34. Claire
thirty-four
“So,what, you’re just ditching us?”
“It’s not like that, Zo.”
Apparently, all of the coaching I’d done about not crying was fruitless. The moment my sister accuses me of leaving them to fend for themselves, I’m done for.
“She’s just moving out, Zoey. Get over it. She’s an adult for crying out loud.”
Michael at least looks up from his phone to say this, but Zoey is firm on her stance: Her brows are drawn tight, and I couldn’t erase that scowl with a magic eraser if I tried.
“Michael’s right,” I nod. “This is just what happens when you grow up. It’ll happen to you guys one day, too.”
“But who will teach me how to braid?” Harper asks, crawling into my lap on the living room couch.
I gather her hair into a ponytail and start twining three strands slowly together.
“I’ll still come visit.”
“It won’t be the same,” Zoey insists, crossing her arms.
Oliver doesn’t quite understand. But while Harper sniffles silently in my lap, it’s Ryan who punctures the arrow through my heart.
“Claire, if you’re gone, who will tuck me in at night?”
The realization hits me, just how much I’ve taken on. Am I doing the right thing?
I pull my little brother into a hug, burying my own tears into his soft brown hair. I don’t even get the chance to reassure him before my mom is barking orders at them.
“Okay. Say goodbye to Claire. We’ve got, like, eight places to get to.”
She snaps her fingers and I wince, watching my siblings fall into line with dread on their faces as they embark into the unknown. My mom leaves me with a disapproving, bitter expression, and I give myself one spare moment to let the guilt chew on me before I have to lock it up.
You don’t realize how much unnecessary crap you have until you have to shove it all into boxes and haul it away. Even with the way I’ve tried to live minimally—after seeing my parents want for things all my life—I still have more boxes than Penelope and I alone can fit into both our cars in one trip.
Even with the massive amount of trunk space her Escalade—Escalade???—has.
“I didn’t realize River Valley paid their teachers Escalade well,” I balk, shifting the box that I had perched on my hip, because I almost dropped it upon seeing her massive wagon in my parents’ driveway.
Penelope shrugs.
“They really don’t,” she chuckles, taking the box from me with ease. “I learned way early on to be responsible with my money, so now I have room to play.”
I sigh, taking her at her word, and move to work on the rest of my boxes.
“You’re doing the right thing,” Penelope says, coming up from behind me. “If they couldn’t even shift around their schedules for one night to help you, Claire Bear, their priorities aren’t straight.”
She tosses me a sad smile, and I can’t decide if that truth makes me feel better or worse. I toss it around in my head, the knowledge that my parents didn’t even offer so much as a box when I said I’d be moving out, let alone their time.
Because time has always been what they’ve coveted. Not their children, not the home they built for their Facebook friends and company Christmas cards, but getting to have all of that and still live like they’re in their twenties, without a care in the world.
A new sort of pain grips me, slowly braiding itself around my esophagus as I heave the heaviest box I can find—full of books—to take on some of my mental load. I’m doing my best to grunt around the ball of tears clogging my throat when I hear a commotion coming from the front yard. Immediately, I fear that my family has returned. I don’t get to decide which would be worse—them coming back to give me another lecture, or to beg me not to leave—because of the scene I find when I get to the open front door.
It’s Lucy and Aaron, standing in front of Aaron’s SUV and a minivan I’ve never seen before. They’re both wearing wide grins. Another SUV pulls up behind them, and Sam steps out, followed by a tall, gangly boy with dark hair, sporting a River Valley High track hoodie and athletic joggers. Juliet appears a moment later, her baby strapped around her with a wrap.
Aaron rubs his palms together and smiles.
“Where do we start?”
I can’t drop the box in my hands, because it weighs a thousand pounds and will likely break my foot if that’s where it lands. And besides, my books are my babies. The only things I’ve ever been able to really claim as my own, and the worlds I’ve always escaped into when home became a nightmare. I almost do. I almost let the box go, but Penelope comes up behind me at the exact right moment and puts her hand on my shoulder, squeezing lightly.
“They love you. Let them.”
Let them.
Because in the past, I have been forced, and then determined, to do everything on my own.
So, instead, I let her reassuring shoulder squeeze and those two words pulse in my hesitant veins as I say, “My bedroom is the first one on the right.”
With five vehicles, it only takes us two total trips to move my things. I took no furniture, since it all belongs to my parents. They didn’t outright tell me I couldn’t take my bedroom set, but I took my possessions and the three bookshelves I bought with my own money and left the rest. I only lingered on the ghost town of my bedroom once before I closed the door and turned my back.
“I just can’t believe you cleaned it before you left,” Sam says, chewing on a slice of pizza that I provided for my moving crew in the most stereotypical move of all time.
“I would’ve done the same thing,” Aaron says, shuddering as he adds, “My momma would’ve come over here and yanked me out by the ear if I hadn’t.”
