I audibly swallow, working up the nerve to say what I need to say. The image of my dad’s email draft in my mind is what pushes me over the edge. “I said, you’re holding me back. I have an opportunity to get the very thing I’ve been working my whole life for, and I realized it would be silly for me to pass that up just for a piece of paper.”

“I never said you had to pass up the opportunity. Even though you were the one that said you didn’t want it when it first came up. I said I would go with you.”

“But I don’t want you to. Kai. We’re young. We have so much life to live and we were about to give up the little freedom we have to step into roles we weren’t at all ready for. It’s just…too much. I think we need space. We need to go our own ways and see what’s out there, ya know?”

“No, I don’t know. What is going on? This ain’t you. Matter fact, it sounds like your dad.”

I cross my arms. “So what, I can’t make my own decisions now?” I inwardly cringe at my attempt to gaslight him.

He huffs. “You know that’s not what I said. I…” He lifts his hand to touch my face, but I pull away from him, eliciting another pained stare from him. “Olivia, baby, please talk to me. What do you need? Whatever it is, I can fix it. Just…talk to me.”

Tears well up in my eyes but I wipe them away as though they mean nothing. “There’s nothing to fix. I’m not trying to hurt you. I just need to do this, Kai. And I need to do it alone. You have to let me go.”

At that, his hands fall to his sides and before he can say another word, I storm out and retreat to the safety of my own room.

Kai texts me once after I leave the party, to make sure I got to my room safely, but after I assure him I have, I don’t hear from him for the rest of the night. The next morning, when there’s a knock at my door, I don’t even have to guess at who it is. I make my way over to the door but I don’t open it; instead I listen to the raps of his hand against it.

“Olivia, please open up. We need to talk.”

I stand perfectly still but I can feel his tortured soul calling to me. “I love you,” he whispers.

“I need you,” he says as his fist hits the door again.

“Don’t do this,” he pleads.

He goes silent and I ponder if he left, but when my phone buzzes with a text, I know he’s still there.