Skipped Thanksgiving Because of My Family's Favoritism novel · Chapter 23 of 24

Chapter 23: After

Felix stood at the head of the Lowrys' table and said nothing for a long time.

On the break-room screen, I watched his face try three different expressions.

The first was tears.

The second was fear.

The third was nothing, and it was the one I recognized.

"Yes," he said.

Bridget didn't move.

"Yes, what?"

"Yes, I picked you. Because you were Elliot's friend, and you'd do what I asked."

The table went dead still.

"It was so easy," Felix said. His voice had gone flat and light, the same voice from the stairwell. "You all came when I called. I cried for one afternoon and Daphne drove me home. Maxine fought a boy for me in a parking lot. I didn't even have to ask."

"Felix," his father said.

"Why shouldn't I say it? They'd have chosen him. Everyone chooses him. He doesn't even try."

He turned his head and looked straight down the table at the phone propped on the gravy boat.

He looked at me through the glass.

"He doesn't even try," he said again, to the camera.

My lab partner moved closer to me on the couch.

I didn't say anything.

I had nothing to say to him, and I found it did not hurt.

Daphne's mother picked up the carving knife and set it on the sideboard, away from his hands.

"Get out of my house," she said.

"Ma'am..."

"Get out. Take your father and go."

Felix's father put a hand on his shoulder.

Felix looked around the table one last time.

Every pair of eyes that had once softened for him was turned somewhere else.

Maxine's father looked at the wall.

Ingrid looked at her plate.

Even the smallest child in the corner had put her face in her mother's sleeve.

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