Work Text:
In the burned house I am eating breakfast.
You understand: there is no house, there is no breakfast,
yet here I am.
September, 1982
Holly isn't stupid. Like alright, she’s 15, but she isn't naive, she knows when things are happening. She always knew when her dad was trying to pretend he wasn’t drunk and she always knew when her mom was pretending she wasn’t mad and she still knows when her dad isn’t okay. Like when he’s kind of on the edge of a nervous breakdown and he looks like he needs a drink before nine AM. Holland hates that she knows this, but it’s saved him a few times, back in the worst of his drinking days. He still does it, but ever since Jack Healy started coming around saying things like, “Jesus, March, not in front of the kid,” her dad started acting right.
Well, as right as Holland March could, anyway.
So she knows, that Sunday morning, something’s wrong. Jack left in a hurry the night before, the door slamming behind him as he got in his car and drove away. A lot of weekends he sleeps on the couch because the guest room in the new house is a storage shed more than anything else and her dad might have stopped drinking so much, but he’s still pretty shit at follow through. Eventually Holly will start cleaning it and he’ll feel guilty and come help. She just isn’t that eager to go through their meager possessions that survived the fire, even five years later.
But back to Jack. He left, in the middle of the night, and Holly slipped into the hallway to watch her father stand in the foyer, looking like he was going to run out after him and instead lit a cigarette in the living room before going outside.
In the morning, he makes Holly eggs, because some things do change, except for the part where her father pretends to eat a piece of toast while he reads the paper and Holly scarfs down two eggs, two pieces of toast, and a glass of whole milk.
“Did you and Mr. Healy get into a fight?” she asks, right as Holland takes a sip of his coffee. He chokes and coughs and has to go get a dish towel to clean up the mess.
“Jesus Christ, Holly.”
“Why’d he leave?”
“He’s an adult, sweetheart. He has his own place.”
Holly wrinkles her nose. She’s seen Jack’s apartment, some tiny thing he got after the comedy club got sold last year and the new owner said she didn't want a PI living upstairs. Jack was nicer than either of the Marches would have been, and he moved everything out in one go. It was closer to them, by five minutes, but Holly liked that it was still far enough away that Jack could be convinced to spend the night. He made great breakfast.
“He hates his apartment,” Holly points out, and her father doesn’t disagree. Instead he just nods and fills his mug again, sitting down across from her. “What did you fight about?”
“Nothing. Just…difference of opinion.”
“About work?”
“Sure. Hey do you wanna go to an art museum today? I've got a meeting with someone across the street, maybe we can look at some paintings or whatever and I’ll go next door and have a chat with a new client. Sound fun?”
“Why isn’t Jack coming?”
“He’s got stuff to do today. For another case. We're just doing a quick meeting it's fine, he’ll catch up.”
Holly doesn’t want to fight with her dad. It sucks and she's meaner than him, but sometimes it's worth it.
Just not today, she decides, and goes to get dressed for the museum.
Jack doesn’t come around for the rest of the week which means her dad is home a lot more during the day. Holly comes home from school to find him working at the coffee table, watching a Dodgers re-run from the night before and smoking with the window open.
“Outside, dad, you promised outside.”
“Shit, fuck—” He drops the cigarette into a can of Diet Pepsi and scowls. “Sorry, lost track of time.”
Holly opens a few more windows and lights a candle. “Where’s Mr. Healy?”
“He's busy. Hey, why don’t we go get something fun for dinner, huh? Or I’ll make tacos, I think we have everything here.”
“We don’t. You've never made tacos for me once.”
“Then we’ll go get some.”
“Dad can you just—can you stop lying? Can you tell me what's going on?”
It’s always a little like a tennis match. Holly serves, her father volleys back.
“Sweetheart, I’m not gonna bore you with the shit me and Jack don’t agree on, alright? You could fill a fucking ocean.” His hand twitches over the pack of cigarettes. “I'll order a pizza.”
“You and Jack fight all the time. I know what you don’t agree on. This feels different.”
Holland gets up and goes to the phone, lifting the receiver and looking through the takeout drawer for the number to Salvatore’s. “Holly, enough. It was a stupid fight between two grown men, we’ll get over it and move on.”
“What did you say to him?”
He slams the phone down so suddenly, Holly jumps. “How come it’s gotta be my fuckin’ fault, huh?” he asks. “What if Jack’s the asshole this time around?”
Holly doesn't know why, maybe because she so rarely incurs her father’s direct anger, but the outburst makes her lip quiver.
Holland pinches the bridge of his nose. “Fuck,” he says, then, “Fuck.” He sits down at the kitchen table and holds his hand out to her. “C’mere.”
She goes. She’ll always go, probably. He hugs her and she remembers her mom used to say that Holland gave the best hugs, because he meant it. Because he said a lot with them.
“Sorry,” she mumbles into the smoke-scented collar of his shirt.
“What?” He pushes her back gently. “No. Stop it. None of that shit. Don't let me talk to you that way ever again, you hear me? You have my full permission to be as mean as necessary to get me to stop. Fuck, Holly, you're not making this easy.”
It's never easy, she wants to say. You make it hard all the time. But she shouldn’t. He needs her right now. She steps back to grab a kitchen chair and pulls it close, sitting so their knees are touching.
“Tell me what happened.”
“Oh my god.” Holland puts his face in his hands and breaths. “I can’t fucking believe this.”
“Dad.”
“Jesus Christ, okay.” He drags his hands down his face. “I need a cigarette, Holly. I can’t do this unassisted. You gotta let me smoke inside.”
“Just this once.”
“Thank god.” He goes to the living room and fumbles to get one free, smoking it and starting to pace.
“Should you sit?”
“No. Maybe. Fuck, I don’t know.” He takes a long drag and blows it towards the open window before bringing the ashtray to the kitchen table and taking a seat. “Okay. You know how we went to the pool a lot this summer?” Holly nods. “You know the nice old men who were there every day and they told you how pretty your swimsuit was and got you the ice cream cones sometimes?”
“Finch and Vinny.”
“Yeah, those guys. Remember when you asked about them? What I told you?”
“You said they were queer. They were gay.”
“That’s right.”
“Even though Finch was married, you said some guys like both.”
“They sure do.”
Holly frowns. “I don’t get it. Does Jack not like them?”
“I—no, sweetheart, it’s not about Finch and Vinny at all. It’s about—” He sighs. “It’s that I wanted to—that I’m the one who—” He takes another drag. “I’m Finch, in this scenario. Okay? And I thought…I thought Jack might…wanna be Vinny.”
It’s takes Holly a few seconds to process. Holland is shaking like a leaf the whole time, trembling hand clutching his cigarette. He stares at her and she looks down at the spot where their knees touch.
“You…like Jack. The way Finch likes Vinny.”
“Well I think Finch and Vinny might be a little beyond liking each other, but yeah. Yeah, I do. I did.”
“And Jack said…no.”
“He…yeah. Basically. He said no.”
Something unwelcome and bitter wells up inside her. Holly suddenly remembers that one of the boxes in the guest room has her mother’s dresses in it that survived the fire. She remembers watching her father box them up, sealing them away with the smoke and smell.
Holly wanted Jack to sleep there. In the room with her mother’s things.
“Did mom know?”
The question might as well be a slap for how hard her father starts, nearly dropping his cigarette. “Yes,” he says. “She knew. She knew everything about me. No one’s ever known me better.”
“Did you really love her then?”
“Fucking—what? Holly, yeah. Yes, I loved your mother. I still love your mother. She just…she knew everything. I couldn’t keep secrets from her. And it never mattered. She didn’t care. I told her things I never told anyone, that included,” he adds, waving his cigarette.
“Except Mr. Healy.” Calling him Jack feels alien now.
Holland sighs. “I—well. Yeah. But I told him a while ago. I just—”
“You told him a secret you’d only ever told mom?” Holly stands. “You told him before me?”
