Chapter 27
Twenty-seven
The month of August went by in a blur. Days between Sunday and Thursday came and went, much as they had before that day I ran into Brooklyn at Otter House.
It was almost like hitting a reset button.
I went to painting classes that Mom taught.
I ran every morning. I started a part-time job as an English tutor at a private elementary school in the next town over.
And with any free time I had, I was writing my new novel—a story told through a collection of letters to and from a girl who signs up to be a pen pal to a boy in rehab.
I’d recently sent it off to a few agents, and although it was crickets as usual on that end, I felt good about it.
It finally felt like the story I wanted to tell.
“So, you know my friend Raquel, right?” Nikki asked as she bit into a carrot. A gust of wind blew by us, sending sand swirling in every direction, including onto our paisley beach blanket.
“Is she the one who has, like, four pet snakes?” I replied.
Nikki pressed her lips together. “I’m pretty sure she’s down to three. I think one of them escaped.”
I felt my skin crawl as I imagined lifting up the toilet seat and seeing a thick spotted snake curled up in the water, like in those videos people post online about finding wild animals in their house.
“Anyway, that’s not the point,” Nikki continued. “The point is, Raquel invited us to Oakridge Farms for some rosé festival thing, and you’re coming. You’re the only person I trust to take photos for my Instagram anyway.”
“I don’t know, Nikki. They’re your friends, not my friends, and I wouldn’t want to impose or anything.”
Nikki rolled her eyes. “Ridiculous that you’d even think such a thing. They can be your friends too.”
“Okay, okay, I get it.” I sighed and started drawing circles in the sand with a twig that had been lying beside our blanket. “But it’s fine. Really, I’m fine.”
Nikki slung her arm around me. “I know you’re fine. But I want you to be happy. There’s a difference, you know.”
I glanced out at the ocean in front of us, calm and glistening with rays of the afternoon sun.
The salty air filled my lungs, and I felt a strange relief wash over me.
I couldn’t help but smile faintly to myself, because as much as I hated to admit it, everyone was right about one thing: salt water truly was the cure to everything.
I had done enough crying, letting all my sadness and anger and frustration melt away with my tears, and now the spray of the ocean cleared my head.
It was as if I was being rejuvenated here.
“I know. I will be. I just need some time.”
“Well, we’ve got plenty of that.” Nikki heaved out a sigh and sat back on her hands. “Speaking of Instagram pictures, what are we supposed to be wearing to this cooking class later? I’ll want a few pics, obviously.”
“Whatever you want,” I told her. “Except maybe things without strings or big sleeves or dangly things, because I can foresee that stuff catching on fire.”
“Of course you can,” she drawled, rolling her eyes behind her purple heart-shaped sunglasses.
We’d booked a cooking class for Mom’s birthday, partially as a joke since she was always cooking for us and partially because it was finally something the three of us could do for fun without worrying about the aftermath.
It was almost easy to forget that not everyone made a recovery, because my sister was a perfect example of someone who finally did.
The class was her idea, and we didn’t question it.
She still went to group therapy once a week, because there was something to be said about continuity and consistency and learning how to move forward and let go of the past.
But Nikki wasn’t the only one who had learned a thing or two about letting go.
I was definitely trying. But sometimes when it was quiet and I would close my eyes, I could still hear Brooklyn’s laugh in my head and still smell his warm scent in the air around me.
So I had learned how to let go, but there were little things that I kept, just like his sweatshirts in the back of my closet, which I wasn’t quite ready to let go of.
>> <<
“I cannot believe you burned it.”
“I am obviously not meant to be confined to the walls of domesticity,” Nikki said as she skipped out of our cooking class with our takeaway boxes in her hand (obviously not including the tarte Tatin she burned).
“Or a kitchen,” I grumbled, and Mom laughed.
“Not everyone has the gift.”
The sun was starting to set earlier and earlier as autumn quickly approached, and we were bathed in golden, dusky light as we walked down the street to the car.
I wasn’t sure if it was just a trick of the time of day, but my mom and my sister looked a bit brighter, as if the sun had lent them some of its light.
As we rounded a corner to the side street where we had parked, a guy in a suit collided directly with my mom, spilling her leftover coffee all over the front of her green sundress.
“Oh my goodness, I am so sorry,” he hurriedly apologized, handing Mom a pocket square from his blue button-up shirt.
He looked to be in his forties, with hair neatly styled back and faintly peppered gray.
He swung his messenger bag on his shoulder behind him, and I could barely make out the name on the ID tag hanging from his pocket, but Dr. in bold letters was hard to miss.
“Oh, don’t worry, this coffee was no good anyway.” Mom blotted at her dress, still smiling that same smile that gave her eyes a bit of glow.
“Can I at least buy you another one?” he asked.
I felt Nikki nudging me with her elbow. “Take your time, we’re gonna get a drink at Ru Ru anyway,” she called, and pulled me away quickly, before my mom had a chance to say otherwise.
We cackled as we made our way down the street to Ru Ru, a small place we’d grown to like that served tapas and drinks.
After catching my breath when we made it to the restaurant, I felt an odd pang in my chest, and it reminded me about Brooklyn and the day we first met.
Was he off in another rehab, running away from nurses and spilling coffee all over someone else?
I looked back down the street, where my mom was still chatting with the man. She laughed at something he said, and the sight of it lifted my heart in my chest. She deserved to move forward, too, like Nikki and I were.