I forced a smile but focused on Uncle Leo. “Where is he?” I asked, not beating around the bush. “He promised.”
His smile faulted, turning to a frown. “He’s doing his best, but sometimes the universe doesn’t work with us, Meyah.”
“No surprises there,” Mom muttered behind me, and I stood a little straighter. We were getting along okay since our talk. But I could tell there were still things she wasn’t telling me, and I wondered whether she was just keeping her opinions to herself because she was scared I’d walk away again and maybe this time not come home.
“It was out of his hands,” Uncle Leo growled, his eyes looking over my shoulder at Mom.
I wanted to say it was okay, that I knew he was probably trying his best, but that shit happens. But instead, I was just angry and disappointed. He made me a promise. He told me he would be here for me. Knowing how hard this was going to be. Knowing I really didn’t want to go in the first place. He couldn’t even call me, tell me he couldn’t make it?
He’d dumped me at my mom’s that morning and ran, disappeared to God only knows where.
I knew we hadn’t talked about what exactly was going on between us, but I thought he at least respected me more than that. I thought that maybe he understood how much this meant to me—how much having him here meant to me.
At that moment, I made a choice. “Let’s go,” I said firmly, walking forward. Skylar, Emma, and Uncle Leo all stepping out of the way as I powered down the pathway.
This was my moment, probably the last one I’d have before I left school and all these kids behind. A few months ago, I would have been happy to finish school hoping that my graduating class would forget about me and that I’d be a passing memory in their lives.
But now?
Now I was determined to make sure they didn’t forget me.
I wasn’t going to let their last memories of me be ones where I walked down the hall with my eyes on the floor, or where kids pointed and laughed in the hallway when Nick stuck a ‘kick me’ sign to my back.
Nope.
I was going to be the girl who came back from all of that with her head held high.
I was going to be the girl who pulled up to the prom on the back of a motorcycle, her family surrounding her, and her middle finger held up firmly in the air.