“Hey, come on. It’s not—it’s not the easiest of subjects to broach, alright? I wasn’t sure what you’d think and it’s just—I don’t know, it seemed like a stupid thing to tell you when I wasn’t gonna do anything about it.”
“But you did. You asked him to be your…your Vinny.”
Holland winced. “Yeah, I’m not sure I like that example anymore, but sure. Yeah. My Vinny.”
“So, what, he was just going to move in? He was just going to be here and it would be like that and you wouldn't tell me?”
“Holly, I would never do that kind of shit without telling you. Whether it was Jack or whoever, some woman, I would never bring someone into our house without telling you—”
“But you did! He’s here every day! He cooks us fucking breakfast and he calls you Holl—” She chokes on it. “Fuck. Fuck.”
“Holly.” Her father stands and puts the cigarette out before reaching for her. She steps back, taking the chair with her in an angry scrape across the linoleum.
“We just got this house. It was her birthday.”
“I know.”
“I’m going to bed.” She turns to go down the hall.
Holland follows her. “Sweetheart, come on. It's early. Don’t go to bed mad, it's not good for you.”
“Goodnight.”
“Holly—”
She slams the door. “Goodnight!”
He stands outside the door for a few minutes, saying her name every so often. Holly leans her forehead against the door and breaths.
“Sweetheart, please.”
She swallows. Eventually, he leaves.
When she was nine, a year before the fire, her father showed up in the middle of the week in September to take her out of school.
“Is everything okay?”
“Yeah, it’s great.” He took her backpack and pointed to the car, where her mother was sitting with her bare feet in the dash, a wide hat on her head.
“Hi, lovey.”
Emma March was beautiful. She kept her nails painted red and wore dresses everywhere she went with wedge sandals that barely brought her to Holland’s shoulders. They smoked like chimneys together, and he took the cigarette out of his mouth that morning and handed it to her before pulling out of the parking lot.
“What are we doing?”
“Goin’ to Disneyland. Takin’ a vacation,” her father said.
“It’s September.”
“Yep. Means less tourists. Probably. Who knows, but we’re goin’.”
Her mother looked into the backseat and grinned. She had kind of crooked teeth, but her lips were always bright red and she was so happy behind her giant sunglasses. She pushed them to the tip of her nose and winked.
“Long weekend by the beach, too,” she said.
It was the last strong memory of her Holly really had. The fire had wiped out days and days of her life, but the moments would sometimes come back, like sirens in her head. A dress and a whiff of perfume. A song on the radio her father would suddenly turn off.
She wakes up the morning after their fight, hungry and tired. Maybe this is what being hungover feels like. Her head is pounding as she goes to the bathroom and tries to get ready. She throws up a little in the sink.
Holland’s not around. The bed is made and there’s a note on the counter that he’ll be back. Holly needs to get dressed, but she’s not particularly motivated.
Her dad comes back with an armful of groceries, happy to see her.
“Hey, good, you’re still in your pajamas.”
“Oh, uh, yeah—”
“It’s fine, we're playing hooky.”
Holly shrugs. “Okay.”
“I’m gonna make breakfast—” He pulls out some bread from the bag. “And the we’ll go do whatever you want to do.”
“I need new shoes.”
He nods. “Great. We’ll get new shoes.”
Holly sits at the kitchen table, watching her dad putter around and make coffee and toast. It was weird at first to see him like that, but then Holly remembered, in the old house, he and her mom would cook together, and there was a time when Holland March could make waffles.
As it stands, he makes a pretty decent plate of bacon and eggs.
They don’t talk about the fight. Holly isn’t sure what she’d even say right now. She doesn’t care that her dad is Finch — that he’s queer and he wants Jack Healy to move in and go to the pool with him and maybe get matching tattoos and pretend they aren’t holding hands when no one is looking. She laid in bed for a long time last night and thought about it and decided if her mother didn’t care, then she wouldn’t either.
But it’s the Jackson fucking Healy of it all.
Mr. Healy, who makes great pancakes and broke her dad’s arm and almost killed a man and takes her to school sometimes when he’s on his way back to his apartment. He’s funny, the way a car crash is funny when no one gets hurt. Like you can’t help but laugh at the absurdity of it all. He and her dad don’t make a lot of sense on paper, but they work well together, you can’t argue with results. And there’s money now, better jobs, too. No more picking up cases from the cops who used to throw Holland a bone, now they get referrals.
So yeah, Holly doesn’t care that her dad wants to kiss men, but she kind of cares that he might have wanted to move someone into their house.
She doesn’t want that. But the thing she wants most, she can’t have.
She cried about it last night, but sitting in the car on the way to the stupid mall, she starts crying again.
She wants her mom.
“Holly?”
She doesn’t answer. She can’t answer. Her whole chest is aching with the missing of it all.
“Holly.” They’re on the freeway and traffic is bumper to bumper, so he leans over and puts a wide, warm hand on the back of her neck. “Sweetheart, I’m sorry.”
“It’s not fair,” she says, but mostly what comes out is snot. Her dad gives her a few minutes before he digs into the glove compartment for some napkins. She blows her nose, wet and loud.
“Try that again?”
Holly sniffs. “I miss mom,” she says, knowing full well it’s going to break him.
Holland’s face falls. “…Fuck.”
“I’m sorry. I know it’s been a long time—”
“It hasn’t,” he said. “Fuck, Holly, you can miss her, I do, too.”
“But you told Jack—”
“I told Jack something important about myself because I trusted him. Because I knew even before I asked him to—”
“To be your Vinny.”
“Jesus Christ. Yeah. Before the other night, I knew he wouldn’t give a shit. And because I—” He stops. “Doesn’t matter. What matters is that’s done. And you were right. I should have told you first.”
Holly shakes her head. “I don’t know. I don’t…think I’d know what to do with it. Like it feels huge and it also feels stupid, y’know? Mom didn’t care, so I don’t either.”
He looks surprised. Not at the honesty, just —
“Yeah. She didn’t care. Look, there’s lots of things I could tell you about me and your mom, but you’re kinda young, sweetheart. We were a team though, right? Your mom was always in my corner, and I always had her back.”
Holly smiles. “Remember when you guys got thrown out of the movie theater?”
“Wow. Wow. That’s a deep cut. You weren’t even born yet. Your mom was pregnant. That’s crazy, did you absorb that through the womb? With your little baby genius brain?”
Traffic starts moving again. Holly wipes her cheeks.
“You don’t have to buy me new shoes, dad.”
“Nah, I’m gonna. I need some, too. We’ll eat in the food court like weirdos.”
She laughs and leans against the window to watch the cars rush past.
October, 1982
“Jack’s gonna start coming around again. Is that okay?”
Holly looks up from her cereal bowl. “Why?”
“Because we’re good. We worked it out.”
“What does that mean?”
Her dad sighs and comes to sit across from her. “It means we’re grown-ups, and we’re business partners. And friends. Before anything else. Jack misses you.”
Holly isn’t sure how to feel about that. She puts more Captain Crunch in her mouth. “Okay.”
“Yeah? It’s alright?”
“He’s not your Vinny, is he?”
Holland sighs. “No. He’s not my Vinny. He doesn’t feel that way and we’re…good. That’s good. It’s just fine.”
It doesn’t seem fine, but Holly’s not going to push it.
Outside, Jack Healy’s car pulls up.
“Seriously?”
Holland looks out the window and sighs. “Jackass. He was supposed to wait for me to call.” He looks at her, like he’s checking if it’s okay. She shrugs.
With Jack back in the house things feel…normal and also not. He’s kind of overly nice, comes in with food and coffee all the time, offers to drive Holly to school and asks about her grades.
“How’d that test go? The one we studied for last month.”
“Fine.”
“Good. You’re a smart girl.”
