Chapter 5

At New Year's, the whole extended family gathered again.

Quinn ate a little, then ran outside to watch fireworks with her friends.

Mom and Dad started arguing about which test-prep program Quinn should enroll in.

Their voices climbed until everyone else at the table went silent.

Aunt Diane nudged me.

"Gwen, they're about to kill each other. Go calm them down."

I kept peeling shrimp without looking up.

"I'm not going."

Grandma Ruth glared at me.

"Your parents are practically fighting and you can still sit there eating?"

I'd tried to break up their fights more times than I could count.

Before the divorce.

After the divorce.

Not once had it worked.

Two years earlier, at our September handoff dinner, they'd started arguing before we even ordered.

Quinn was running late, so it was just the three of us in the room.

When the shouting got worse, I said something careful and neutral, taking neither side.

Mom turned on me instantly.

"I'm the one supporting you this year and you won't even take my side? I always knew you were ungrateful."

She'd already lifted a chair off the floor.

I had no choice but to soften my voice and talk her down.

Dad let out a short, ugly laugh behind me.

"If you love your mother that much, she can keep you next year too. Fine by me. Quinn's the only one I want."

That was all it took.

"Quinn is supposed to be mine next year!"

They started hitting each other.

I stepped between them.

Dad's hand swung across my face.

The slap was loud enough that the room rang with it.

They paused for maybe a second.

Then went right back to fighting.

Neither of them asked if I was okay.

Later, Quinn arrived.

She stood in the doorway, eyes already filling.

She didn't have to say a word.

Mom set the chair down. Dad lowered his hands.

They hurried over, both reaching to wipe her face.

"Don't cry, Quinn. Mom and Dad were wrong. We scared you."

"Come sit by Dad. Order whatever you want."

There were other fights I'd tried to stop, and every one of them left me looking just as pathetic.

But I loved them.

So I kept trying, clumsily, uselessly.

I kept believing it was my job to hold together something that had already broken.

Now I didn't love them anymore.

If they stabbed each other across the dinner table, I honestly wouldn't care.

Aunt Diane kept at me.

"Move, Gwen. How can you just sit there?"

A sharp crack came from the living room.

Dad had been slapped.

Grandma Ruth stamped her foot and looked at me like I was a lost cause.

"You've got ice in your veins."

I took my time with a spoonful of soup.

"They won't listen to me. Wait for Quinn."

The relatives tried. They failed.

Eventually Quinn came back.

She took one look at our parents in the middle of the room and sighed.

"It's New Year's. What are you two doing now?"

Mom let go of Dad's collar.

Dad rubbed his wrist.

"Nothing, honey. We were just messing around.

"Come here, Quinn. Take your holiday money. I shouldn't have ruined your night, so there's an extra hundred in there."

Dad pulled out an envelope too.

"Go buy yourself some new clothes tomorrow. If it isn't enough, text me."

Then, right in front of everyone, Mom handed me a noticeably thinner envelope.

"Nothing extra for Gwen. Our fighting doesn't bother her in the slightest, so there's nothing to make up for."

I took it calmly.

I didn't argue. I didn't say a word.

Mom seemed surprised at how easy I was being, and looked at me twice.

By June, neither of them remembered my SAT.

I went alone.

I checked my results alone.

I filed my applications alone.

Once my score was released, admissions offices called nonstop.

Some of the best schools in the country wanted me.

I didn't change my mind.

I chose Redstone University, more than a thousand miles away.

At the end of August, it was almost time for another handoff.

Mom came into my bedroom and threw herself into helping me pack.

She could barely hide how happy she was to send me off and get Quinn back.

The next morning, I left early with my suitcase.

I wasn't going to the restaurant where we always did the September exchange.

I was going to the airport.

Nora came to see me off.

While we waited at the gate, she asked, "Your parents worship Quinn. What happens when you're successful someday? Won't they dump the whole burden of taking care of them on you?"

I smiled.

"Easy. We settle it through the court.

"One parent each. Every September, we switch."

I just didn't know yet which of them would spend their later years being passed back and forth like something nobody wanted.