Page 97 of The End of Summer

But this morning, I woke up to find I was the only one left.

My voice came back, but I’ve been sitting here for the past ten minutes, listening to the silence.

I hear a door open upstairs.

“Hello?” I call out.

An officer who I do not recognize comes to my cell. “What do you need?”

“Is my dad here? Chief Andrews, from Eastport?”

“Don’t think so. Let me check.” He uses a phone to call someone and ask.

“He said he’ll be in at nine.”

“What time is it?”

“Just after seven.”

“Okay,” I say.

I wait. There’s very little else you can do in jail. I replay the events over in my mind – the ones I can remember – and little details emerge, like the look on Keith’s face when he saw me, which was an odd combination of sad, smug, and surprised. I think about my interview for Eastport Elementary, the fact that I got fingerprinted last night, but not in the way I would have preferred, and I wonder if I just threw my entire life plan out the window by ending up here. I think about Arrow, about Kit and Jenny, and about what will happen to all of them given this new series of unfortunate events. And of course, I think about Brady, wondering if he’ll be disgusted with me.

Wondering why he hasn’t come for me yet.

I breathe with intention, trying desperately not to panic. The officer has taken up residence at a desk on the other side of the bars I'm locked behind, and I ask him to turn around so that I can use the toilet. When I’m done, I wash my hands in the small, metal sink, lie flat on my back on the bench seat, and stare at a speck on the ceiling.

Until my dad arrives.

I hear his footsteps. He greets the guard and then dismisses him. “I need to speak to my daughter alone,” he says. The guard heads up the stairs and shuts the door behind him.

My father pulls up a chair outside my cell. He sits down, rests his elbows on his knees, laces his fingers together, rests his forehead on his hands.

And begins to cry.

I have never seen my father cry before.

It is the most gut-wrenching experience of my life. Without words, I can see that I have broken him. Hurt him beyond measure. Gravely disappointed him. His shoulders heave as the tears fall from his eyes and onto the tile floor.

My own eyes fill with release, an understanding that yes, this is horrible, but it happened, and my dad showed up. He came back for me. He wouldn’t be crying if he didn’t still love me.

I fucked everything up, and I’m sorry.

I try to say the words aloud, but it comes out as a gasp, because my tears have become sobs. He looks up. He wipes his eyes. He stands up, grabs a few tissues from a box on the small, steel desk nearby, and silently offers one to me.

I stand, approach him at the bars, and gratefully accept his offering.

Our eyes meet.

He shakes his head and sits down in the chair again.

I return to the bench.

“Brady came to bail you out,” he says.

“He did?” I hiccup.

“He asked for me specifically,” he continues.

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