And so it’s nice to have him there, saying sweet things and being good to her dad. They fall into their regular old bullshit easy, like nothing happened. It’s simple for them, and that’s really great. Holly likes that her dad is happy because for a long fucking time he was a miserable asshole and it was mostly his problem, but it was hers, too.
She leaves them on their own one night, walking to Jessica’s so they can sit in the basement and pretend to watch a movie while Janet gives everyone press-ons and they pretend to drink from one bottle of Miller High Life Jessica stole from the fridge.
“I like the red,” Jessica says, holding Janet’s hand up the light. “It’s pretty.”
“My mom says it’s a hooker color, but she bought it anyway.”
Holly takes an actual drink from the bottle and hates the taste. She hands it to Jessica. “Red is classy, your mom doesn’t know what she’s talking about.”
“Yeah, well she’s being a bitch anyway.”
Jessica chokes on her drink. “Janet!”
Holly raises a brow. She’s not surprised, Janet’s been kind of going through her rebellious phase. She told Holly she wanted to stop going to church. Just for a little while, to see if she missed it.
“That’s why Holly’s so lucky,” Janet says, breaking off one of the nails from the kit. It cracks and she swears.
Holly blinks. “What?”
“You’re lucky,” Janet says again. “Your dad probably never acts like that.”
Holly stares. Janet doesn’t seem to know what she’s said, and she’s already moving on. Holly can’t really hear. There’s like a ringing in her ears and it keeps getting louder and louder. She tries to swallow and nothing happens.
She gets up and starts walking up the stairs.
Jessica looks at her. “Where are you going?” she calls after her, but Holly just keeps walking. Past Jessica’s parents in the living room, out the door, and down the street. It’s a fifteen minute walk and she does it without thinking, without hesitating, without even looking or knowing where she’s going. She just walks. She thinks for a second about walking to the old house, which is closer and still just an empty lot with made up walls and bedrooms. But she walks home. Opens the door and finds her dad watching baseball with papers strewn all over the coffee table and Jack doing a fucking crossword at the table.
“Hey, whoa, what are you doing home?” He gives the half-drank beer on the table a little push, nothing to see here, but he’s not drunk and Holly knows it.
She always knows.
“I wanted to come home.”
Holland looks at her.
He always knows, too.
“Holly, what’s an eight letter word for frantic?” Healy asks, and Holly wishes he was fucking dead.
“Frenetic,” she says. “Sorry for interrupting.”
She goes down the hall and hears her dad mutter quietly, “Fuck.”
“What’s the matter?”
“I’ll be right back.”
Holly walks faster, but Holland stupid fucking long legs March catches up with her, and she kind of wishes he was drunk because his reflexes are always shit when he’s wasted. He puts a hand on the door before she can slam it shut.
“Holly.”
“I’m tired, dad. I wanna go to bed.”
“What happened?”
“Nothing.”
“No, tell me—” The phone rings. Jack picks it up. “Tell me what’s going on.”
She stares at him. He stares back.
Jack clears his throat.
“It’s, uh. Jessica’s mom. She said Holly left and she wanted to make sure she got home okay.”
Holland nods. “Yeah, she’s fine. Tell her thank you.”
“Sure, sure.” Jack leaves them alone.
Holland looks at her again. “Holly.”
“Why is he here?”
Holland sighs. “I told you, we’re good. We’re working.”
“No, you’re dicking around.”
He points. “You said he could come here. Don’t get mad at me just because you’re in a pissy mood. What’s your problem? Why’d you leave Jessica’s? You got her mom all worried.”
“It’s stupid, forget it, can you just leave me alone?”
He folds his arms over his chest and stands in front of her door. It’s so fucking annoying that he’s chosen now to start being responsible. She wishes he'd waited until she’d moved out.
“Janet said something stupid—”
“Stop the fucking presses,” he mutters, then shakes his head. “Sorry, uh Janet. Boring Janet said something stupid. What did she say?”
Holly collapses on her bed, staring up at her ceiling. In the old house, there were stars up there.
“She said…she said I was lucky. Because her mom’s being a bitch and I don’t have to deal with that. She said you probably never act like that.”
There’s a quiet in the room that unnerves her. It’s so silent she can hear the TV, the dull roar of the stadium crowd.
“You’re missing the game.”
Holland comes and sits on the bed, laying down beside her.
“That was a real shitty thing for her to say.”
“Yeah. I kind of just…shut down.”
“Jesus.” Holland covers his face with his hands. “Fuck, sweetheart. I'm sorry.”
“It’s fine. I told you, it was stupid.”
“No. It was mean. And patently untrue, I’m a huge bitch sometimes.”
Holly looks at him, and he’s already looking at her.
“Janet sucks,” he says. “And I’m glad you came home.”
“She’s just going through a phase or something. That’s what I heard her mom saying.”
Holland sits up. “Do you wanna go through a phase? Would that make you feel better?”
“I think I’m going through one right now, it’s just not that bad.”
He nods. “Okay, well. That’s good. I don’t want you to miss out on the teen experience.” He sighs. “Look, if you don’t want Jack here—”
“I want him here. I like Jack,” she admits. And that’s not a lie, she does. She hates him a little, too, but she’s pretty sure that’ll pass. Whatever he wants to be, even if it’s not her dad’s Vinny, she thinks it’s better that he’s here.
“You hungry?” he asks. “We got Chinese but I didn’t eat all of mine.”
“Okay.” She gets up and follows him out of the room.
“Maybe Jack’ll give you the rest of—”
Jack is gone. He’s left a note on the table that he’ll be back tomorrow. It’s one difference between before and now. Jack doesn’t spend the night anymore.
Holland sighs. “Come on,” he says. “Let’s feed you.”
Holly knows people think her dad is handsome. A lot of her girlfriends kind of swoon a little when he pulls up in the car to get her after school sometimes, giggling like idiots when he lights a cigarette and waves.
And then there’s the moms — Holland tries to show up for school things now, even though he and Holly both hate going, and they flutter their eyelashes and crack their gum and watch him stand with his hands on his hips while he listens to Holly’s english teacher explain The Odyssey assignment everyone is doing this year with her cheeks turning Pepto pink.
“What’s her problem?” Holland asks under his breath when she leaves, and Holly just shakes her head.
“Recently divorced.”
“Ouch.”
“Yeah, don’t even think about it.”
He looks mock-aghast. “I would never.”
“Whatever, Romeo. Can we leave before my math teacher shows up? I think you’re his type, too.”
Holland shushes her and they walk quickly back to the car.
“You can’t say stuff like that,” he says, lighting a cigarette before they back out of the parking lot.
“Why? No one could hear me.”
“Yeah, but someone might. You just—” He shakes his head. “You can’t say that,” he says again.
“Sure,” Holly says. “Whatever you say.”
They’ve been strangely blasé about the whole Finch and Vinny thing. Holly wants to understand, but Holland isn’t so willing to talk about it.
“Can you just tell me when you knew?” she asks one night. They’re sitting in the backyard while Holland blows smoke at the stars and Holly drinks chocolate milk.
“Uh. A long time ago. Maybe in high school. I had a girlfriend, you remember Susie? She used to be friends with your mom, too. She had a brother. Chris Knife was his name. He was the quarterback on the football team.”
“Ew, that’s cliche.”
“I know, isn’t it?” He laughs and shakes his head. “Anyway, he had that whole too cool for school athlete thing going for him.”
Holly balks a little. “That does it for you?”
“Don’t say does it for you. This is already an insanely inappropriate fucking conversation for us to be having. But, uh. Yeah. Sometimes.”
“Did you tell him?”
Her dad laughs. “Fuck no. Absolutely not. No way. Honey, I didn’t tell anyone until I met your mom.” He takes another drag. “No, it was just…it was my secret.”
