Satisfied, I reached for the top of the suitcase, slammed it shut, and closed the zipper without an afterthought. I wasn't mad at Diane. If I had been, that would have meant I had feelings. Honestly, I didn't blame her. If I had a stepdaughter like myself, I'd call the police as well.

"Mia, you ready?" my father called out from the bottom of the stairs.

I didn't answer.

"Mia Rose Jett!"

"Two minutes!" I set the lightly packed suitcase beside my bedroom door and took one last look around at the bare walls of an old prison before I entered a new one. My walls were always empty, just like my bed, my dresser, and my desk. No personality. Once I walked out the door, it would be like I had never lived here. This space could quickly become a guest bedroom, and I bet Diane already had a Pinterest board dedicated to it.

"Oh, no. You can't wear that." Diane scrunched her face from the bottom of the stairs. Her short bleach-blonde bob didn't move as she shook her head slightly from side to side. She always wore too much hairspray. Come to think of it, I don't believe I'd ever seen her without her hair blown out, straightened, and sprayed in place. Even when she did her fifteen-minute workout videos after dinner in her room with the door cracked, I'd never seen her hair move.

"What's wrong with what I'm wearing?" My chin dropped as I straightened my oversized black t-shirt that read "cute but psycho" over my destroyed jean shorts, revealing my chicken legs. One would think I was naked underneath, the shirt was so big, but I wasn't. I was covered. Promise, Dad.

"Nothing's wrong. Let's move. We're already late for the airport," my father said, waving me down. He always avoided confrontation at all cost, and sometimes I wondered who he was more scared of—Diane or me? At this angle, I finally noticed the bald spot he'd been complaining about on the top of his head. I never believed him before, but now I didn't care enough to point out he was correct. He’d been a handsome man, but even with Diane around, loneliness had sucked the life out of him. Bags scalloped under his brown eyes and his cheeks were sunken.

Marriage would do that to you.

The suitcase banged against each stair as I stepped down. "She could have, at the very least, brushed her hair," Diane said under her breath as she walked out the door ahead of my father and me. I pressed my lips together at the hypocrisy of her statement. At least I could run a brush through my hair if I wanted to.

"Not too much longer now," my father said as he gripped the handle of the suitcase and brought it behind him. He was right. Only eleven and a half hours longer, and I would be 3,447 miles away from both of them, give or take. He was choosing a perfect life, and I wasn't a part of perfect, and that was okay. I’d done my research. I knew what was waiting for me on the opposite side of the plane ride.