CHAPTER TWELVE
Friday morning, my watch still hadn’t ticked, but the Bearberry Cabin Wi-Fi was having a rare working moment—enough to catch Grier’s Instagram post. Her architectural shot featured the tennis court built on the sprawling Quintero compound.
Twin racket heads crossed in the foreground, and the caption read, Love or nothing.
If I’d also been there, our team of three wouldn’t have worked for tennis. Since spring, it had been harder and harder to make us work in a way that didn’t leave me feeling like a film extra to the leading duo.
Grier and Ana had found love, and I was genuinely happy for them.
But there had been no goodbye to the shape we’d made as three best friends.
I’d waited, but they never acknowledged our collective change in status, which made me determined to not care so much.
To never bring it up, which was something the years with my parents had made me so very good at.
I stared once more into my screen. I normally would have responded to Grier’s post with something cute like two heart emojis. But I left the comment section blank and, once again, swiped away my regret.
I tried to busy myself around the cabin, but I couldn’t stay here with only my bitter loneliness to keep me company another second.
Penn had left me with questions. I would have to wait until he returned to continue to investigate those.
But he wasn’t the only mystery in my life.
I grabbed my keys and set off to learn more about Del’s miraculous vision.
A short time later, I parked along Cedar Street, immediately noticing a change to the Spines and Pines exterior. Del’s birdcage hung from the wooden awning, but instead of feathered friends, it held two clay pots with red flowers.
Today, though, I’d come to check out another business.
I still hadn’t been to the site where a runaway Jeep had crashed into the front window.
I avoided caffeine because of my migraines and, as a result, avoided most coffee joints too.
But Penn’s curiosity had rubbed off on me, and I wanted to see Needles for myself.
I shifted toward the sidewalk when the watch face snared one corner of my vision. Penn. Had I conjured him this time?
As I wound the watch crown after so many days apart, butterflies swarmed my belly, zooming around the kind of nervous-excited feeling that had inspired radio hits and big movie moments. But I squashed those tingles as quickly as I could. The “we” he loved referring to was temporary.
“Welcome back to downtown Sacred,” I said as Penn appeared and gauged his surroundings.
He moved in front of me, warm-sensation close. His outfit of the day was medium-wash jeans I’d seen before, new-to-me black sneakers, and a simple navy-blue T-shirt. His smile lit me from the inside—a welcome sensation after my body had churned over Instagram.
And right when I said, “What was up with . . . ,” he butted in with “So the last time I . . .”
We both laughed, and it was my turn to scan the street.
“Do you have earbuds?” Penn asked. “You can pretend you’re talking to someone on your phone.”
Of course! Earbuds would help me interact with Penn in public. Leave it to a ghost to find a better way to live. I fished in my backpack for the case and popped in the buds, then wedged my phone into the front pocket of my jeans so it was visible.
“Nice one,” I told him. Then I jutted out my pointer finger. “You left me at the end of a covered bridge.”
“Which I never would’ve done on purpose. But yay, you! Clearly you made it back, so Thomas Guide for the win.”
I glared. “You left me at the end of a covered bridge before telling me the very important thing you remembered.”
“Guilty,” he said, right before his face twitched with recognition. He gestured ahead. “Wait. Is this the antique shop where you got the watch?”
“The one and only. Any memories?”
Penn stepped closer and paused to take in the Spines and Pines storefront and the street. He shook his head. “Nothing comes to mind, but that doesn’t mean it won’t.”
Disappointment pinged softly, but I plastered on a smile. “Let’s get off the street. There’s a place I want to check out, and it’s perfect for the catch-up session you owe me.” I led him down the block and pointed to our next stop.
“Needles,” he remarked about the corner shop painted in steel gray with white trim. A black pine-tree outline drawn into a coffee-mug handle made the cute logo. The infamous bay window I’d read about in the article, now totally renovated.
A bell over a forest-green door dinged inside, and once again, Penn appeared two paces ahead of me in the homey space that smelled of roasted beans and cinnamon.
A chirpy voice bordering on cringe pelted me from behind the counter. “Welcome to Needles! What are you pining for today?”
Penn’s immediate bark of laughter had me turning toward him instead of the barely-of-legal-working-age barista.
“That is truly atrocious,” my favorite ghost said, which I agreed with so hard, I realized that not only was I not ordering what I was pining for, but I was also giggling into what the rest of the place would’ve called empty air. Despite the earbuds, I was failing my deal-with-Penn-in-public test.
“You did that on purpose,” I said in my best ventriloquist impression.
His wink went straight down to the base of my spine, and I spun back around to see that, thankfully, the barista had been called away by his manager (Needles polo, clipboard, pen behind ear).
Then the chirpy clerk was back. “Welcome to Needles! What are you pining for today?”
“Seriously, what?” Penn teased from behind me. As the onlooking manager nodded his approval, Penn added, “‘Needles’ to say, this kid must be super green.”
Zero play from me this time. I bit my cheek as Penn snickered his way over to an empty two-top table. I finally managed to order a decaf iced latte and a spice muffin.
“Looks delicious,” Penn said, eyeing my treats. “And remember that I don’t mind you eating.”
“I don’t mind me eating either,” I said before swallowing my first bite of muffin. My brows furrowed over the taste, and I took another bite.
“No good?” Penn asked.
“No, it is.” I plunked my phone on the table for show. “But there’s a flavor I don’t know.” I looked to the menu board for clues. Horror flashed across my face. “I think he gave me a cascara muffin instead of the spice one.”
Penn leaned in. “I guess we’ll know for sure in a couple hours.” I leaned in. “That is not helpful.”
One more inch. “I’m nineteen.”
I flinched backward slightly. “What?”