Holly watches him. It makes her kind of sad, actually, that her dad had to hold onto that. She thinks about what it feels every day, carrying the memories of her mom, things no one knows except Holland and Holly. She can’t imagine carrying this, too.
“Maybe he’d be your Vinny now,” Holly says.
Holland shakes his head. “Nah. He—” He stops. “He died. Car crash with him and some of his friends. It was pretty fucking awful, actually.”
“Jesus, dad.”
He points at her. “Hey. You asked. Sorry,” he adds. “Fuck, that got gruesome. You wanna go watch the game?”
Holly nods and Holland takes a last drag off his cigarette before he drops it into the little collection in a garden pail of dirt by the door. Part of his effort not to turn their new backyard into an ashtray, he said. Holly remembers Jack bought it.
In the morning, they’re standing in the driveway, bickering over where to go to breakfast, when Jessica’s mom pulls up in her station wagon.
“Hey Marches!”
Holland looks over his sunglasses and grins. “Mornin’ Linda.”
“Holl, this is my sister, Nancy.”
Nancy is a pretty brunette who leans one arm out the window and gives them a wave. “Hey.”
Holland holds out his hand. “Nice to meet ya.”
“Nancy’s doing a thing with the Los Angeles Ballet until Christmas, isn’t that nice.”
Holland nods. “Sure is. Holly did ballet, you remember that?”
Holly shrugs and gets in the car.
“You guys should come by for dinner next week, I’ll have Paul throw something on the grill.”
“Yeah, I’ll give you guys a call.” He waves and they watch the station wagon make the turn onto Jessica’s street.
“Subtle,” Holly mutters, when Holland starts the engine.
“Yeah, well. She was pretty, right?”
“I guess.”
He looks at her. “You know it’s probably gonna happen. Like I’m gonna meet someone, Holly.”
“Does it have to be Jessica’s aunt?”
“No, but it could be someone else.”
Holly buckles herself. “Like Jack.”
“No,” Holland says, pulling out of the driveway. “Not like Jack.” He grips the steering wheel. “Let’s go to the diner. The one down the street, alright?”
“Whatever.”
“Don’t start this shit this morning, okay? I get it, you’re pissed off about fucking everyone and everything. I was fifteen, too. But I don’t want to be alone forever, alright?”
“I’m here.”
“You’re my daughter,” Holland snaps. “You’re going to college, you’re gonna move out, you’ll have your own life. Maybe I don’t wanna be alone for it, you ever consider that?”
“You can’t replace mom,” she says, and Holland almost swerves in front of a garbage truck.
“Jesus—” Holland slams the brakes at a red light and looks at her. “What the fuck is wrong with you?”
“With me? You’re the one who wants a new wife!”
“I want a relationship, Holly. Fuck’s sake, I’m not replacing your mom. That’s not—” He shakes his head. “We’re done talking about this. We shouldn’t even be talking about this. I’m your dad. If I wanna date Jessica’s aunt, I’ll do that, got it? You’re a kid, I’m the parent. Enough.”
Holly slumps in the seat. “Take me home.”
Holland shrugs. “Whatever you want,” he says, and makes a u-turn that probably breaks nine laws.
Back at the house, Holly goes straight to her room and slams and locks the door. She hears Holland get back in the car and drive off, which is fucking fine by her, she doesn’t think she could stand to look at his face for another second.
She hates him. She hates him and she hates him and she hates Jack and she hates her mother for leaving her and she hates Jessica’s aunt for being as pretty as she is and she hates that she’s hungry, she’s so fucking hungry —
That night, she gets her first fucking period.
In the morning, Holland is appropriately embarrassed. He makes breakfast and fumbles an apology and smokes three cigarettes in the backyard before he comes back inside and says, “I’m a fucking asshole.”
“Yeah. I know.”
“You’re supposed to say, no you’re not dad, you’re great.”
“Yeah, well.” She shifts uncomfortably in her chair. There’s toilet paper folded into twenty layers in her underwear and everything hurts.
“What’s the matter with you.”
“Nothing.”
“No, something’s up. You’re squirmy and weird.”
Holly pokes at the soft yolk of her egg and watches it flood her plate. “I, uh. I got my period. Last night.”
Holland blinks. “Oh, fuck. Shit.”
“My stomach hurts.”
“No, yeah, I bet it does.” He runs a hand through his hair and gets up to grab the Tylenol from the cabinet, shaking a few into his palm. “Okay, take those, eat your food, and we’ll go to the store.”
At the Ralph’s they stand in front if an aisle of choices. Holland picks out two packs, shows them to her, and buys her a bottle of pain killers to keep in her bathroom.
“Tell me when any of these are low, or just ask me for money. Whatever you need. You want the hot water bottle?” They’re back at the house. She’s showered and cleaned, the little boxes tucked away under her bathroom sink. She nods and he puts on the kettle and brings over the rubber bottle wrapped in a dishtowel. He’s good at this, which makes sense — he used to do this for mom. It wasn’t this hot water bottle, that one melted five years ago with their photos and shoes. But she remembers her mom laying on the couch with her feet in his lap, the bottle resting on her stomach while he massaged her ankles and they watched TV. He would bring home chocolate and gummy candies and treat her extra special.
This was going to be her mom’s job, but Holland March got saddled with it instead.
“I gotta go meet Jack,” he says after a while. “You gonna be okay here alone?”
“Yeah, I’m good.”
“Okay.” He pats her leg and gets up, grabbing his jacket and throwing it over his arm. “You okay if Jack stays for dinner after?”
“Sure. Just—don’t tell him?”
“Don’t sweat it,” he says, leaning over and kissing her temple. “Just take it easy, okay?”
“Okay.” She watches him grab his keys and open the door. “Wait—dad?”
“Yeah, baby?”
“Thanks.”
His expression softens, and he hesitates. “I—yeah.” He nods. “Of course. Anything for you, you know that right?”She nods and he smiles. “Okay. Enjoy your couch time.”
The door snaps shut behind him. Holly rolls back to her side and pushes her knees into the hot water bottle, pressing it tight against her stomach until she finally falls asleep.
November, 1982
In a surprising turn of events, it’s Holland who starts cleaning out the guest room. He walks past it one Sunday morning in early November and then stops, standing in the doorway. Then he starts opening boxes.
Holly puts her book down and goes to watch. He’s just come back from a client meeting after Jack dropped him off, so he looks a little absurd in his shirt and tie, sitting cross-legged on the floor and holding up one of Emma’s dresses that didn’t go up in flames.
“That’s pretty,” Holly says. It’s a pale blue with flowers and ruffly little sleeves. Her mom wore dresses almost year round, shaved and moisturized her legs like it was a second job.
“Jesus, Holly.” He drops it with a start. “We gotta get you a bell.”
“Can I help?”
He raises a brow. “You want to?”
“Yeah.” Holly steps into the room and opens another box. It’s not all stuff from the first house. It’s also things they’ve collected since. Books and magazines, a phonebook from ‘78. Stuff they gathered in the rental that didn’t fit here, and probably didn’t fit there either. Holly opens a box of dolls she’d decided she was too old for when she turned eleven.
“Should we donate some of this?”
“Probably,” Holland says, looking at another dress now. Yellow with brown polka dots. He sets the entire box aside after a minute.
Holly scoots closer. “Can I…can I have some? Of mom’s dresses?”
“You sure?” She nods. “Yeah, some of them might fit you. She honestly wasn’t much taller than you are now, you’ll probably get taller than me.”
“Doubtful.”
“Eh, everyone needs a dream. Here.” He closes the box and hands it to her. “There’s a couple more over there. You can do what you want. I think…it all got cleaned. When your gran was here, right…right after.” Holly nods. She barely remembers that. Just Tom and Judith coming all the way from London to bury their daughter and dig Holland out of his grief long enough to stand in front of everyone in a church they’d never been to and tell everyone how loved Emma was and how much they would all miss her and how there was no one like her, there would be no one like her. Then he started crying and he couldn’t finish and Tom came and helped him off the stage.
