9. BLUE
BLUE
Five minutes had passed since Isabella got a phone call from the yacht manager.
She got the position. She’d had her interview before mine, and even though I felt relieved that I wasn’t the one boarding the yacht and sailing away, the thought of being alone once again made my chest feel heavy.
By now, I could say I’d grown used to it, but you can never truly get used to people leaving.
To saying goodbye without knowing if you’ll ever get to say, see you soon.
She slipped her arm through mine as we made our way toward my home.
“It’s just a week,” she said when she noticed how lost I was in my thoughts. “Time will fly before you know it.”
“I know.” I looked at her. “It’s just…” I let out a slow breath. “I’m worried about Gianni. Growing up, I only had him, and now it’s difficult to have just my mom and me.”
“You can always come live with me,” she said. “My dad is usually away on his fishing tours, and my mom is always at the store. My uncle is the one who checks up on me more often than my dad does.”
“I think that would be hard for me too,” I said. Tears filled my eyes. “How is he, anyway?”
“As good as he can be,” she said. “I think that’s why he’s been checking up on me, because no one saw the signs when she…” Her voice faded.
Her eyes filled with tears, and mine were already slipping down my cheeks.
When you lose someone, you always think of that loss as your own. You forget that others lost that person too, that they’re grieving just as deeply. If someone carries it well, it doesn’t mean it hurts any less. It only means they’ve become good at hiding the pain.
She pulled me into a hug, wrapping her arms around me as her tears dampened the skin on my neck.
I closed my eyes, my nails digging into my palms. I had only ever allowed a few people to touch me, and lowering that wall with Isabella meant I’d gained another friend.
And the summer before, in 2002, I’d lost one.
It was just another day, July 21st to be exact.
I worked at the gelato shop and did what I always did.
After my shift, I’d head home, clean the house, go to sleep, wake up, and do it all over again.
I’d never suffered from the need to be the center of attention or spend every summer day outside.
I preferred staying home, locked away with my music.
Somehow, it was easier to live inside my dreams until the day I could make them real.
When my shift ended, I locked up the shop and walked toward the town center, but it was far too quiet. I took the path by the port because it was an easier walk home and spared me the steep hill.
A crowd had gathered beneath the cliffs, standing in a circle near the shore. Someone was lying motionless on the pebbles.
Oliver was there, along with my brother, who held Isabella tightly against him.
One of his hands rested on top of her head while she cried into his chest. I didn’t know her well back then, so I wasn’t sure if the person on the ground was someone close to her, but my heart still began to pound, urging me forward.
As I stepped closer, the murmurs faded. People glanced at me, then quietly moved aside.
The first thing I saw was a hand, its fingernails painted pink with tiny white daisies on each one.
I swallowed. My feet refused to move.
I passed Gianni and Isabella. Just before I reached the center of the circle, Oliver stepped in front of me, blocking my path.
I’d never stood this close to him before. He towered over me by at least two heads. When I lifted my face, all I could see were his green eyes, his jaw clenched so tightly it looked painful, and his brows drawn together as he slowly shook his head.
“Don’t,” he said.
I tried to brush past him, but he caught my wrist. I shoved him anyway, and this time he let me through, though I could still feel him behind me, close enough for his breath to brush against me.
That’s when I saw who was lying on the pebbles.
“No… no, no.”
The words tore out of me, catching in my throat. I lurched forward, my legs moving before I could think. A sharp ringing filled my ears, drowning out everything else as the world around me blurred.
God, please. Anyone but her.
I shoved past the people standing in front of me, desperate to prove my own eyes wrong.
They weren’t.
My heart pounded wildly, then seemed to stop the moment I saw the still body of my best friend.
“Annie!” I screamed, collapsing beside her.
The light that had always danced in her eyes was gone, leaving them clouded white.
Her lips, once soft and pink, had turned purple, and her face was frighteningly pale.
Pink glitter remained beneath her eyes, streaked down her cheeks as though she’d been crying.
Her hair was soaked, her top and jeans drenched with sea water.
Both of her hands were twisted at her sides.
“No.” A sob caught in my chest. “Please… no.”
I shrugged off my denim jacket and draped it over her, pulling it gently up to her neck. Her top had become almost transparent from the water, and I couldn’t bear the thought of strangers staring at her.
