I miss him so much.

I don’t know how this happened. I don’t know how I went from throwing my phone across the room to sobbing against his chest, but I’m just glad he’s not dragging me to the office. He waits until I’ve calmed down a little, and then he presses his cheek to the top of my head.

“I’m sorry, Clara. We both are.”

I don’t know how truthful he’s being, but even if he is sorry, I don’t think it’s going to change anything. He should be sorry. Being sorry is the least he could do to right his wrong.

I just can’t understand this level of betrayal. I can’t understand how my mother can walk around one minute, supposedly full of grief because she lost her soul mate, but then the next minute, her tongue is down his best friend’s throat.

“It’s like neither of you even cared about them.”

Maybe I wouldn’t be this mad if I had walked in on my mother kissing a random stranger. But Jonah isn’t a stranger. He’s Jonah. He’s Jenny’s Jonah.

He pulls back, dropping his hands to my shoulders. “Of course we care about them. What you saw . . . that had nothing to do with them.”

I pull away from his hands. “It had everything to do with them.”

Jonah sighs, folding his arms over his chest. He really does look remorseful. A small part of me wants to stop being so angry, just so he won’t have that look on his face anymore.

“Your mom and I . . . we just . . . I don’t know. I can’t explain what happened last night. And honestly, I don’t want to. That’s for you and your mother to discuss.” He takes a step forward. “But that’s the thing, Clara. You need to discuss it with her. You can’t lock yourself in your bedroom forever. I know you’re angry, and you have every right to be, but promise me you’ll talk to her about this.”

I nod, but only because he seems so sincere about it. Not because I’m actually going to talk to my mother about it.

I don’t feel quite as angry with Jonah as I am with my mother, because this really isn’t even his fault. I feel like 90 percent of my anger is placed on my mother. Jonah and Jenny weren’t even married. They hadn’t even been dating that long. And my dad isn’t Jonah’s brother, so his betrayal and my mother’s betrayal are on two different levels. Two different continents.

Jonah should feel guilty, but my mother should feel like scum.

I look up at the ceiling and run my hands down my face. I drop them to my hips. “I can’t believe I threw my phone.”

“It’s your birthday. You get a free outburst. Just don’t tell the other students.”

I’m surprised, but I actually find it in me to laugh at that. Then I sigh heavily. “It sure doesn’t feel like my birthday.”

It’s hard for today to feel like my birthday when my own mother forgot about it. Guess that means our traditional birthday dinners are over for good.

Jonah points to the classroom door. “I have to get back in there. Go wait out the rest of this period in your car. I at least need the class to think I punished you.”

I nod and take a step away from him. He walks back toward his classroom, and part of me wants to tell him thank you, but I have a feeling I’d immediately regret that. I don’t really have anything to thank him for. If we’re keeping score, he still owes me about a million free passes.

The next three class periods sail by without a single assault. Progress.

I haven’t seen Miller since first thing this morning, and it’s kind of killing me. We usually text each other throughout the day, but my phone is probably at the bottom of Jonah’s wastebasket. When I finally make it to the cafeteria for lunch, I can see the relief spread across Miller’s face when I approach the table. He scoots over and puts space between him and Efren.

“You okay?” he asks as I take a seat. “Rumor has it you threw your phone at Mr. Sullivan.”

“I might have hurled it in his general direction, but I was aiming for the trash can.”

“Did you get detention?”

“No. He took me out to the hallway and gave me a hug.”

“Hold up,” Lexie says. “You threw your phone, and he hugged you?”

“Don’t tell anyone. I had to pretend I got punished.”

“I wish I had an Uncle Teacher,” Lexie says. “Unfair.”

Miller presses his lips to my shoulder and then rests his chin there. “You okay, though?” he whispers.

I nod because I want to be okay, but the truth is today sucks. Last night sucked. These past few months have sucked, and I can’t seem to catch a break. I can feel heat behind my eyes, and then Miller brings a hand up and squeezes the back of my neck. “It’s nice out. Wanna go for a drive in Nora?”

That’s the only thing that could probably make me feel any sense of relief right now. “I would love that.”

I’ve skipped a funeral with him, done drugs with him, gotten detention with him, snuck him into my bedroom, lost my virginity to him. In comparison, skipping half a day of school seems like an improvement in my behavior.

Miller drove us to the city park. It edges a large pond—one my dad used to take me fishing at on days like this. Miller sits under a shade tree and spreads his legs, patting the ground between them. I sit down with my back against his chest, and he wraps his arms around me as I adjust myself until I’m comfortable.

My head is leaning against his shoulder, and his cheek rests against the top of my head when he says, “What was your father like?”

It hasn’t been that long, but I still feel like I have to jog my memory to answer his question. “He had such a great laugh. It was loud and filled up the entire room. Sometimes it would embarrass my mother in public because people would turn and look at us when he laughed. And he laughed at everything. He worked a lot, but I never held it against him. Probably because when we were together, he was actually present. Wanted to know about my day, would always tell me about his.” I sigh. “I miss that. I miss telling him about my day, even when there was nothing to tell.”

“He sounds great.”

I nod. “What about yours?”

I feel a movement in Miller’s chest, like a silent, unconvincing laugh. “He’s not like your dad was. At all.”

“Did he raise you?”

I can feel Miller shake his head. “No. I spent time with him here and there growing up, but he was in and out of jail. Finally caught up to him when I was fifteen, and he got a longer sentence. He’ll be out in a couple of years, but I doubt I’ll have anything to do with him when he gets out. It had been a while since I’d seen him when he got arrested, anyway.”

So that’s why my father made that comment about Miller’s dad, about the apple not falling far from the tree. My father was wrong, obviously.

“Do you keep in touch at all?”

“No,” Miller says. “I mean . . . I don’t hate him. I just realize some people are good at being parents and some people aren’t. I don’t take it personally. I’d just rather not have a relationship with him.”

“And your mom?” I ask. “What was she like?”

I feel him deflate a little before he says, “I don’t remember her very well, but I don’t have any negative memories of her.” He wraps one of his legs around my ankle. “You know, I think that’s where my love for photography came from. After she died . . . I had nothing to remember her by. She hated the camera, so there are very few pictures of her. Not much video. It wasn’t long after that when I asked Gramps for my first camera. I’ve had it in his face ever since.”