They get most of the room cleared out. A lot of it doesn’t mean anything at all. Holland takes half of it in three garbage bags to the curb and the rest of it goes in the backseat and they drive it to the Goodwill. Holly’s walking around while her dad helps them take everything out of the car, stopping in front of a shelf with a bright blue pair of rollerskates at eye level.
“You want ‘em?”
“Maybe.”
He picks them up. “Try ‘em. I think they might fit you.”
Holly nods and toes her sneakers off, bracing herself on Holland’s arms while she gets her feet into the skates. She stands a little unsteady, but they do fit perfect.
“Let’s get these,” he says, and they walk out with skates and a new fruit bowl for the kitchen table.
Jack Healy’s kind of a workaholic. That’s what Holly’s figured out. Sometimes it’s good — Holland would love to sit on a check for a few days, drag it out, make a few earnest trips out for questions and then report back that he needed more time. Her mom would sometimes ask him if he felt good doing that, but she never complained when the money bought new shoes and nice dinners, so Holly figured it was mostly for show.
Now, they try to do honest work, because Jack was raised Catholic. At least, that’s what her dad says.
He’s sitting at their kitchen table that morning, leaning back with a cup of coffee in his hands and smiling at something her dad’s been complaining about. Mrs. Welby, some English broad who hired them to track down her husband’s mistress and see if she was really pregnant or just a “pumped up little tart.” Holland even used the accent and everything.
“Well we should go talk to her again,” Jack says. “She needs to explain why she’s writing checks if Marjorie’s such a tart, or whatever she called her.”
“This morning?” Holly asks.
Jack shrugs. “No time like the present.”
“No, we’re supposed to go skating.” She just bought new laces.
Holland winces. “Shit, yeah, we are.”
Jack shakes his head. “Go later, we need to talk to her now before she finds out we know about the checks.”
Holland shakes his head. “Nah, she’s not gonna figure that out. We told what’s her name not to cash this one for a few days.”
“Holl, she’s living in a one room apartment next to a cigar shop and a pet store, pretending to be pregnant. She’s gonna cash that check.”
“We can go after. Or you can go by yourself.”
“She likes you better.”
Holland grins. “Of course she does, but I’ve got a prior engagement.”
Jack looks genuinely put out, which Holly smugly counts as a win. She doesn’t know when she started playing some kind of game with him, but she may as well have fun with it. Jack looks at her, but she keeps her head down, eating her cereal.
“Fine, I’ll just…wait for you to get back.”
Holland sighs. “Don’t be a baby about it, you can come with us.”
“Yeah, Mr. Healy. Come skating with us.”
Jack fixes her with a look that tells her he might actually know the rules to this game after all, but Holly just smiles.
“I’m not doin’ that. You want an excuse to laugh at me, you can find one any time of day.”
Holland shrugs. “So come hang out. I’ll buy you lunch.”
Jack looks like he has a lot of things to say about that, but an hour later, he’s sitting at a table at the roller rink, watching the two of them wrestle their skates on while he eats cheese fries.
“You don’t skate,” Jack says.
“I used to.” Holland stands on wobbly legs, towering over both of them.
Used to covers a lot of territory. Jack wisely doesn’t press the bruise.
It’s a late Saturday morning so the rink isn’t too packed yet, but they’re setting up a few birthdays in the booths. Holly steps out onto the polished wood floor and finds her footing. It’s been as long for her as it’s been for Holland, but after a few laps around the rink, she starts getting the hang of it.
Her sixth birthday was a roller skating party. Not here. Holly would have probably thrown up and Holland definitely knows that. He and Emma always threw her a big party, always somewhere fun. After that one, Holly wanted to go skating every weekend, so they took her.
“Still got it!” Holland crows as he skates backwards past her.
“Show off!”
“Come on, you can do it.” He loops around and shows her how to glide her foot back, one fluid curve along the floor. “Just like that,” he says, keeping a hand on her shoulder in case she falls.
Holly starts to get the hang of it, even managing a few turns. She laughs, which startles her, because she hasn’t felt like she’s really had something to laugh about in weeks.
She glances up, and Jack Healy has a really weird look on his face.
After, she sits in the car while Jack and Holland go talk to Marjorie about the checks, and then they all pile into a diner booth for dinner.
“Good day,” Holland says, stretching his arm across the seat, resting his hand on Holly’s shoulder. “Right?”
She nods. “Yep. Good day.”
Jack looks between them, then smiles. He pays for dinner and drops them off. Holland lingers by the passenger door.
“We could look over some things,” he says. “You don’t gotta rush off.”
“I think you’re probably sick of me.”
“Need to put a timeline together on these checks, Jack. Why don’t you come in and help?”
“I’m beat, March.”
Holland nods. “Right.” He pats the door and steps back. “Well. Yeah. Me, too, I guess. Have a good night, Jack.”
Healy nods. “You, too.”
Every year since her mom died, Holly and her dad have gone out for Thanksgiving dinner. The last couple years, Jack’s come with them, but this year Holland gets it in his head he wants to make a turkey.
“When I met you, you couldn’t cook an egg,” Jack says. He’s chopping onions while Holland gags and pulls out the bag of gizzards.
“It’s called growth, Jack. Look it up. Holly, honey, please get this out of my sight.”
Holly snort-laughs and takes the bag of gizzards, tossing it into the trash. Jack’s got his sleeves rolled up and her dad is wearing a Dodgers sweater and jeans. It’s kind of stupidly domestic and, for a second, Holly thinks maybe she’d like it if they wanted to be Finch and Vinny, if it meant more days like this. They look happy together, bickering back and forth about how to season the turkey, how long to cook it, how much it weighs. Holly busies herself chopping celery for the stuffing and eventually makes herself scarce when it looks like they might actually kill each other.
“Turkey’s dry,” Holland complains later, but Jack eats every bite and tells him it’s good, to stop bitching so much, and they eat the pie Jack bought from the nice lady who lives next door to him and take a walk after dinner. Holly puts on her skates and does eggshells up the sidewalk, nearly eating shit on the curb.
“Let’s not go to the ER tonight, alright?” Holland calls after her, his cigarette bobbing in the dark. Jack’s face is soft and happy and open and he stays probably a little too long that night, nursing an Old Fashioned while Holland drinks a beer in the backyard under the stars. Holly goes to bed, listening to the quiet murmur of their voices until she’s almost asleep.
At eleven, the patio door suddenly flies open, jolting her awake, and she hears her dad say, louder than he probably means to, “What the fuck is your problem?”
“Holl—”
Holly gets up and goes to the door, opening it just far enough to listen.
“Do not fucking Holl me, alright? Jesus Christ, Jack. You know, it was a good fucking day man. I really thought this was just gonna be a nice day and you’d go home and appreciate how fucking quaint it was. Instead you’re still just jerking me around, huh?”
“I’m not. I was just—”
“No, okay? Shut up. I’m talking. I got a good life Jack, you know that? Could be a lot fucking worse. Has been a lot worse, and the life I have is the life I come with, alright? It’s a package deal, no negotiations.”
“I wasn’t trying to—”
“Because I got a lot of good things going for me! Like things are honestly looking up like they never have before. And you know what’s kind of shitty about all that? You. Because you’re most of the reason they’re better.”
“That’s not true, March.”
“Well I haven’t been doing it by myself! And it’s not Holly’s job to prop me up anymore. Never shoulda been, Emma would have killed me.” Holly hears him sit heavily on the sofa. “This is the life I have, Jack. You either want to be part of it, or you don’t. You get to pick. I told you how I felt and you said no, and that’s fucking fine. I’m a big boy, I can handle it. But don’t act like there’s some other world where it works because there isn’t one, okay? This is the one we have. I don’t have the fucking luxury of wishing for another one.”
