Dylan felt so pissed off he could've smashed something. But he was an adult man and single father, and he couldn't afford any more criminal mischief charges, so he needed to keep the smashing to a minimum.

Instead, he fetched Talia and walked angrily out of his dad's house, stealing the picture of himself and Ellie from the entrance, making sure to leave smudges of grease on the shiny brass handles on the front doors.

When he got home, beer comforted him as he Talia play in her room by herself, thinking of his dad's and Ellie's words while simultaneously trying to push them out of his mind.

Pushing them out of his mind proved difficult, so Dylan took the picture of himself and Ellie off of the floor where he'd set it and glared at it. There he and Ellie were: donning graduation gowns and smiling. He wondered if she'd known what would happen that night.

That night happened long ago, and now they were here. Here, this moment: his dad and Ellie had pushed him into a corner. He couldn't afford to put Talia in an after-school program, not without severely limiting their spending money. Ellie helped him so much by picking Talia up from school, but right then, her help seemed conditional, like if he didn't stop seeing Leah, she might stop offering after-school childcare. His dad's financial help might be conditional, too. His dad had once said he didn't expect Dylan to pay him back fully, but he had probably kept a tab, and the oil change today would hardly put a dent on the amount owed. If he stayed with Leah, would his dad suddenly expect to be paid back in full?

He wondered if he should stop accepting their help altogether, if he should sign Talia up for the cheapest after-school program he could find, if he could even find one. If he did that, he could slowly pay his dad and Ellie back, then not owe them anything. He wouldn't even need to see them; he'd be freed from their grasp.

But that defeated his purpose for moving to Mountain Springs. He'd moved here so that he could see his family. So that Ellie could help him. So that he could enjoy life and not just live paycheck to paycheck. And now he was considering going back to a paycheck-to-paycheck life and shutting out the family he'd come here to be closer to. Because although he could now afford a better life for his daughter, it felt like his life was burning around him.

No—not "burning." That word was insensitive, given the circumstances. If he had said something like that in front of Ellie, she would be sure to tell him that. "That's insensitive language, Dylan."

Ellie. He gritted his teeth. Ellie and Dad.

Thinking again of his dad and Ellie, he wanted to punch something. He drank another beer, and thought about smashing the picture. But he refrained, putting the picture on the top shelf of his closet, its new home.

One good thing about living in Mountain Springs: he had no drug contacts. An urge for something to numb the pain, something to soothe the burn, festered inside him, and he had to take several deep breaths, reminding himself he was over that shit, and had been for years, and never wanted to do it again. He needed to be present. For Talia.

The fridge beckoned him, offering the next best thing: another beer.

After his fifth beer, he felt the sudden urge to call his mom. Disregarding his tipsiness, he dialed her number.

"Sweetie?" Her voice made him feel instantly better.

"Hey, Mom." He tried not to sound drunk.

"You never called me back when I called you last week. Or the week before that."

"I'm calling you now."

"How have you been? How are your living arrangements?"

"I got my own place."

"That's great! I'm sure living with your dad and Ellie got old pretty fast."

"It wasn't that bad," he lied, and then an idea—another lie—popped into his head. "Dad and Ellie want to invite you and Tim over for Thanksgiving dinner. What do you think? Talia misses you."

He could tell by the pause that his mom didn't believe him. "They want to invite us?"

"Well, I mean, it was my idea, but yeah. They're on board."

"Let me talk to Tim about it," his mom said hesitantly, and he wondered if that was a no.

"Please come. I could use my mom right now. And like I said, Talia misses you."

"Well...we just planned to have a whole chicken by ourselves. I suppose having a turkey with you would be better."

"You've gotta have turkey on Thanksgiving."

"Okay, sweetie. I miss you."

"Miss you too, Mom. I hope we see you soon."

Dylan hung up after their chat, not knowing whether he would feel proud or regretful of his actions once his tipsiness passed. Though he wouldn't let himself sabotage his dad's marriage, sabotaging his Thanksgiving seemed like fair game.

Still feeling talkative, he dialed Leah's number.

"Hi!" she said, and the tone of her voice soothed him. "What's up?"

"I just wanted to hear your voice."

"That's really nice. But I can't talk long. I'm at work. Just started my cigarette break. They get angry if I take longer than five minutes."

"How is work?" he asked.

"Ugh. They moved me to the SmartShopping department."

"What's that?"

"It's this new service where people can pay ten dollars to have their groceries brought out to their cars. Can you believe that people would actually pay ten dollars for that? When they could just do it themselves for free? How much time are they really saving, anyways? They still have to do their shopping on the computer."

"Does it really surprise you? People pay that much for lattes and cocktails." His distaste for this carefree spending seeped through his judgmental tone tone. "I could buy a bottle of vodka and a bottle of juice and have cocktails for days."

"We should do that," Leah said, and he could almost hear her smiling. "Have a cocktail party. Just us."

"I'd like that."

"Me too. Well, I should go, but I miss you."

"I miss you too. Come by tonight?"

"I'd love to."

Dylan hung up smiling, fully aware of the fact Leah had just used the l-word to describe spending time with him. 

The flame in his heart, the one that he thought had flickered out, suddenly made its presence known, grew larger.  That burning feeling? Maybe it wasn't such a bad thing.