Chapter Fifteen
Now
I blacked out for most of the ceremony, and then it was over. Somewhere to my left, there was an old woman crying softly. Mourners blew noses into handkerchiefs.
Besides the reporters, I recognized almost everyone here. Generations of parents and kids, many of whom I’d been with as a counselor—even shared a cabin with.
But I didn’t want to talk to any of them. I wanted to disappear. Get away from the unrelenting press of bodies and questions and tears.
Across the sea of people, I locked eyes with Kendall. Before I could lift my hand in a wave, she looked away.
So, she really did hate me. The confirmation felt like a sucker punch.
A warm hand found my lower back, and I flinched, expecting I’d have to fight off some leering reporter hoping for a photo op. But when I turned, it was only Trevor.
“Oh, it’s you,” I said, not sure if I was grateful or angry. “I thought—never mind.”
There was a tension in his eyes that made my stomach squeeze. “Can I get you anything? Do you want to go talk for a few minutes, get away from everyone? We can—”
“No,” I said, harder than I meant it. The word sliced through the air between us, and his hand twitched against my back. I stepped away from him. I didn’t want him to make me feel better.
“I’m all right. Thank you for coming.”
He gave me a stiff nod. “You know I wouldn’t have missed it.”
“Greer!” We both started at the sound of my name, always said with such unearned authority. The real cherry on top of today.
I could feel my hair frizzing from the late-morning heat, the ill-fated eyeliner melting into my eyes. They were stinging, and my lips were chapped, and my pits were drenched. I was a mess. And now, I had to deal with him.
“You should go,” I said.
Trevor opened his mouth to argue, but I gave him a look that must have been desperate enough to change his mind. I watched him walk away for a moment before a clammy hand squeezed my shoulder.
“Hey, Dad,” I said, giving him a smile that was more like a grimace. We both simply stared at each other for a long, painfully awkward moment; to hug or not to hug?
I didn’t know what the right thing was. I couldn’t even remember the last time he’d hugged me. But I threw my arms around him anyway.
His whole body tensed, for less than a second, before he put a tentative arm around my shoulder. He put his other in his jacket pocket, before not-so-subtly checking his watch.
“I’m about to head out. Lexi’s got a club soccer game tomorrow, and, well…They have a shot at the championship.”
I’d known he was coming only for the afternoon.
That was all he could make it up for, he’d told me a few days ago—the first time I’d been able to get him on the phone since my mom had died.
It stung, knowing that he wasn’t even willing to stay for the full weekend, or bring the rest of his family.
Clearly, it wasn’t worth it to him: supporting me and my mother.
It never had been, though, so I shouldn’t have been surprised.
“Nice job with your speech,” he said, and it was quiet between us for a long beat. I could feel him groping around in his mind, searching for anything at all to say to me.
“Thanks for coming, Dad. Guess I’ll see you…later.” Maybe next year. Maybe not.
I almost turned around, away from him, to let him slink off and pat himself on the back for going out of his way to be here. But then I remembered the photo in my pocket, and I forced myself to ask.
“Hey, wait,” I said, pulling it out to show him. “Do you recognize this woman?”
He squinted, taking it from me to get a closer look. “Yeah, of course. Winona, right? Winona Hayes.”
Winona Hayes. I was simultaneously excited and disappointed—I’d wanted to have a spark of recognition when I finally heard the name. But there was none. “Who is she?”
My dad blew out a breath. “Gosh, haven’t thought about her in a long time. She used to work here, back when I did. She was married to—Frank, right? Your mom sure was heartbroken when she left.”
My eyes widened in surprise. “They were friends?”
The corner of his mouth pulled up into a small, almost wistful smile. “Oh, were they. Thick as thieves. She was your mom’s best friend. She never told you about her?”
I was stunned into silence. All I could do was shake my head.
My dad looked over my shoulder, out at the lake, as if he were straining to remember something.
“Her little girl was the same age as you. You two would play together while your moms would talk. The two of them sure went through a lot of wine together back then. What was her daughter’s name…
” Despite the heat, a chill crept up the back of my neck.
Steph, I thought, filling in the blank in my head. As a baby, I’d played with Steph Bennett.
“You said ‘when she left.’ Do you know where she went?”
My dad wiped the sweat off his brow and checked his watch once more in a way that he thought was subtle.
“There were all sorts of rumors about it—no one ever had anything better to do but talk around here.” He glanced around at the grievers walking by, shaking his head, as if they were the gossips in question.
“Your mom came back to the house late one night, wailing like a banshee. It was just after your first birthday party, I remember. It had been such a long day, out here in the heat, playing with you in the lake. I was exhausted.” He coughed a laugh, but there was no real humor in it.
“I was so mad when she flung the door open, like a bat out of hell. You were sound asleep, and I thought you’d wake up.
You never were a great sleeper. She was crying so hard she could barely talk.
Completely hysterical. When I finally calmed her down, she said Winona was gone. She’d hightailed it out of here.”
I felt nauseous, thinking about my mother losing her best friend. A best friend I’d never known a thing about.
My dad twisted his wedding ring. “We were…your mom was never the same, after Winona left. It changed her.” He shook his head, as if he were coming out of a trance. “Anyway.”
I was grateful for the information—I was—but hearing him say anything even approaching negative about my mom made me want to spit on him.
He’d had a secret plot to leave, too, after all.
We looked at each other. The shape and color of our eyes was so similar, it was sometimes startling. In his face, I saw myself. But I mostly saw a stranger. I saw a man who didn’t know a goddamn thing about me, who had never cared enough to learn.
“Is that why you took that job, then?” I asked, words spilling out of their own accord. “Because she changed?”
“Greer…,” he said, like he was exasperated, and ran a hand through his too-short hair. “I didn’t mean to upset you. I know today is hard. Your mom was a very special woman.”
“Thanks,” I mumbled, the ire draining out of me, then paused before I put the old photo back in my pocket. “Does this mean anything to you?” I asked, flipping it over to show him the pencil-drawn symbol.
He closed one eye and squinted at it, and I knew immediately it was a dead end. “Not a clue.”
My shoulders slumped in disappointment, though I wasn’t exactly surprised. “Well, I appreciate you coming. Seriously.” Even if he couldn’t even stay a single night.
“Annie would be proud of you,” he said, though I’m not sure either of us knew what for. But I forced myself to smile anyway, and I watched my only living parent leave me behind, again.