The house gets quiet. Holly swears she can hear them both breathing.
“I’m sorry,” Jack says quietly.
“Yeah, well.” Holland sniffs. “Me, too.”
“I’ll, uh. I’ll get going. I’ll call you Monday, alright?”
“Call me Saturday. I’m not sitting around all weekend on this one, we need to stake out that club before someone gets wise.”
“Sure, sure.” The front door opens. “You know, it was a good day, March. Really. One of the best.” He sighs. “Have a good night.”
When he’s gone, Holly thinks about going into the living room, but by the time she works up the nerve, Holland’s already on his feet, going back outside to smoke a cigarette before going to bed.
December 1982
Whatever it was, they don’t talk about it.
Holly thinks of a hundred ways to bring it up, but none of them sound right and her dad never mentions it. Jack shows back up like nothing happened and they drive to meetings and stake-outs and he orders them pizza and everything’s just…okay.
Holly skates almost every day.
It rains more, so when it does, she nags Holland until he says yes and he drives her to the skate rink, sometimes joining her, but mostly smoking at a table and looking over photos or reading a magazine. He seems happy she wants to do something other than be angry at him, and honestly, they’re mostly okay.
She’s mostly okay. Sometimes she wants him to go out for a smoke and never come back. Holly thinks about how quiet the house would be, how maybe no one would even notice. Just her and her memories, careful and selective.
Does she remember her mother’s voice? She does. Posh and pretty, but she forgets, sometimes, what she might say. Holly and Holland used to fight before the fire, because they run off the same kind of thrumming, ceaseless energy Emma never had. She grounded them, kept either one from flying off the handle. Without her, Holly’s tried to reason maybe she needs to be her, but she thinks if she told her dad that he’d walk into fucking traffic.
She puts on one of the dresses one day, when she’s home alone. It doesn’t fit right — Holly’s not quite grown into the body she’ll have, but Holland was right, her mother wasn’t much taller than her. The dress sits strangely, too stiff from years of sitting in the box. Holly knows she’s imagining it, but if she inhales deep enough, she thinks she can smell the smoke.
The thought makes her stomach turn. She runs to the bathroom and dry heaves into the sink, coughing and gasping, feeling stupid, stupid, stupid.
She gets the dress off as quick as possible, yanking it free and throwing it across the room like she’s been —
No.
No.
Anyway. She pulls on a sweater and jeans, settles into them like a cocoon and shoves the box of her mother’s clothes so far under the bed, maybe they’ll tumble into some other world and she’ll never have to see them again. She tries to read, she paces, she tries to eat, but everything tastes like sand.
She grabs her skates and goes outside to do circles in the cul de sac.
Jessica’s mom invites them over for a Christmas party. It’s a mix of kids and Jessica’s cousins, a few family friends and the Marches. Holly abandons her father immediately and latches onto Jessica’s side, disappearing into her room to listen to music and contemplate the blunt she stole from her uncle.
“I shouldn’t,” Holly says. Her dad admitted that he and her mom smoked weed years ago, but she knows he’d fucking have her hide if he caught her doing it now.
“Pussy,” Jessica says, but she can’t do it either. She shoves it into her bedside table drawer and they go out into the living room to find something to eat.
At that moment, Jessica’s aunt Nancy pulls Holland under the mistletoe and lays one on him.
Jessica gags. “Gross.”
The whole thing kind of makes Holly hover out of her body a little bit. She’d never seen anyone kiss her dad except — yeah.
Holland gently pries Nancy off of him and ushers her along. “I think you’re a little drunk,” he says, and it surprises Holly that he isn’t. He spots her a few seconds later, looking sheepish before he vanishes to go smoke outside with everyone else.
After, they walk back home in the cold, and Holly says almost against her will, “I guess Nancy is pretty.”
“Jesus Christ,” Holland mutters.
“Did you like it?”
“I am not answering that. Stop talking about this. Now.”
“She really seems to like you.”
“She’s too young for me. She’s twenty-eight.”
Holly exhales, watching her breath cloud. “Isn’t Jack, like. Sixty?”
“Be quiet.” They walk a little while in silence. Holland sighs. “He’s fifty-four.”
“Oh-kay.”
“You’re getting fucking coal in your stocking, you know that right?”
He holds her hand anyway when she reaches for it, all the way back home.
Jack makes Christmas dinner in their kitchen, and he gets Holly some wrist-guards and knee pads.
“You’re always skatin’ outside, I’m worried you’re gonna break something.”
It’s a sweet gift and she says thank you and shoves them in her closet later. She gives her dad a few new ties, new sunglasses because a guy punched him in the face last week and broke his, and a new wallet. Holland gives her a Walkman.
“Holy shit.”
“You like it?”
She nods and hugs him, immediately going to get one of her tapes and test it out.
Jack gives Holland a watch. It’s heavy and gold and looks expensive, which Holly’s trying not to think about. The fight on Thanksgiving feels like it happened years ago, or maybe like it didn’t happen at all. Sometimes Holly wants to grab her dad and yell at him, he hurt you, why is he still here because wasn’t Holland good enough for her mother? Didn’t Jack know that? Couldn’t he see?
Just like Thanksgiving, it’s nice. It’s nice in a way Holly wishes it wasn’t. But it would be stupid and mean to try and make it anything else.
Before he leaves, Jack gives her a box of tapes from his car.
“You like Kim Carnes?” he asks.
“Sure.”
“Okay, I think there’s a couple Kim Carnes tapes in here. Bunch of other stuff. Lady next door was gettin’ rid of all these. Your dad told me about your Christmas gift, figured you could look through and see what you like.”
Holly takes the box and nods. “Thanks, Mr. Healy.”
“You—you know you can call me Jack, sweetheart.”
“Sure. Merry Christmas.”
Jack nods. “Yeah.” He pulls her in and kisses the top of her head. “Merry Christmas.”
People keep on changin’
So everyone’s gotta bend
I’ll keep waiting
Love’ll come around again
February 1983
Jack hasn’t picked her up from school in a long time. Holly usually walks, or takes the bus, but today she comes out to see him reading the newspaper and waiting for her. She waves off Janet and Jessica and goes over to him, leaning against the passenger side.
“You know you look like a real creep.”
He swears. “Jesus, kid. Scared the shit out of me.”
“I assume you’re here for me?”
“That’s right.” He leans over and opens the door. Holly thinks about it for a second before she tosses her backpack in the backseat and climbs in.
“What’s the special occasion?”
“Nothin’,” he says, turning onto the street. “Was close by, thought I might save you the walk. You want ice cream?”
“It’s February.”
He shrugs. “I can eat ice cream any day of the year. Could eat ice cream in a blizzard. Used to, actually, back home.”
Holly raises a brow and shrugs. “Sure,” she says, and leans back and closes her eyes.
He takes her to some joint she doesn’t recognize and gets her a cherry dipped and plain vanilla for himself. They sit in the car eat in silence for a while until Holly looks at the sky and says, “It’s getting late.”
“Yeah, we’ll get goin’ in a second.” He angles himself towards her. “Listen, Holly. I gotta ask you something. Or—tell you something. I guess.”
Her stomach drops. “Are you leaving LA?”
“What?” He laughs. “No! No, where the heck would I go, huh?”
“I don’t know, back to New York.”
“God, no. I mean, greatest city in the world, but, uh. No. I’m staying here.” He clears his throat. “It’s, uh. It’s about me. And your dad.”
“…Oh.”
“I know he’s…told you some things.”
“He tells me basically everything,” she says coolly.
“Right, yeah. And that’s good, I think. Mostly. So you know…what happened. Last year.”
She nods. “Yeah. Dad asked you to be his Vinny.”
“He—his what?”
