Maya
She had known this was coming. But knowing it and walking through it were not the same thing.
She pretended she couldn’t hear the whispers. The back of her neck burned.
Every familiar face that turned away felt like a fresh betrayal.
She had come to this picnic every year for as long as she could remember. The smell was the same as it always was. Char and smoke and something sweet underneath.
The man at the grill met her eyes. He frowned and looked back down at the burgers, ignoring her.
Maya’s stomach folded into a hard, painful knot as she stumbled past.
She thought about Reid at the table, nobody buying the cakes.
She tried to fix a smile on her face.
Maya heard the dunk tank before she saw it—the shriek of children, a dramatic splash, a bubble of delight that carried.
One of Owen’s colleagues was hauling himself back onto the platform, dripping wet and laughing. A line of kids stretched back across the grass, clutching their tickets, practically vibrating at the chance to dunk their teacher.
Maya had always loved the dunk tank. There was something about it that reduced everyone to the same age—the adults screaming louder than the children, the dignified neighbor who coached little league suddenly flailing through the air with his arms windmilling.
She watched the current volunteer hit the water.
She could raise a lot of money in that tank today.
Half the picnic would line up for the chance to drop her into the water.
Another child ran past her, nearly colliding with her legs, and looked up with a startled expression. His mother following appeared a moment later, glanced at Maya, and scooped the child ahead without speaking to her.
Maya had done nothing wrong.
She had given this community years of herself. She had loved it and it had turned on her.
She felt so alone.
"Maya." Sandra was standing a few feet away, Greg beside her. They both looked uncertain.
“Let’s walk together,” Sandra said.
Maya swallowed. “I’d like that”
They walked, the three of them, while the party moved around them.
They made it to the edge of the sports field, where the picnic thinned out and the noise became manageable, and she stood there with her hands in her pockets and her face turned slightly away from the crowd.
She had come.
She had walked the whole length of it.
She was still standing.