cadets in second and third class made jokes about the two of them being “the prom king and queen of West Point.”
He was cute. He was athletic. He was generally nice enough. But he was also a blowhard, self-centered, and completely oblivious to his faults.
“If you ask me,” Greg was saying, “Pierson should have done hard time. My mother says—my mother was the mayor of Baltimore for two years, did I mention that? Anyway, she says that his negligence was enough to impeach him, or at least indict him when he left office…”
Stop staring at me. She wanted to blurt it out, to shout it even, but she held her tongue. She could feel how desperate her father was to talk to her. That was part of the reason she brought Greg, so that they couldn’t open any cans of worms during this visit. She knew he wanted to ask about Sara. She knew he wanted to apologize, to try to make amends, to put all the ugliness behind them.
The truth was, she didn’t hate him. Not anymore. To hate someone required energy, and she was putting everything she had into school. To her, he was a non-issue. This visit was not reconciliatory; it was bureaucracy. Decorum. Etiquette. The values that the academy instilled in its cadets were not entirely applicable to Maya’s unique situation, but her takeaway was that she should at least have a check-in with the man who raised her, this shell of his former self. If for no other reason than to prove to herself that she could still stand to be in the same room as him.
But now she wished she hadn’t.
“So,” Maria said suddenly. Greg had stopped talking long enough to spoon some stew into his mouth, and Maria was taking full advantage of the temporary reprieve. “Maya. Have you spoken to your sister lately?”
The question took her off guard. She had expected it from her dad, but not from Maria. Still, it was as good a time as any to practice the skills she’d been developing on her own time. She fought the instinct to display any betraying expressions and instead smiled lightly.
“I have,” Maya replied. “Just yesterday, in fact. She’s well.” Only half of that was a lie.
“You have a sister?” Greg asked.
Maya nodded. “Two years younger. She’s in Florida on a work-study program. Very busy.” Another lie, but she told it with ease. She was getting better at that all the time, and often told small, off-the-cuff fibs just for practice—and, admittedly, for a bit of a thrill.
“And, uh…” Her dad cleared his throat. “She’s getting by okay? She has everything she needs?”
“Mm-hmm,” Maya answered curtly without looking at him. “Doing great.”
Greg simpered as he turned to her father. “You ask that like you don’t talk to her, Mr. Lawson.”
“It’s like Maya said,” her dad answered quietly. “Sara is very busy.”
Maya knew that her own sudden departure was a blow to him. But if that was the case, then Sara leaving was a death stroke.
In that first summer, just a few months after their father saved President Pierson’s life, after he told them the truth about their mother and the tension in their home was sky-high, Maya confided her plans in her sister. She told Sara that she had tested out of her senior year of high school and was running down admission to West Point.
As long as she lived, she would never forget the panicked expression on her little sister’s face. Please. Please don’t, Sara had begged her. Don’t leave me alone with him. I can’t do it.
As much as it broke her heart, Maya had made her plans and intended to see them through. So Sara made some of her own. She went online and found a lawyer who would take her case pro bono. Then she filed for emancipation. She knew it was a long shot; there was no proof or evidence of neglect, abuse, or anything like that.
But in a turn that shocked both sisters, their father did not fight it. Less than two weeks after Maya left for military school in New York, her dad attended the court date and, in front of a judge, told his then-fifteen-year-old daughter that if she wanted freedom from him enough to do this, to take him to court for it, she could have her freedom.
That same night came another event that Maya would not soon forget. Her father called her. She ignored it. She still hated him back then. He left her a voicemail that she didn’t listen to for two days. When she finally did, she wished she hadn’t. His voice wavering, breaking even, he told her that Sara was gone. He admitted that he deserved all of it and then some. He apologized three times, and told her he loved her.
It would be another six months before they spoke again.
But Maya did keep up with her sister. Upon emancipation, Sara packed up what she could carry and got on a bus. She ended up in Florida and took the first job she found, as a cashier in a thrift store. She still worked there. She lived in a co-op, a rented house with five other people. She shared a bedroom with a girl a couple years older than her, and a bathroom with everyone else.
Maya made sure to call her sister at least once a week, and more when her schedule allowed. Sara always promised that she was doing fine, but Maya wasn’t sure she could believe it. She’d left high school with the assurance that she’d go back, but she never did. These days Maya didn’t bother trying to convince her to return; instead, she pushed for Sara to test for her GED. Just another thing Sara claimed she’d do. Someday.
Maya lived at the academy year-round, and was given a stipend every semester for uniforms, books, food, and the like. She usually didn’t have much left over, but she sent her sister some money when she could. Sara was always appreciative.
Neither of them needed anything from him anymore. They didn’t want anything from him anymore.
They really had talked the day prior; that part wasn’t a lie. Sara was sixteen now, and one of the girls in her co-op was teaching her to drive. It pained Maya that she was missing out on such important parts of Sara’s life, but she had her own goals and was determined to meet them.
Simply put, the truth about their mother’s death and their father’s lies had driven a wedge between not only them and their father, but the two girls as well. They were on separate paths, and though they could keep in touch and help each other when able, neither was about to go too far out of their way to disrupt their own lives.
“Would anyone like some more?” Maria offered. “There’s plenty.”
Maya’s attention snapped back to the dinner table. She’d been lost in her own thoughts, and when she looked around she saw that everyone else was finished eating. Still she set the spoon down. She just wanted this visit to be over, to thank them and get the hell out of there. “No thank you. It was very good.”
“Agreed,” said Greg enthusiastically. “Absolutely delicious.” And then the blond idiot went and opened his big mouth yet again. “Thank you, Mrs. Lawson.”
A flash of anger combusted inside her like a swelling backdraft. The words forced their way out of Maya’s mouth before she even thought about them. “She is not Mrs. Lawson.”
Maria did a double-take. Her father continued to stare, but now his eyes were wide in surprise and his mouth slightly open.
Greg cleared his throat nervously. “Sorry,” he muttered. “I just assumed…”
More anger welled inside her. “I told you that on the ride down here. You wouldn’t have to assume anything if you stopped