“You know.” She waves her cone between them. “Finch and Vinny, from the pool?”
“Finch and—oh! Oh, yeah. Yeah, I remember. They were—” He stops. “Wait. You’re saying, in this scenario, I’m Vinny?”
“Obviously dad is Finch.”
“Why?”
“Because he was married. Finch likes both.”
Healy shakes his head. “I was married, too, Holly.”
“Yeah, but it’s different.”
He stares for a few seconds, then sighs. “Okay. Sure. Your dad asked me to be his Vinny. And, uh. I said no.”
“Yep.”
“And we had…a disagreement, after Thanksgiving. I don’t know if he told you about that.”
He didn’t, so Holly just shrugs.
“What’s your point, Mr. Healy?”
“My point is…your dad’s important to me. You’re both important to me. Lately I’ve been doin’ a lot of thinking—” He looks at his ice cream starting to melt onto his hand and tosses it into the bushes next to the car. “I want to fix this.”
Holly blinks. “…Fix it.”
“Yes.”
“How?”
Jack looks appropriately put out enough that Holly realizes right away.
She looks down at her lap. “Why are you telling me?”
“Shouldn’t I? I mean—you and your dad, you know—”
The life I have is the life I come with.
“Package deal,” she says.
No negotiations.
Healy nods. “Right. I don’t wanna just make this work with him. I want to make sure it works for you, too.”
Holly feels a trickle of ice cream hit her hand. She brings it to her mouth and licks it clean.
“You can do what you want,” she says, taking a bite of her ice cream. “It doesn’t matter to me.”
“You’re not…upset.”
“Nope.” She holds her ice cream over the side of the car and drops it in the parking lot. “Besides, it had to happen sometime. Dad finding someone, I mean.”
“It’s not about replacing anyone, Holly. You know that.”
“Yeah.” She looks at him. “You couldn’t.” She leans back in her seat. “You should take me home. Dad’s gonna be worried.”
Jack watches her for a few seconds, then nods. “Right.” As he pulls out of the parking lot, waiting for traffic to slow, he says, “So we’re good?”
“Yeah, Jack.” Holly looks at him. “We’re good.”
April, 1983
In some ways, it changes nothing.
In others, it changes everything.
Jack still doesn’t spend the night, and Holland is always home before Holly wakes up, even if it’s two or three in the morning. She doesn’t know what they talked about, or what was said, but he sits her down one day and tells her he and Jack are trying this thing for real.
“You know you can’t tell anyone,” he says, and Holly nods. “I’m sure…I mean some people are fine with it, but you know it’s not—” He runs a hand through his hair. “We’ll just keep this to ourselves, alright?”
And that’s easy enough. Holly doesn’t talk a lot about herself at school anyway. It’s simple to keep secrets. To live a life apart. So in that way, nothing changes.
The things that do — she measures them in moments. Jokes and stories and meals she doesn’t have to wonder about. Jack Healy sits at their table and he makes her father smile and laugh in ways Holly doesn’t recognize, even from before. It’s good to see him happy, and it’s good to see Jack happy, too.
Holly wants to be happy. She listens to her father laugh in the other room and tries to imagine he’s doing it for them both, even though she knows only part of this is for her.
When she was little, and she was angry, her mother would make faces until she would laugh. She gets up and goes to the bathroom, standing in front of the mirror and making faces until her cheeks turn red. It works a little. She turns out the light and opens the door and hears Holland say quietly — “You could spend the night, you know. It’s not against the law. You’ve done it a thousand times, no one gives a shit.”
“I think someone does,” Jack mutters. She hears him pull on his jacket, then a soft mmph as Holland kisses him. She gags a little.
“She’s fifteen,” he says. “She hates everyone.”
“Me especially.”
“Welcome to parenthood,” Holland teases, and Jack laughs.
“Oh, she’d kill you for that.”
“Well, she’s gonna have to get used to it. I like you right where you are.” Another kiss. Holly squeezes her eyes shut.
“You’re kind of a brat, you know that?”
“I’ve been told.”
Jack sighs. “It’s late. Maybe later this week, alright?”
“Yeah, yeah. Drive safe.”
“You’re not on the road, I think I’ll be okay.”
“Ass.”
Jack laughs and shuts the door. Holly waits until she hears her dad turn the locks and go down the hall to his room before she walks quickly to her own.
Sometimes the Nice Guys bite off a bit more than they can chew. Holland had a bad feeling about their current case from the start, but they were doing someone a favor and now he’s getting dressed to go down and file a police report.
“Is everything okay?” Holly leans against the wall as he pours a cup of coffee.
“No, actually. It’s kind of all fucked up.” He takes a sip and hisses. “Fuck, hot.”
“Where’s Jack?”
“Telling the guy we’re done. Figured he might be the best man for the job. I’m gonna see if Will down at the station can get this taken care of quick.” He won’t give her details which means it’s gotta be pretty fucked up. She can probably weasel it out of him later, but for now she leaves it. He glances up at her. “Can you, uh. Can you stay close to home today?”
“Why?”
“Because I’m your dad and I asked, how’s that for a reason?” She raises a brow. “Why does authority not work on you, huh? Who raised you?” Holly leans forward, chin in hand, and he sighs. “Because it would make me feel a whole lot better while you’re home alone, alright?”
“Sure. Can I skate in front of the house?”
“Uh, yeah. Just don’t go further than the stop sign, deal?” He holds out his pinky and she takes it with her own.
“Deal.”
After he’s hugged her a little harder than usual, Holly eats and changes before grabbing her Walkman and her skates. She’s done this a hundred times when he’s gone and usually had time to at least hit up the corner store for a soda before he comes back, but something feels wrong and she doesn’t want to push her luck. And it’s cloudy, last thing she wants is to skate in the rain.
One thing that’s been pissing her off since Christmas — every tape Jack gave her in that box is fucking great. She didn’t get rid of any of them, and she kind of hates that and she’s kind of glad. She checks the Walkman, pops in Autoamerican, and takes off.
Holland’s always telling her not to skate with her headphones on. “You’re gonna trip and crack your head open. What if there’s a car? What if I’m getting fuckin’ stabbed, Holly Elizabeth March, and you can’t hear me screaming for help, huh?” He’s always pretending not to be worried, but secretly, he’s terrified.
Holly turns up the volume. He can yell at her when he comes back.
She does a few passes around the cul de sac, then up the sidewalk and back down. The clouds are pulling in tighter overhead, so she gives herself ten more minutes. Autoamerican is fifty minutes and fifty-four seconds long. She stops and flips the tape, figures she’ll make it through “Rapture” and go inside.
She turns and starts skating up the sidewalk when thunder cracks overhead and it starts to rain. She gasps, startled by the noise and sudden downpour, fumbling on her skates and falling left arm first onto the curb.
The bone breaks with a sound she can feel in her teeth — and she screams.
One of the neighbors, Mr. Stathakis, comes over and starts fussing at her in Greek and English. He yells for his wife in the garage and she runs over, trying to turn Holly onto her back, but she can only lay on her stomach and cry and scream and swear, clutching her shirt in her hand, her headphones hanging off her head and blasting — toe to toe, dancing very close, barely breathing, almost comatose — until someone shouts, “Holly!”
She looks up, and Jack Healy’s face swims into view.
“No, no, not you—”
“Easy, honey, it’s okay.”
“Eh, do you know—”
“I’m a friend of her dad’s. Holly come on, you need to go to the hospital.”
She grits her teeth and tries to squirm out of his grip because she’s going to wait for her dad her dad is coming home and he’s going to take care of her he will he will he will —
She throws up on Jack’s shoes. Doesn’t mean to, isn’t mad about it. He forces her up and lifts her into his arms, taking her to the car and laying her in the backseat.
