And now, all of it, every single thing I endured, wasn’t for me. It was for him. Scott. The boy they adopted. The one they were building everything for.

I wanted to scream, but all I could do was hold the milk bottle in my hand so tight I thought it might shatter.

After a moment, I forced myself to move. My fingers fumbled with the door handle, but I finally opened it and stepped inside.

Mom rushed over as soon as she saw me. Her apron was so patched up it was impossible to tell what it used to look like. She wiped her hands on it and gave me that worried look she always did. “Savannah, why didn’t you call? Your dad could’ve picked you up! You shouldn’t be walking around alone, you know how hard that is for you. I’ve been worried sick!”

Her words made my chest ache, but this time it wasn’t from comfort.

Dad was on the couch. He gave me a guilty smile, his hand moving quickly to stub out the cigarette he was holding. The faint smell of smoke lingered in the air.

“Oh, you’re back,” he said, like everything was perfectly normal.

I just stood there, staring at the two of them, feeling like my entire world had flipped upside down.

"Savannah, how’s the scholarship going? Did your teacher give you any trouble?" Dad asked.

I swallowed the anger, setting the milk down in front of him. "It’s fine. I gave up the scholarship and gave it to Scott. I also promised I won’t fight him for the next spot."

"You haven’t eaten much the past few days, have you?" I could tell he was just trying to sound like he cared. "I bought this with the money I made selling cardboard boxes."

Dad let out a relieved sigh and pushed the milk towards me. "Good, good. I heard the Harlow family is really powerful. We can't compete with them, so don’t worry. Even if I have to borrow money, I’ll make sure you finish college."

"Just drink the milk, Savannah. You’ve been looking tired. I can see you’ve lost weight, you need something to get your strength back."

Dad rubbed his forehead where Scott had hurt him, trying to sound casual about it, but I could tell he was faking it.

I still couldn’t shake the image of him kneeling outside the school gate for three days.

But now, I wasn’t sure when he was being real with me and when he was just acting.