Chapter 2
RainOnATennRoof: Wow
RainOnATennRoof: What didn’t you say?
RainOnATennRoof: What didn’t you do?
RainOnATennRoof: You
RainOnATennRoof: I didn’t think about you. Until now. :)
RainOnATennRoof: Who is this?
silvergurl0917 has logged off Messenger.
Present
It takes exactly four hours and seventeen minutes to reach Catalina Street in Cranberry.
Without even thinking about it, I slow the car down well before Nadia’s house, eventually pulling over in front of Old Man Noemi’s in-street parking.
From here I can see enough. There’s the emerald ivy curling over Nadia’s place like a clawed, leafy hand.
When I crane my neck a little, I make out the glow from her kitchen, through the daisy-patterned curtains she sewed herself when we were little kids.
From here I can look at my new life and think about all the senseless mistakes that led me to this moment.
Sleeping with the department head.
Deciding to never again sleep with the department head.
All that stupidity leading to a very convenient firing under the evergreen excuse of budget cuts.
In my mind’s eye, I’m back in Gregory’s office, tucked in the basement of the art department at Temple University.
It is one big square with no windows, and there are piles of random objects everywhere.
I had found the mess charming once, but this day, all I see is trash.
A constellation of Skittles peeks out from under his desk.
At the very bottom of a pile of abstract expressionists’ biographies is a first edition of For Whom the Bell Tolls, covered in a thin layer of mold after a coffee spill.
My classroom is right above us—the jewelry studio.
It’s my favorite place on campus, maybe even in the whole city.
It’s got a dozen jewelry benches, each one made of rustic, knobbed wood.
A wall of windows faces northwest, which means my classes get the most luscious gold afternoon light—the perfect setting for photographing finished pieces.
A raw turquoise, blue as photos of the deep sea, bezel set in brass.
A silver locket that opens to a faceted Montana sapphire that glows like a lantern made of cornflowers.
Every day, my students amaze me, but my favorite part of teaching is witnessing the ways they amaze themselves. How they go from I can’t do this to Holy shit, I did that.
And now Greg is taking it all away.
Greg’s arms are crossed as he gives me a big, fake sigh. “I tried everything, Sage. It’s just…” He waves his hands. “You know how it is.”
And that’s how he dismissed me from the life I’d pulled together from nothing.
The one I’d slept in my van for. The one I’d sold basil starts at farmer’s markets for.
The one I’d stitched and scraped and carved up from the thinnest air, all to get away from the one place I never, ever wanted to live in again.
And now I’m looking right at it.
Cranberry.
My eyes well with tears before I can stop them. “No,” I whisper. “No, no, stop—”
A single tear makes it to an eyelash, and I violently swipe it away.
But it’s too late.
Next to me, in the passenger seat, a figure materializes like the pale curls of coffee steam. It’s only one tear, so her edges stay as blurry as a dream. It’s only one tear, so the ghost is gone before either of us can say a damn thing.
And what would I say, anyway? Sorry for killing you? Thanks for the coffee? Leave me alone now, please?
I take a breath, as deep and long as I can make it, and turn the car back on.