CHAPTER 76: Safe

MIA

I sat on the familiar beige couch in Dr. Harlan’s office, the one with the slight dip in the middle from all the people who’d sat here before me.

The room smelled like old books, the kind of scent that was supposed to calm you down but mostly just reminded me I was in therapy.

I’d been coming here for months now, every Tuesday at four-thirty and yet nobody knew.

It was my secret, this hour where I didn’t have to be the funny one, the loud one, or the girl who always had everybody’s back.

“Mia?” Dr. Harlan called as he settled in the armchair across from me, notepad on his lap, and pen in hand.

And in that notepad were probably all the dirty secrets I’d ever told him.

I know I make them sound special, but the secrets are actually pretty boring—which was another reason I’d never told anyone.

Never told anyone how Mom and Dad had pretty much checked out when Amelia and I were kids.

How they’d leave us with frozen dinners and the TV for company while they worked late or went out