“Wait a minute.” Dad sets his mug down on the counter. “Why didn’t you apply? You worked so hard on your portfolio pieces. What happened?”

“You know what happened.”

Mom died and my dad started to drink.

We did what we had to do in order to get from day to day. Those things did not include essay writing and portfolio development.

Before he can try to initiate some kind of father-daughter-heart-to-heart thing, I shove back my chair, spring to my feet, and cross to the garbage. “It’s okay.” I drop the overly ripe banana into the can with a thump and shrug as if it couldn’t possibly matter. “There’s another project I’m working on. I’ll have plenty to keep me occupied this summer without being a part of City Art. And I can always apply next year if someone drops out. So it’s fine,” I lie. “Look, I’ve gotta go.”

“I can give you a ride to school,” Dad offers.

No. He can’t. Not without being late for work. It’s an empty offer and I can see from the slump of his shoulders that I’m not the only one who knows it. More than anything I want to call him out. But I bite back the angry words and instead say, “Rose said she might wait to walk with me. She’ll never forgive me if I don’t show up.” I shift the bag on my shoulder and make a beeline for the back door.

My hand is on the knob when my father says, “Meri, I’m sorry. I should have asked before about City Art. I know your future is on the line and I—I’m screwing it up. I’m trying to do better, it’s just . . .”

I glance over my shoulder. My father looks down at the coffee in his hand so I won’t see the tears. But I see them anyway, and even if I couldn’t I can hear the sorrow thickening his voice when he quietly admits, “I miss her.”

Everything inside me freezes. The red-hot anger I stoke like a life-giving fire suddenly extinguishes, leaving me cold and weak and raw.

I can’t breathe.

I can’t speak.

It’s like the moment I relive every night when I try to fall asleep—the one where the police officers come to the door with their serious, rosy-cold faces and stiff words, telling us about the vehicle that slid on a patch of black ice and couldn’t stop in time.

They were sorry. Everyone was sorry. My friends. My teachers. Our neighbors. The guy behind the counter at the market two streets over. Everyone told me first with their words and now months later with a shake of the head how sorry they were that the person who drove the vehicle too fast during a spring snow was alive and well and my mother, who had simply been standing on the sidewalk in front of a potential new design project, was dead.

We’re all sorry. So what? It doesn’t change a damn thing.