NOBODY FROM MY FAMILY CAME TO MY GRADUATION

at the shop, and for a second nobody breathed.

My dad made a sound. Not a word. Just air leaving him.

“Tamsin,” he said. “Put that away.”

“No.” She was crying now, but quietly, the kind of crying where the face stays mostly still and the eyes just leak. “No, Dad. I’ve been carrying this for seven years. Seven. I was seventeen and you handed it to me and continue reading …