Chapter 12

• My tone has softened now that he's brought up his mother. "Loved. Past tense. And you hurt me, too. How can you ignore that fact?" I ask. When he was six years old, she had put him and his uncle on a raft and sent them to Florida. I calmed the anger and broken glass that had filled him as a child. As he had stated during our time together. "You know we were more complicated than that, Miguel. Our ending was more complicated."
• His mouth purses into a sneer as he looks at a framed picture that's sitting on top of my bureau. It belongs to my dad. He gives a head movement as though he's trying to block out the picture.
• He turns to face me and gives me a chilly glare. "Perhaps it was. You left so quickly that I was never sure." I nibble at my thumbnail. Years ago, he attempted to help me kick the habit, and I get the feeling that he's resisting the temptation to take my hand out of my mouth.