“Look, I know you hate me right now, but you need to see a doctor, alright?” He turns and yells for Mr. Stathakis to call down to the precinct and ask for Holland March, but whatever he says next is just sounds and her own blood pumping loud loud loud in her ears. Everything hurts. Everything hurts.
Jack takes her skates off. Eases the headphones off her head and presses stop on her Walkman. She can’t believe it isn’t broken.
“We’re going to the hospital, alright? Your arm’s broken.”
“I fucking know that,” she snarls. If he gets any fucking closer, she’s going to bite him. She’s glad she threw up on his shoes.
“Holly, just relax. As much as you can.”
“F—fuck—” Her teeth are chattering. She coughs and can’t get the rest of it out. Jack takes off his jacket and covers her. The rain’s stopped, but she’s so cold.
“It’s gonna be okay,” he says, and takes her to the hospital.
There’s a lot of back and forth for a few minutes because Jack just keeps saying, I’m a friend of her father’s, he’s on the way, but the second they try to separate them Holly suddenly panics. She doesn’t want to be alone, so she grabs Jack’s shirt and asks him to stay.
“Honey are you sure you want him here?” the nurses asks. She looks at Jack like he’s a stray, which, yeah he kind of is, but it’s not like that. It’s nothing like that. Holly wants to tell her he makes her dad laugh and she missed it, she missed it so fucking much, but instead she just nods and throws up again, this time on the nurse’s shoes.
Everything after that is a blur. They take her for x-rays to confirm the break. Jack sits in a chair and holds her hand and they give her medicine that makes her head swim and her body feel light. Eventually she hears the sound of someone yelling in the hall and of course it’s Holland, he can’t do anything without pissing off everyone in a five mile radius, but hey, maybe that’s why Jack loves him, too. Emma March always said it fondly. Called Holland a shit stirrer and a problem like they were pet names.
“Holy shit.” They’re still finishing up her cast when he gets there and Jack suddenly makes himself scares — Holly sees him flit past the window. “Holy shit, sweetheart. Holly. Are you okay?”
“No.”
“Okay, yeah, stupid question.” He looks up and sees her x-rays images sitting on the bedside table and picks them up. “Jesus fucking Christ.”
“Sir!”
“Sorry.” He sets them down and drags Jack’s chair closer to the bed. “I’m right here, okay? I’m sorry it took so long, I think Mr. Stathakis called three different precincts before he got to me.”
“S’okay.”
Holland pushes her hair back. “They gave you the good stuff, huh?”
“Kinda can’t feel my tongue.”
He laughs. “You’ll be okay,” he says, and kisses her brow. “You’ll be okay.”
It takes another ten minutes to finish the cast, and Holly’s arm feels huge in it. She stares at it while the doctor explains everything they’ll need to do. After a while, a nurse comes by to tell them to wait to be discharged.
Holland sighs and sits on the edge of the bed. “Scoot over,” he mutters, and lays down beside her. “Why don’t you sleep, alright? It’ll take at least an hour for them to send us home.”
“M’not tired.”
“Of course you’re not. You just tough it out then for me, huh? See how long you can stay awake.”
Holly sighs, resting her head on his chest.
“Dad?”
“Yeah.”
“I’m sorry.”
Holland looks down. “Okay, help me out here. For what?”
“I don’t know. Just…stuff. I guess. This.”
“Don’t be.” He kisses her temple. “There’s nothing in this whole fuckin’ world you ever need to be sorry for, you hear me?” She nods. “Good. Now get some sleep.”
She closes her eyes, feeling like maybe she’ll drift off. Someone knocks on the door, but she doesn’t look.
“She okay?” Jack asks.
“Yeah. Just dealing with the pain meds. She’ll be out the rest of the day probably.”
“Poor kid.”
Holland sighs. “Yeah, well, good thing you were there.”
“I’m sure Mr. Stathakis—”
“Jack. You were there. For once in your god damn life, let me appreciate you for something, alright?”
“…Yeah, alright.” The chair creaks as Jack sits. “I gotta tell you, Holl. I don’t know how you do this parenting shit. I don’t think I’m cut out for it.”
Holland laughs. “I got bad news for you, babe. You’re already doin’ it.”
“I’m not—”
“Who took her skates off, huh? Who put her in the car and drove her to the hospital? Who’s been worried out of his damn mind for the last hour?”
Jack groans. “Christ.”
“Look, she may not want you, but the truth is you’ve been doing this for a while. You just didn’t know it.”
“Yeah, but she hates me.”
“I told you. Parenthood. You’re a natural, stop fighting it.” Holland strokes her hair and kisses her head. “She’s a good girl, Jack. She’s just sad and angry. Her mom should be here, and she isn’t. I should have been better, and I wasn’t. She wants to get mad and hate you and hate me, let her. I think she deserves to be pissed off for a while.”
“Mr. March? We’re ready to send her home.”
“Great.” He gets off the bed. “Just watch her for a minute, okay? I’ll go take care of everything.”
Holly keeps her eyes closed. From his chair, Jack leans forward and she feels a warm, dry hand covering her good one.
“Package deal,” he murmurs. “You sure are gonna give me a run for my money, huh kid?”
Holly doesn’t move, doesn’t speak. But she does, carefully, let her fingers curl around his for just a second before he pulls back.
Maybe, she thinks, she should give him a break.
June, 1983
To celebrate Holly being cast free, they talk Jack into going skating with them.
“I can’t believe you’re not scared shitless of this,” he mutters, standing on shaky legs.
“It’s not the skates’ faults I fell,” Holly says. “Come on, you’re doing great.”
Jack shakes his head. “I look ridiculous.”
Holland’s already on the rink, showing off and getting back into the swing of things. “Nah, you look great,” he says, whipping past them.
Holly shakes her head. “Ignore him. Just take it one step at a time, okay?”
“Sure, sure. Easier said than—” He wobbles, almost toppling over, but steadies himself. “I can’t believe I let you talk me into this.”
“You love us,” Holly says, and Jack laughs.
“God help me,” he mutters, looking across the rink at Holland, “but I really do.”
After, they get burgers and take Holly to the beach. She closes her eyes and lets the water rush up over her feet before she bends down and lets her arms get soaked in the spray. It’s crowded, even for the evening. Jack and Holland are waiting at the car, bickering about a case. Eventually, when she’s had enough, she walks back, kicking sand out of her shoes and throwing herself into the backseat of Jack’s car.
Holland looks up in the rearview mirror and grins. “Lookin’ good Miss March. We’ll go to the pool tomorrow, huh? Say hi to Finch and Vinny.” He looks over at Jack and winks.
“Pain in my ass,” Jack mutters, and pulls onto the road.
It’s not always good. Sometimes, it’s worse than it ever was. Sometimes, they fight. Sometimes, Holly slams her door and screams into a pillow. It isn’t fair that her mother is gone. It isn’t fair that Jack still doesn’t know if he should move in or not. It isn’t fair that Holland sometimes drinks until he can’t walk straight, even if it’s rarer, even if it’s almost never at all.
It isn’t fair that she follows them, and it isn’t fair that Holly wishes she’d never go away.
Someday soon, she’ll have lived longer without her mother than with her, and that isn’t fair either.
But then, other days, it’s great. It’s really great. Her dad remembers the school play and they take Jack to the movies for his birthday. They watch baseball and listen to records and Holly learns to cook. They plan a trip to New York, and Holly starts daydreaming about college, about packing her things and leaving her mother’s ghost behind.
And then sometimes — it’s just a day. Nothing extraordinary happens. Nothing is terrible Nothing is spectacular. She comes home, she does her homework. Someone makes dinner, and they talk about nothing important at all.
It’s those days, when she catches her dad putting a hand on Jack’s neck, when Jack leans over and kisses him goodbye, when they both muss her hair before going out on a case — it’s those days when Holly starts to feel like everything is okay.
Like she’s going somewhere — and she’s going to get there just fine.