Chapter 2
Marina
When it comes to my life as an old chair, there’s only one person who gets to really see my seams pull.
Darleen Wiles, aka Grams, has always seen the loose threads I try to hide. By the time I reach her house, after a long day of packing and my shift with the devil incarnate, I’m unraveling.
“Aghhhhh” is my very formal greeting. She opens the door, allowing me to steamroll past her and flop onto her couch at the fanciest senior community in town. Luckily for me, she’s fluent in distressed Marina, and doesn’t need further translation.
The scent of vanilla and orange blossom envelops me as I sink into the plush pink couch that just happens to match my hair.
“You want to tell me what happened?” Grams’ cherry red curls are pushed back by a pair of glasses she desperately needs but insists don’t “suit her face.” Instead, they serve as an expensive headband covered by messy hair—but not her insurance.
“Taco Bell was closed,” I say—well, try to. It comes out in a collection of groans mostly muffled by the couch cushions. We do dinner every Thursday night; I had accounted for dealing with all sorts of challenges leading up to tonight.
Work.
Jenna.
But Taco Bell—of all places—being closed at 7pm on a weekday? That was an unexpected betrayal. The last straw, which I couldn’t even plunge into a Baja Blast.
“First off, how dare they. Secondly, I think maybe there’s more going on than cinnamon twist withdrawal,” Grams says, leaning over to place her hand on my back.
“Well, Aunt Andrea, then Jenna—”
“Say less.” Grams grumbles. She’s never been a fan of the Brooks family—my family. She’s a Wiles through and through. Her loyalty was to my mom, and now, me.
Everyone else can go to hell, and she’ll be the first to say so.
“So, what did those vipers do this time?” Grams asks. Her hand moves from my back to her phone. Soft lo-fi from her puzzle game becomes the background music to our conversation.
“Aunt Andrea is kicking me out—for real this time—because of the audition, I guess,” I huff, shaking my head.
“Then, Jenna threw a bunch of my stuff into bags and got into my journals. Grams, it was terrible. I should never have flipped through them at the store.” My explanation begins coherently, but by the time I’ve gotten into full rant mode, I can’t even remember where I started.
But it’s Grams, so she understands. She always has.
Aunt Andrea has often said Grams pities me for losing my parents so early.
If that’s true, pity feels a lot like love.
She may not have been around a lot when I was small, but since junior high, there’s always been junk food, fairy tales, and as many old movies as we could watch in a night.
I’ve long since realized that Prince Charming doesn’t exist, and happy endings are wishful thinking.
Fairy godmothers, however, if they were real, would take the form of Darleen Wiles with her messy red curls and floral cardigans.
She keeps magic alive the same way she keeps my parents’ albums close to her record player.
“You can stay the night here if you want. We can watch a musical, make some popcorn— hell, our whole dinner can be a snack plate. I’m assuming you got the second audition.
When is it going to be?” she asks. The sound of pings and clicks pepper our conversation, but Grams has always been good at multitasking.
“Next week,” I answer with a small quake to my voice. Usually, I would have texted her every single detail, but with the way the day went, I barely had time to take a deep breath ’til now. “They want me to come up with an original song for the audition…”
“Well, you’ve got plenty of those. Damn-it! Ugh! I keep missing the letters on this damn app,” she grumbles, throwing her phone down next to her on the soft cushion. I chuckle. Even someone as good as she is at multitasking has her limits.
“That’s because you’re not wearing your glasses,” I say. She hasn’t been wearing them for months, and her eyesight is only getting worse.
“Well, they shouldn’t expect you to be able to choose glasses based on trying them on with those plastic lenses!
I didn’t know what I looked like, and those sales ladies were very complimentary,” she grumbles before pushing her glasses down onto her nose and studying her phone.
It’s just the two of us here, but she always says she dresses up for herself.
Which would be fine if she didn’t have the vision of a bat.
“But Mari, about this band. You’ve got talent. You always have,” she says.
“They’ve all been practicing for a long time and—” I shake my head, “maybe I don’t have lead singer energy. I’m not Mom.”
She frowns, tilting her head for a moment, her wrinkled hand reaching out to touch my face. I bite my lip, wishing I hadn’t said anything.
