I can feel myself trying to hide away inside myself, burrowing down to a safe space where I don’t have to hear my own story. That place doesn’t exist. “No. He was hit while he was crossing the street.”

Surprise, confusion, anger, contemplation. Those are the phases people usually go through when they learn about my father’s passing.

Surprise that his death wasn’t something typical, like a heart attack or an illness. Confusion when they internally ask themselves, “Did she just say her father was mowed down by a ninety-one-year-old driver who didn’t see the red light?” Anger when I say no, the driver didn’t go to jail. All the DA required was for him to surrender his license. And contemplation when they say to themselves, “I guess it was an accident. The man was extremely remorseful and it was his first offense.” Followed by the inevitable, “I’ll never let my parents drive past their eighty-fifth birthday.”

“Why didn’t you tell me?” Ryan asks, pulling me back to the present.

“I couldn’t.”

“Why not?” he demands. When I talk about my dad, people are always sympathetic. Poor Kara, they think. Ryan is the opposite. His manner is almost accusatory.

“The night before it happened, my dad and I had a fight. It ended badly.” I’m hoping to leave it at that but I can see Ryan is expecting more. I try to speak again but my voice catches. Guilt takes altering forms with me. Sometimes it’s a stab, other times a dizzy spell. Right now, it feels like a slow squeeze around my throat—nothing fatal, but enough pressure to remind me that it’s there and it’s never leaving.

I roll my neck a bit and add, “I just couldn’t talk to you. I needed to suffer and, on some level, I think I wanted you to suffer, too. That’s why I said what I did the last time we spoke.”

Ryan levels a look back at me that hits like a punch to the gut. “What were you and your dad fighting about?”

I should make something up. I should spew out the first generic excuse I can think of. But I can’t, so I don’t.

“We were fighting about you and me. I told him I wanted to go back to you.”

Ryan’s immobile until he shakes his head. “This is ridiculous,” he says, his tone clipped and frustrated. “You should have told me. I could have helped you.”

“I didn’t want your help,” I fire back. “Listen, let’s not talk about this anymore. It’s over now so there’s no point dwelling on it.”

“Are you serious? You can’t tell me that and expect me to be okay with it.”

“Can we just not talk about it anymore?” Then, quietly, “Please?”