Chapter 18
There’s no hesitation about my first stop when I get back to Ocean Beach.
Nick drops me and my luggage off at the main house.
A tire swing hangs from the giant shade tree and bright plastic toys are littered around the yard.
I leave my bag at the bottom of the steps and knock on the aluminum screen door.
“Sibley, stay out of the cookie jar, you hear,” Anita shouts over her shoulder before turns to face the door—and me. She stops short.
“Hi,” I say tentatively.
“Hello,” she crosses her arms defensively but I can tell she is surprised to see me.
“I came by to apologize. I never should have run off like that.”
“No, you shouldn’t have. I was worried about you.” She frowns. “And I missed you.”
“I know. I had to take care of some stuff back home and kind of get my head back on straight.”
“The teacher?”
“Yep. That’s done. He won’t be a problem anymore—hopefully not for anyone. I’m sorry he came down here.”
“He needed an old-school ass-kicking,” she says with a grunt.
“Yeah, I heard Whit gave him that black eye. Did he get in trouble?”
“You’re going to have to talk to him about that.”
“Fair enough.”
Anita watches me carefully through the screen until she says, “My mama said the Barnes girls are runners. I’m just glad it didn’t take you thirty years to come home.”
Home.
The word strikes a chord, something deep inside I never understood beyond the superficial. I reach for the door handle and wrench it open with a loud screech. Anita’s eyes widen but she allows me to pull her into a tight, clinging hug.
“So,” she says, in a slow voice, “wanna come to a Fourth of July party?”
“Yes. I really, really do.”
“Ivy’s parents will be here for the week and they always have a big cookout. Lots of crab and shrimp. We can crash at her place legally this time.”
“Sounds fun.”
“Better than France?”
“Way better.” I laugh. There’s a brief silence between us and I muster the nerve to break it. “How angry is Justin?”
“Honey, I don’t know what he’s going through right now, but I can say you hit a nerve leaving like that.”
“But he’s the one I actually told I was leaving and why.”
“That doesn’t fix the part inside of him that suspected you always would.” She notices my confusion. “Justin lives with Richard because his family took off. First his daddy. Then his mama. There are a lot of reasons those guys created that Pact. One of them was to keep from getting hurt.”
“Nick said that. He said they were all scared.”
She nods. “They may look like men but inside they’re boys—each with lingering damage. You came in here and started to repair some of that, but—”
“I left, fulfilling their biggest fear. Especially Justin.”
It all clicks.
“I can fix this,” I tell her. I step off the porch and reach for my bag. “I can make it better.”
“Summer,” she says, and I pause, “if you can that’s great, but if you can’t…you may have to let him go. For his own sake.”
I walk back to my camper and find my mother sitting on our patio with another woman her age. She’s pretty, although a bit more weathered than my mom. She’s rounder in the middle and her hair is completely silver, bringing out the blue in her eyes.
“Hi,” I say when I come into view.
“Sweetie!” My mom cries. “You’re back!”
“Yep, Nick just dropped me off.”
A million questions float between us but she remembers herself and gestures to the woman behind her. “Summer, this is my cousin, Sugar.”
“Oh! Anita’s mom?” I step forward, glancing between the two women. Everyone seems pleasant, which is a good sign. “It’s really nice to finally meet you. She and I were just talking.”
“I told her I would watch Sibley today while she got some shopping done, but I thought I’d stop by before I went over to her house.”
“Look, Summer,” my mother says, handing me a piece of paper. “Sugar brought this photo of me and her back when we were kids.”
I take the rectangular piece of paper out of her hand. The two women—girls then--were stunning. Both with long sleek hair and even in the faded color picture you can see how tan their summer skin is. “Those are some pretty scandalous bikinis you have on,” I laugh.
“We used to swap.” Sugar says. “The white one was mine and the green one your mother’s. She had a bigger chest than I did, so I would have to knot it in the back to keep it from falling off.”
Both women laugh at the memory and my mother looks happier than I’ve seen her in a while. They both look happy and it’s impossible to tell they spent the last thirty years not speaking.
“Sugar just invited me to a Fourth of July party over at the beach,” my mom says.
I raise an eyebrow and smile. “I got the same invite from Anita.”
Sugar checks her watch and stands. “I guess I better get going, or Anita will wonder where I got off to.”
My mother stands too and gives her cousin an enthusiastic hug. “Thanks for coming by,” she says.
Sugar smiles back and squeezes back. “I’ve missed you.”
Once Sugar leaves, I follow my mom into the trailer. “Repairing the family tree?” I ask.
“It’s time.”
“Why now?” I sit on my bed and she slides behind the table where her computer sits, open.
“Because you can only let wounds fester for so long, honey. I learned that the hard way.”
“So you think I’m doing the wrong thing by leaving?” I guess.
She shrugs. “Your life isn’t the same as mine. What went on between me, Richard, and Sugar has nothing to do with you. I just realized I needed to come home and put some bad memories to rest. I’m happy they were still willing to take me back.”
“So you and Richard…”
“Are testing the waters.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means we only have one life, Summer, and he and I wasted too many years being afraid. We aren’t going to let that happen again. Will we make a go? I have no idea. We aren’t the same people as we were thirty years ago—but that doesn’t mean we aren’t better matched now than then.”
I flop back on my bed and stare at the ceiling.
I try not to focus on the fact her life has come together when mine continues to fall apart.
I’m happy for her. I just need to get my act together.
I listen to her fingers click against the keyboard.
I roll over and say, “Does it ever get easier? Love and relationships?”
She looks at me over the laptop screen. “I wish it did, honey. But at some point, you have to push aside your fears and follow your heart.”