She was running away again, and it felt as if that time it'd be for good. I spoke in a rush.

"And I said I would help you. Don't make me a liar, please. Don't make me a failure. Maybe I couldn't pass the fuckin' differential, but don't take helping you away, too."

She turned toward me a little. "It's never going to be like in Montauk. You understand that right? That weekend was a dream, but this, Callum Andrew, is our reality. And in our reality you can't charm and kiss me. You can't walk me home, or take me out on dates. You can't graduate college and drive me around in your father's car."

"I get it," I said. "Alright? I get it, Topolina."

"And I'm not your Topolina."

I sighed. "You don't have to sound so damn robotic. You don't have to be so . . . fuck, Everly, I care so much about you that I risked going to your house tonight, just to see you, and here you sit, cutting the threads that binds us as if it means nothing." I looked at her. "You aren't some dream I want to relive. You're the part of my life that someone has decided to rip away and I'm trying to figure out how to tie us back together. If you don't want me, then tell me so. But don't sit here and act so matter-of-factly about what happened and plague me with all your damn rules. I already have enough rules to abide thanks to one Brighton. I don't need another."

She sat quietly for a moment before she said, "I told you so long ago that I didn't want to hurt you. I don't know how else to say it to you, because if I begin to tell you how much it hurts me, or how much I miss you, and think of you, that agony will swallow me whole, and I will beg you not to take me back to my father's house." Her breath caught as if she was trying not to cry. "That's how I feel-your heart swallowed me like a well and I will never be able to climb out. I fell. I fell into your infinity. And my inability to free myself will doom your life." She turned away, pressing her forehead against the window.

I swallowed the lump in my throat and soothed my hand along her back. I let her "cry". I let her have a moment to feel without having to explain herself-the girl who couldn't even write in her journal without someone snooping.

"For the record," I said, "You will always be my Topolina. There are certain things that your father has no control over, and how I feel about you, Everly Anne, is something he cannot change. You're still the girl who's too beautiful for me to look away from."

"Please just stop," she cried. "Unless you'd like to rip my heart out and give it to Truscott, tonight, because that's what's happening. My whole heart is ripping at the seams."

I reached across the car and pulled her into my arms, allowing her to hide her face in my shoulder, and cry tearlessly.

"I don't want to hurt you," I whispered. "But I don't want you to ever believe, when I am away from you, that I am not thinking about you. That I'm not missing you profoundly."

"Don't take me home," she begged. "Don't make me go back to him."

"I wish I didn't have to, Topolina." I kissed her neck. "I'd keep you right here if I could."

Everly pushed away from me. "Please don't kiss me. I can't take how you feel, right now. It's too much, Callum Andrew. It makes missing you even worse."

"All right," I nodded. "What about the other thing? What about your heart, Everly Anne? What about your freedom? Do I ignore those things, too? Tell me what to do, because I have no idea what hurts you more, right now."

"We should have kept on course," she said. "It was only ever supposed to be about helping Truscott."

My chest burned, even though it expected her answer; for her to run away. "That's what you want? You're sure?"

"That's all I can do," she said quietly. "That's all I have left."

Timothy whipped open the door as soon as we reached the porch. Everly looked at me with a forced smile. "So, thanks for taking me on that drive-by. I'm just gonna go to my room and snort this coke we scored. Night."

I smiled back at her. "Next time we'll do hookers and heroine."

With her head down, she squeezed past Timothy, into the house.

"I swear my only crime was taking her to eat at a crappy diner downtown."

"Well now I know you're a liar," he said. "Everly doesn't eat, so the last place she'd ask you to take her is to a diner."

"She did it for me since I was hungry. I gave her a ride around town in my dad's Chevy." I nodded to the car at the curb. "That said, I do apologize for keeping her out late. It's not my intention to cause trouble, but as you can understand my time doesn't always belong to me."

Timothy stepped to the edge of the stairs. "You're causing trouble by drifting in and out of her life. She was perfectly content with the way things were before you started poking your nose where it didn't belong. The differential is over. You don't have any reason to show Everly interest. There are plenty of girls your own age that you can canoodle with."

"Locking her in a cage won't get you anywhere," I argued. "I understand you're afraid of her getting hurt, I really do, but you're not talking to some teenage kid who doesn't know better. I can give her both freedom and safety. I'm not canoodling or trying to do something reckless with your daughter. I care for her and enjoy her company. Why can't you just allow her a little freedom? Happiness?"

"She's not like other girls her age. She isn't capable of doing the same things, of those same freedoms, even though at times she might feel more free because she has no line embedded in her system alerting her to the danger she's crossing. Look at what happened to her going to the beach. My rules have made sure she is able to live as long as possible, the most comfortable as possible. You're screwing that up. You're making her believe in things that aren't true."

"No, Sir, that's the difference between us. I haven't made Everly do anything."

"That's interesting given that I have read pages of passages in her journal that state 'he makes me' at the beginning of a sentence when she's writing about you."

His bravado disgusted me.

"You read her journal? Christ, even on paper you offer her no freedom. And you don't understand why she's trying to run away from you? Look at yourself, Dr. Brighton."