Mine wouldn’t, I ponder. She’d just tell me how disappointed she is the next time she sees me.
“Thank you guys again,” I reiterate for probably the billionth time.
“We’ve got your back,” Lucy says with a smile. The rest of the crew—minus Sam and Juliet’s son Mason, who was all too thrilled when Penelope revealed her PlayStation and told him to have at it—nods and passes along the sentiment.
Hope begins to stir in Juliet’s arms, getting fussy with what I’m assuming to be the hour creeping closer to her bedtime. By the time Oliver came around, I was the one who set those routines. Her little cries bring me to a somber place, twenty-one ringing in for me with a baby bottle, since my parents took a couple’s vacation that weekend.
But at the same time…
“Let me take her.”
“Are you sure?”
“Absolutely. I need my baby fix.”
She passes over the chubby, dark-haired girl, and my body washes in reminiscence. I tuck her to my chest, and she instantly coos, falling prey to the rocking technique that got me through Oliver’s infant years.
“Excuse you? Baby whisperer?” Sam exclaims, until Juliet shushes him. “Can you teach us how to do that?”
He says the rest in a whisper, and I grin at the baby in my arms who is in the pre-sleep-drunk state of smiling. She’ll be out in a matter of minutes.
“Absolutely,” I say quietly, smiling down at Hope.
“She must be going through a sleep regression,” Juliet elaborates.
“I remember when it was like that with Oliver. I was in my junior year of college, and I studied for finals on the floor of his nursery.”
“And you helped raise all five of your siblings?” Lucy asks.
“Mhm.”
“God, I wouldn’t want to have kids anymore after that,” Penelope says, then tips her beer back for a swig.
“Pen!” Juliet exclaims.
“What?! I’m just being honest. Raise five kids that aren’t yours instead of getting to live a normal childhood? I’d be done.”
The sadness that fills my smile isn’t new. But the camaraderie is.
“She’s right. I don’t want kids. I decided a long time ago.” It shouldn’t feel this freeing to admit it, but a weight falls off my chest with my admission, joining the one that had fallen away when I shut my bedroom door at my parents’ house. “I’m pretty content to be the fun aunt.”
Eventually, everyone has to leave. Tomorrow is Friday, after all. We all have to be at work, although, Sam has already admitted that his students will be watching a movie, and Juliet winces as she says that she planned a “flashlight read.” How I wish I could join seventh grade again, just for the day.
I say my last thank you’s, and help Penelope clean up the dinner dishes before we both crash on the living room couch. She lays her head on my shoulder and exhales.
“Welcome home, roomie.”
I can’t help the way that statement makes my heart flutter with anticipation in the same moment that a noose of guilt tightens.
“Hey. This is going to be fun! We can host book club at our place.”
I nod.
“It just sucks that I have plans this weekend. I’m sorry to leave you here all alone on your first Friday in a new place.”
“No, it might be better this way. You can go have fun with your brother, and I can get settled and not aggravate you.”
When Penelope revealed that Connor had invited her to spend the weekend with him and his dad’s family, I was kind of relieved to get to process this weekend on my own.
“Let’s get one thing straight: You’re not aggravating me. I want you here. For as long as you need, or as long as you’d like to stay.”
Later, in the guest room that is now mine, sleep won’t come, even tucked into the queen-sized, comfy bed that swallows me whole with its downy comforter. I’m scrolling on my phone when it vibrates in my hand.
Nathan
Did everything go alright with the move?
My heart cinches. We haven’t spoken in almost two weeks, effectively calling it quits after that moment in his bed. As the weight of the day settles, I remember our fingers zapping in the doorway to my temporary classroom, and the concern in his eyes, hidden behind his glasses. I decide that I am allowed one moment of guilty pleasure after the day I’ve had.
Claire
Everything is all moved in. Thanks for checking.
I set my phone on the bedside table, expecting that to be the end of it, but my phone vibrates again almost immediately.
Nathan
I hope this isn’t a strange observation, but why aren’t your nails painted?
I have to laugh. He would notice—he did notice earlier today, when he’d rubbed his thumb over my chipped manicure.
Claire
Not strange at all.
Since I’m moving out on my own, I didn’t think spending money on my nails was the responsible choice anymore.
I’ll live.
The way bubbles pop up and disappear several times in our text thread makes me giddy. I can’t have him, and yet, here he is, texting me late at night to check in.
Nathan
I’m glad to hear it went well.
I know we shouldn’t, but I’d love to see you. Would you like to come over for dinner this weekend? If you and Penelope have plans, I understand.
I can’t have himflies out the window.
Because right now, want triumphs over the do’s and don’ts.
And I want Nathan. Rules be damned.
Claire
She’s actually going out of town tomorrow. I’d love to see you, too. What can I bring?