No one ever thought we were related.

“Are you surprised?” I asked, startling Elise, who finally took her eyes off him.

“I just thought you were an only child, that’s all,” she said before changing the subject. “Where’s your dad?”

“No idea,” I said, a little worried. I didn’t know where he was, if he’d even gone into the office that morning. Mom looked like she wanted to break something and I just wished he’d get here soon.

As Mom chatted with the donors at her table, her voice grew more and more strained. “Text your father,” she whispered to Christian when there was the slightest lull. She shot me an annoyed look, like his absence was somehow my fault.

“I have,” he said. “Five times.”

She glanced at Dad’s empty seat and then at the table two over from ours, where her assistant Greg sat. Elise’s impromptu appearance had meant bumping him to a seat at a nearby table belonging to an attendee who was a no-show. I could see the gears turning in her mind. She was thinking about recalling Greg to fill the empty seat between us.

I wondered where Dad was, if he was going to show up at all. He and I played hooky once, the second year after we began attending the annual Northside fundraiser, skipping it at the last minute without telling Mom.

“Come on,” he’d told me, right before I was about to change into my dress. “I don’t want to do boring grown-up things tonight.” Mom and Christian had gone earlier in the day to help set up, and we were under instruction to arrive half an hour before the donors came.

“Does Mom know?” I asked, hopeful, but also dreading Mom’s wrath.

He shot me a conspiratorial wink and shook his head. “Better to ask for forgiveness than permission.”

I hesitated, afraid of what might happen after.

“Don’t worry,” he said, as if reading my mind. “She won’t be mad at you.”

We went to the movies and I remembered the thrill of defying Mom’s orders. Dad’s phone rang a couple times but he ignored it, so when she called me I didn’t answer either. We both knew there’d be consequences later, a storm waiting on the horizon, but I also felt safe, because we were a team and I had someone in my corner.

After, we got ice cream, sitting outside sharing a large cup of mint chocolate chip as the stars appeared one by one. “Do you love Mom?” It was a question I’d been obsessed with for as long as I could remember, but I never felt brave enough to ask until now.

“It’s complicated,” he said after a lengthy pause.

I remembered feeling confused, almost angry. I was eleven and I thought it was simple: People should only be together if they loved each other.

“What I do know is that I love you.” He kissed me on the head and I couldn’t help but smile. Christian had Mom, and the grades, and everything I didn’t, but Christian didn’t have Dad or this moment.