“My memory from the bridge. I’m nineteen.”
I pulled the brown notebook and opened it to our running list. “My guess was close.” But a feeling cast a shadow in the center of my chest. Penn had only lived for one more year than me. “Did you remember anything more?”
He cupped his hand around his stubbly chin, giving it a light scratch. “Yeah, and that’s the part that actually came first. It’s not a memory, though. We missed something,” he noted. “At the bridge, the T-shirt I was wearing under my button-down. It was from a concert.”
I sat arrow-straight in the chair.
“While you were telling me about your family,” Penn continued, “I saw the year printed around the edge of the logo. It was a T-shirt for this band, Bye Bye Bridget.”
“My friends and I just saw their show,” I said. “I can’t believe I didn’t recognize even a part of their logo.” I made a breathy snort. “What is wrong with me?”
He grinned. “Based on the efficacy rate of other known laxatives, I’m thinking you’re about to find out.”
Curious, polite, and funny.
I shot him a playful side-eye before recording the age Penn was when he died, and the year printed on his shirt.
“It’s something. You were nineteen in the last three years, and you .
. .” I trailed off. It was still so hard to say.
“I mean, it was fairly recent. Your last day here. Your clothes back that up.”
“But now we have proof.”
I glanced up from the notebook. “Why do we have it, though? Why do you get these specific memories when you do? It can’t be totally random.”
“Well, there is one thing,” he supplied. “Every time it happens, it feels like a memory is close but out of focus. Like I have to actively will myself to reach it, and if I can, then it clicks.”
“That makes sense. On the outside, it looks like you’re concentrating really hard,” I said.
“Whatever triggers it has to have something to do with that,” Penn said, pointing to the watch. “It’s the only reason I’m here at all.”
I drummed my fingers over the tabletop. “Maybe when you go somewhere familiar or important, or do something you’ve experienced before, it releases a memory?” His favorite bridge, the barn full of cut wood.
“So we just have to keep trying places and . . .”
“And wait for your life to come together. Piece by piece, like my tía’s mosaics.”
He smiled at that, then tipped his chin. “For now, all you can do is drink your coffee before it gets cold.”
I laughed and sipped my iced coffee but noticed a hint of that strange flavor mixed into the espresso and milk. On a grumble, I pushed the drink away.
“Really? There too? That info is not on the coffee menu.”
“Tastes like it,” I said. “Maybe all those cheery puns are an act, and that barista has something against short Cuban girls wearing earbuds.” I stowed the notebook, my vision landing on the new bay window. Penn’s memory and our discovery had overshadowed the real reason I wanted to come here.
Today, a rectangular two-top table stood in the alcove. “What Del saw two years ago with the Jeep crash—it happened right there,” I said.
Wide-eyed, he studied the nook. A young couple sat there now, huddled over a wedge of chocolate cake. “The space is so tight that anyone sitting there is almost right up against that window. That little girl’s head.” He shook his.
“I know. Thank God she’s okay.”
“All because of Del,” Penn said.
The name lit a light bulb above my head. “You know that feeling you get before you leave?” I asked him.
“Too well.”
“Have you felt it yet?”
“Nope,” he said.
I zipped up my backpack. “Do you think this watch might want us to go to the fair?”
A good old county fair would be filled with a lot of local teens and nostalgia—all promising memory kick-starters for Penn.
Del had already invited me along, but I didn’t want to actually commit to “going with” her.
I also didn’t want to show up alone, though security cameras would show only me sidling through the entrance turnstile.
We stopped at Bearberry Cabin first because Anne Shirley needed to eat.
Penn stood at one end of the kitchen while the orange kitty gobbled up her dinner.
The secret to her not turning up her snobby nose at the boring kibble Del sent along?
I tossed in little bits of turkey lunch meat as a fun topper. Yeah, I had a cat.
And the fact that Anne Shirley looked up every few bites to stare into the miraculous space that Penn took up was more proof that she sensed, or maybe even saw, him. And that was always something.
“?Qué calor!”
My belly sank as Tía Vivian entered the tiny space. “The rain left but forgot to take the humidity with it,” she added as she grabbed a sparkling water from the fridge. “I’m almost done with the new bridge railing. Did you see?”
I still wasn’t used to the fact that only I (and maybe the orange tabby) could see Penn.
“Not today,” I said, answering her question.
I peered through the window that faced Bearberry Creek.
She’d replaced the original, plain railings with new ones from the workshop.
Even from this far, the floral vines she’d carved into the golden teakwood stood out as something masterful. Special. But . . .
“The new owner wanted a lot of fancy work for one little footbridge,” I said. And in Viv’s catalog, fancy meant deathly expensive.
My tía shrugged. “Money isn’t an issue with this client. And art isn’t only for the big and important things. Small things should get attention too.”
Vivian lunged at the oasis of the kitchen sink, splashing cold water over her face and neck. Her tan was Malibu-princess level, but . . .
“Sunscreen only works if you reapply,” I said. “You’ve been out there since dawn.”
Vivian tucked a smile behind her snarl. “And I could go a hundred more hours, sobrina. Is this you practicing for being a proper madre Cubana?”
I flicked the comment away on a huff. Marriage and . . . kids? I didn’t see how those fit into the Perfect Triangle I’d designed. Not when every image of that kind of future kept bouncing off too many sour childhood memories.
“I might be home late.” I deflected. “We’re going to the county fair.” Immediately, I blanched. One glance at Penn showed way too much amusement over my flub for the second time today. A How you gonna get out of this one? remark sat between his brows.
But Viv was unfazed. “‘We’? You mean you and that girl, Del?”
I exhaled. Yes, Tía, that’s exactly what I meant.