Milo’s on Dad duty, old habits die hard. I dig through my purse, then find it and gasp. There are multiple missed calls, from my dad’s facility and the hospital.

“Fuck.” I stand up. “Milo was supposed to be fucking handling this. What the fuck?!”

“Chloe.” Nick stands up and grabs my arm, holding me steady. “What’s happening? What’s wrong?”

I call Brookwood back, my heart pounding as the phone rings. “I need to get to the hospital.”

Chapter Twenty-Three

My dad is fine.

He’s asleep when I get there, his body looking small and frail in the hospital bed. Brookwood called an ambulance when he complained about chest pains. But once he got here, he said he felt fine, had no memory of his chest pains, and all of his tests showed no problems. They’re keeping him overnight for observation, just in case.