So I say the other things I’m thinking instead. “What if I can’t do it, Ethan? What if I can’t stay in the same place? If I’m like my mom and I just can’t handle it?” It’s not hard to push aside the Robert problem when these fears are also true. I can remember watching my mother pack a duffle bag with clothes. And I can so clearly imagine myself in her place, saying, It’s just for a day or two. To clear my head, baby. I’ll be back by the weekend. It’s not that far a leap.

“You aren’t going to wimp out on your kid,” Ethan says. “You’re the toughest person I know.” He fills two highball glasses with ice, pours us some sweet tea, and hands me a glass. Sits across from me, hands folded on the table, like we’re having a meeting and I have his full attention.

“I do feel it,” I confess, swirling my tea to hear the ice cubes clink. “That thing I think she felt. The only way I know to fix that kind of restless itch is to put miles between me and wherever I was.”

“You’re self-medicating with survival,” Ethan says, studying my face as if he knows there’s something there to find. “You’re addicted to drama.”

“Sure,” I say, pretending I know exactly what he means so maybe he’ll drop it. I worry whatever thread he’s tugging will lead to what I’m trying to hide.

“If you’re in survival mode you can keep problems buried, because the way you grew up, that wasn’t okay. When you upend your life, you don’t have to sit with how unfair it was. And whatever drama you come up with won’t be worse than the anger and hurt you’re carrying around, because that was the original hurt. That’s the deepest cut.”

He might be right about the part he understands. When I close my eyes, I always see it: pine needles, my mother’s diamond ring, and my broken guitar, Irene’s Christmas tree, and the stars on Matty’s ceiling, like every moment of my life gets loaded in that motorhome. Everywhere I go, I’m dragging it with me, collecting more hurt and loss and sad sweet memories that I don’t want to hold. But this time I think the drama could be the worse kind of pain. If I tell Ethan and Robert the truth, I could lose everything that’s good, and if I don’t, I’m ruining the good thing anyway.

“I could be your drama sponsor,” Ethan says. “We’ll have meetings, and when you’re about to grab your keys and hit the road you can call me and we’ll stage an intervention. I’ll bring donuts.”