“No, you’re you, Mari,” she says with a firm nod. “And that’s enough.”
I wish she didn’t feel like she had to lie.
“Besides,” Grams’ grin becomes wide and wicked, “would it be rude to say I looked up this Aligned Shadows, and honey, the raccoons outside have an easier time staying in tune.”
“Yes, Grams, that would be rude.” I let out a sigh. “Especially since I was here last New Year’s and the raccoon playing the old noisemaker was a musical prodigy. I cannot be compared to that level of artistry.”
“In that case, I won’t say anything beyond, ‘I’m rooting for you.’ You know I always am.” She winks, and as much as I’d like to believe her, it would be nice if she could come see a show without wearing ear plugs.
“I know they’re not the best band in the world, but I need something.”
Grams retrieves the glass candy dish from the coffee table and places it in my lap. “I was mostly teasing to get you to laugh. They’re not the worst, Mari, but you deserve the best.”
The band may need work, but so do I.
“I’d rather practice together than be out of my league.” I pull myself up from the sunken cushions to select a mini chocolate bar that has probably been in the dish since last Halloween.
Across the living room, there’s my mother’s picture hanging on the wall. Grams’ AA coin is perched on the frame to commemorate 10 years sober.
I’m proud of her.
Grams doesn’t talk about it much. She doesn’t talk about them much either.
She’ll put on an old record of Mom and Dad’s once in a while to commemorate birthdays and anniversaries of the joyful and tragic things life has had to offer.
“A world tour in heaven,” she calls it. It’s the loveliest thought I’ve heard anyone say about their passing.
Conversation dissipates as she throws her phone down for a second time and walks to her bedroom.
“A new song by next week, hm?” she shouts, and dear God, she’d better not be climbing anything. “You said you went through old notebooks earlier?”
“Grams?” I roll off the couch before the cushions can suck me in any farther and leap to my feet. There’s a clatter of something falling, and I race to the edge of the living room. “Grams!?”
“I’m coming, I’m coming,” she says, shuffling back into the room. “Ta-da!”
In her hands there’s … another notebook.
No—not a notebook.
The notebook.
As she slips it into my hands, my gaze falls to the wilted strands of weeds woven through the binding and a lopsided Camp Mangrove sticker on the front cover.
I remember what happened that last summer. The yelling—the fights—the reason I could never go back.
It was all my fault.
“I thought Aunt Andrea threw this away.” I saw her throw it away.
“Maybe she did,” Grams says with a shrug. “As you know, the raccoons and I have an understanding. Even before I moved into this place, an alliance was formed.”
I would roll my eyes if she wasn’t so damn funny.
The musty smell of rotting paper is strong as I flip through the water damaged pages.
The words and drawings are faded but undeniably mine.
I’d carry this thing around every summer, racing to write down my ideas after going for a swim.
The lack of patience shows in the way the pages are morphed from the touch of wet fingers.
The entire notebook is strangely bloated at the center, like there’s something stuck inside.
“Huh…” I peel the sections apart as carefully as I can manage until something small and beaded falls onto the floor.
My bracelet.
Friendship bracelets are commonplace at camp, but this one is different. A pearl gleams in the middle of the plastic pony beads. Something I must have found in a freshwater clam, on one of the many afternoons I was left to my own devices. The worn elastic is fragile as I slip it onto my wrist.
And while I may have outgrown the imaginary friend who “made it for me,” I somehow haven’t outgrown this.
A frown pulls at my lips as I study the bracelet. For a moment, I’m not 22-year-old Marina, standing at my Grams apartment after a bad day. I’m the little girl lonely enough to make up impossible things to play with.
At least now I know the difference between reality and pretend.
“I remember. You always came back from camp with the most fun little stories,” Grams says. “You and that little friend. What was his name?”
Gale.
His name was Gale.
And his imaginary smile was brighter than the Florida sun.
“It’s not important.” I frown, flipping through the collection of scribbles until my fingers trace the M+G carved into the back cover.
A strange ache pulls at my heart as I stare at the tiny blades of grass and weeds pushed into the spiral binding.
I know Grams isn’t the biggest fan of the Aligned Shadows, but I can’t help but wonder, “Do you think I could make a song out of this?”