My fingers wrapped around her hand.
It was ice cold.
I lowered my head and pressed a kiss to her fingertips.
“Annie…” My voice broke between sobs. “Why are you so cold?”
I clutched her hand against my chest as tears spilled onto our interlaced fingers. Footsteps approached behind me, but I didn’t look up.
Nothing else mattered.
Only her.
“Gabby.”
Oliver’s voice came from beside me, cold and controlled as always.
I turned to face him, meeting his eyes. “Oliver, why isn’t she waking up?”
He didn’t say anything. He just stood there, turning his head toward the sea.
“Annie.” I pressed my hand against her face. “Annie, don’t leave me. Please, not you too.”
I heard him walk away. He didn’t say another word.
He just left.
I lowered my head again as the tears kept falling.
“1Piccola,“ an older woman said softly, trying to pull me away.
She managed to move me only an inch before I collapsed over Annie again.
From somewhere behind me, I heard someone say they had seen her jump into the sea from that cliff. And I didn’t even know she was here.
She was supposed to come tomorrow. We were supposed to prepare for the Light Festival, and now there was no point. There would be no light left in it.
My only friend is gone.
No. It’s not true. She’s just sleeping.
I shook my head and gently patted her cheeks, but she didn’t move. She lay there completely still, as though I didn’t exist. Pink glitter covered my fingertips, and I stared at it, unable to look away.
She had been happy.
Another set of footsteps approached. This time it was Gianni. He pulled me away from her, and this time, he managed.
“She’s gone,” he whispered. “We have to go. They’re taking her to the coroner’s office.”“Gianni, no, she’s not dead,” I cried. “She can’t leave me. She just can’t.”
My fists slammed against his chest.
“Why do people always leave me? What’s wrong with me?”
“Nothing.” He pulled me closer. “Just… sometimes, something is wrong with people.”
I snapped back to the present, wiping away my tears.
That’s how it is. I wish I could tell you it gets easier, but it doesn’t.
There comes a time when you learn how to keep going, when you laugh again and life carries you forward.
Then, on the most ordinary day, you stumble across something that reminds you of them.
Suddenly, they’re everywhere again, and all you can think about is how much you wish your favorite person were still here.
That’s what Annie was to me.
She was my favorite person.
My best friend.
Sometimes I still catch myself talking as if she’s here, as if she’ll come back this summer and we’ll go to the Light Festival together. We’ll catch up like nothing ever happened. But no matter how long I waited on the beach with two pieces of paper and a bottle, she never came.
I always made a wish for her, too.
Mine was to turn back time. To hold her a little tighter. To smile with her a little longer. To convince her to stay with me. To talk to me.
And for her… I wished she would come back to me.
Then I’d throw the bottle into the sea, hoping that maybe, just maybe, the sea would grant that wish.
But I know my wishes will never come true.
Only my fears do.
It’s been a year, but it feels like a decade. I guess that’s what grief does. A minute without your favorite person feels like a year, and a year without Annie feels like a lifetime.
“My uncle never forgave himself,” Isabella said. “And my aunt never forgave him.”
“I always asked myself why she did it.” I swallowed the lump in my throat. “But I guess only she knew the reason.”
“No matter what the reason was, it drowned her.” She wiped away her tears, then cupped my face and brushed mine away with her thumb. “The truth is, she was drowning long before she jumped. We all thought she was strong, but even the strongest people drown when they can’t carry the pain anymore.”
“I know.” I sniffed.
Slowly, we made our way to my house. My mom stood by the window, a cigarette hung between her fingers as she stared toward the port. Then her gaze focused on us.
Her eyes were swollen from crying, yet her face was calm.
Too calm.
She had no reason to be, and somehow that frightened me more than if she’d been screaming.
“Is she okay?” Isabella asked.
“She is,” I said quietly. “Out of all of us, she’s more okay than we’ll ever be.”
The truth was, I didn’t know.
She never talked to me. She could have been carrying burdens none of us could see, but she never spoke about them. Not to me. Not to anyone.
We stepped inside and climbed the stairs until we reached the apartment door. The moment I opened it, my eyes landed on a worn brown leather suitcase waiting beside the staircase.
“Look who finally decided to show up,” my mom said as she closed the window shutters.