“Oh, I’m sure you could make plenty,” she says with a little laugh. “Did you know it’s not used as a summer camp anymore? They rent cabins and the springs are open to the public. I’ve been wondering what it looks like…”
“You keep tabs on my old campsite?”
“I keep tabs on lots of things. You know I was a counselor there when I was a teenager,” she says.
I’d forgotten that, for a time, Camp Mangrove was special to both of us.
“Of all my old journals I’ve seen today, this is the only one that’s unfinished. Doesn’t that feel wrong, somehow?” I muse, flipping through the last half of the book to the blank, water-damaged pages waiting for more adventures.
“So, go fill it!” Grams’ eyes are suddenly bright. She can’t be serious right now. “You’ve got a car and a free weekend, don’t you?”
I laugh, but she only stares back, her grin growing wider. No, she can’t be serious.
“There’s no way.”
“You said you wanted a new song, right?” she argues. “What better place for inspiration than the source? Besides, you know your aunt is going to drive past here hoping to see your car parked in the lot. Enjoy yourself and make her sweat.”
“You said you don’t like the band!”
“But I like you!”
“I—” I pause, reaching up to scratch the stretch of skin at the back of my neck, earning a glare from Grams. She’s convinced the scratching is making my psoriasis spread—which isn’t how it works exactly—but it does make it harder to heal and the inflammation worse.
So, the glare isn’t exactly unwarranted.
The relief I feel always makes me ignore the damage I’m doing.
Still, I lower my hand and weave my fingers together on my lap.
At least I can be grateful Grams’ comments come from a place of concern and not disgust like Jenna. I wish she wouldn’t worry so much.
I have it under control.
Grams presses the journal back into my hands with an expectant look on her face. She’s actually serious about me taking some last-minute trip.
“You might as well be suggesting the two of us go to a beachside resort. I’m stuck here,” I groan, tilting my head up to the ceiling.
“I think you’re confusing our predicaments, my dear,” she walks over to the kitchenette and hoists herself up on the counter to reach the top of the fridge. “You have your entire life. Don’t you think it’s time to be a little reckless?”
Spoken by the queen of reckless behavior herself.
“You are not supposed to be climbing things!” I shout, leaping off the couch to spot her, my nails digging into the uneven skin on my elbows. If she falls…
“And you aren’t supposed to be scratching your skin,” she scolds in a sing-song voice. Dear God, this woman is going to break her hip one of these days. Today, however, she is unscathed. With a coffee can clutched in her hands, she shoves it at me as readily as the candy bowl and old notebook.
“Wait, what is all this?” I ask, popping the plastic lid off, expecting to see a stash of expensive chocolate. Instead, I find a thick roll of money.
So much money.
It’s not just singles. There are twenties, a bundle of fifties—how does she have this much cash?
“What do you think I’m in the poker group here for—fun?” Her grin is wicked, and honestly, why am I surprised? I’ve seen her play and it’s ruthless. But this? This must be years’ worth of winnings.
“Grams, this is too much.”
“Then buy yourself something nice with the leftovers.” She shrugs, as if she’s sending me out the door with five dollars for the ice cream truck, not hundreds for a horribly irresponsible weekend getaway.
“No, I mean, I can’t. What am I supposed to do: wander around the wilderness, write in my diary, in hopes I make a song good enough?” I ask. “I’ll just shut myself in for a weekend and—”
“Mari, you need this,” she interrupts. “Do it for yourself, not the band. Whatever you decide, keep the money, will you? I’m planning on cleaning out Darla next Tuesday anyway.”
“Unless management shuts you down again,” I say, raising an eyebrow, but I can’t keep the amusement out of my voice. The feud between her and Darla is ongoing and, until now, has seemed mostly playful. The pair get confused by the staff constantly because of their red hair and similar names.
“Can’t keep a shark out of the water,” she says—and when did she put on sunglasses? I let out a laugh. Grams is something else, and I wouldn’t change her for the world.
No one in their right mind would go along with a plan like this. I’ll do the reasonable thing and sneak the money back into its rightful place when she’s not looking.
There’s no way anyone, not even Darleen Wiles, can convince me to do something so ridiculous.