By Way of Accident

by Laura Miller

  “River?”

  “Yeah, okay. It’s no big deal,” I lie. “Just hold onto it, will ya? I might be home this weekend. I guess I could take a look at it then maybe.”

  “You’re coming back this weekend? I thought you had a baseball game with your friends Saturday.”

  “It was cancelled,” is all I say. It’s a lie too.

  “Okay,” she says, sounding happy again. “I’ll just keep it in the hall desk drawer. It’ll be waiting for you when you get here. I’m so excited you’re coming home. Rea will be excited too.”

  “Okay, Mom, well, I’ve got to go.” I’ve got to get off this phone before she gets wind I still care about an old damn letter. I’m trying to play it off as best I can, but I don’t know how long I can keep this act up. Right now, I don’t know if I feel like punching a wall or finding someone to hug.

  “Okay, dear. I’ll talk to you later.”

  “Later,” I manage to get out.

  I hit End call as soon as I can get my finger to it, and I set the phone carefully down onto the table. It feels like my damn heart is about to beat right out of my chest. I take a couple breaths to try to calm it, and then I sit back in my chair.

  “What the hell?” I smile. A letter from Brooke.

  There’s a guy outside the window walking his dog. My eyes follow his every move, while my mind goes back to the summer of ‘99 and Brooke’s laugh and her long legs and her soft lips. Damn it! I jump up and run into my room. I grab my duffle bag from my closet and start throwing tee shirts and shorts into it. It’s half full in thirty seconds. I have no idea what’s in it—except clothes—but I don’t even care.

  I run to the bathroom and throw my toothbrush into the little thingy I keep my deodorant and cologne in, and then I throw that into the duffle bag too. Then I take the bag, head back out into the kitchen and grab my phone. I text Tim and tell him I won’t be able to make the game Saturday. They’ll find someone else. And before I know it, I’m snatching up my keys and making a beeline for my truck in the driveway. The weekend starts early this week.

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Love, Brooke

  “I’m home,” I announce to everyone and no one at the same time. “Mom, Dad, Rea.”

  No one answers. I throw the duffle back into the corner and practically race to the hall desk. I pull on the drawer, and with a wood-scratching-along-wood sound, the whole damn thing comes completely off its tracks. I set the drawer on top of the desk and then go to searching. Inside, there’s a stack of papers and envelopes—junk mail, junk mail, grocery store ads. Why does she keep all this crap? I drop it all one by one onto the desk’s surface. Then, suddenly, I stop. Staring at me is a letter. It’s a faded yellow, and it’s addressed to me at my old address, and it’s in her handwriting. I follow the curves she always added to my name, and then I breathe in before slowly flipping the envelope over. And then I see them—a pair of faded, red lips. I smile and move my fingers over them. What I wouldn’t give to touch the real things.

  I take another breath and force it out slowly through my mouth before I carefully peel open the envelope, being cautious not to tear it any more than I have to. It’s old, and by now, it’s sealed shut, so it’s hard to open it without making a mess of it, but I manage all the same. Once the seal is broken, I pull out the blue paper she always wrote on. I breathe out again and try to control my heartbeats. I know I shouldn’t feel this way about a damn letter, but when your past comes back to you like this—when you can see it, when you can hold it—I guess you just can’t help but give it the moment it deserves. And I guess that moment deserves these sweaty palms too. I try to swallow the lump growing in my throat as I unfold the letter. And when I get it opened, I look at how she signed it first. Love, Brooke, in her pretty letters, scrolls across the bottom of the page. My heart both jumps and sinks at the same time, and I go from feeling a sense of relief to feeling nothing but panic in no time flat. What the hell does the letter say? I find a chair in the kitchen and fall into it as my eyes go to following over her last words to me:

  Dear River,

  We’re here. I just started at my new school, just in time for Thanksgiving! And we had to make a list yesterday of what we’re thankful for. You made my list! And so did Winnie-the-Pooh! P.S. He’s getting better at shaking hands. I think I’ll teach him how to roll over next. He’s stubborn, so it’ll probably take me a while, but maybe by the time I see you next, he’ll be able to do both.

  Anyway, I’m liking eighth grade so far. I hope you’re liking it too. I bet you’re already a baseball star this year, and you haven’t even had your first game yet! I miss you. It’s not so bad here. Oh, I haven’t even told you where here is yet! Nashville, Tennessee. And before I started school here, I thought about where I was going to tell everyone I was from—because people always ask you that when you’re new. It took me two seconds to come up with it. From now on, whenever anyone asks me where I’m from, I’m going to tell them Detmold, Missouri. I know it’s not exactly the truth, but the truth is, that’s the only place I ever felt like I was home. For a summer, I was home with you, River.

  Please write soon. My new address is 1007 Lake View, Nashville, TN. I can’t wait to hear from you! Did I mention I miss you?! I’m so happy I didn’t lose you in the move! I’ll talk to you soon!

  XOXO

  Love,

  Brooke

  I let my hand holding the letter fall gently to my lap and rest there. I feel a small fixed smile on my face, but my heart hurts like hell. I’m so happy I didn’t lose you in the move! plays on repeat in my head. Why didn’t I ever get this letter? Where was it this whole time? My eyes travel to her name again at the bottom of the page. She wrote to me. I just didn’t get it. How the hell didn’t I get it? I stand and snatch up the envelope from the desk again. There’s a yellow label stuck to it. And in black ink on that yellow label is my parents’ current address. And I think about how we moved to town and sold the house and the land. The original postmark is a few weeks after we moved. The letter must have gotten to our old place, and somehow I missed it. Damn it! I drive my palm hard into the desk’s surface. The grocery ads fall and fly every which way onto the floor just as I take another look at the postmark date. There’s no date on the letter, but that’s not strange because she never dated her letters. What’s strange is that she mentions Thanksgiving in the letter. But the postmark is the end of February. That’s at least a few months that aren’t accounted for. Something doesn’t quite add up, but I guess it really doesn’t matter. What matters is that she wrote to me.

  If your heart can physically ache, I’m pretty sure that’s what mine is doing right now. It’s been nine years, and now I know—she didn’t give up on me, or at least not when I thought she had. I thought that knowing would make me feel better—would help her memory start to disappear. But now, the only thing that keeps runnin’ through my mind is that I’ve got to find her. Suddenly, there’s a new, strange sense of hope coursing through my veins. I think it’s because I’ve just realized that she never said good-bye for good. So, I’ve got to find her. Somehow, I’ve got to tell her I didn’t give up on her either. I’ve got to let her know she didn’t lose me in the move.

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Why Nashville?

  “Blake, I need you to do me a favor, buddy.”

  “Oh, great,” he says, playfully rolling his eyes.

  “What? You don’t even know what it is,” I say.

  “Yeah, but you don’t sound like you’re gonna ask me to get ya notes for a class or somethin’ easy like that.”

  I furrow my brows at how he knows that before letting go of an audible sigh.

  Blake lets his head fall back. “Oh, jeez, I’m right, aren’t I.” His head eventually rolls back into place, and he just stares at me. “What? Do I gotta help you rob a bank? Lie in court? Get my girl to talk to some chick about alternative options?” He cocks his head in my direction and narrows one eye at me.

 
; “What? Wha... Why are you my friend again?” I ask.

  “Because I’d do any of that shit for you,” he says with a straight face.

  I keep my eyes on him. “Have you done any of that stuff?”

  He shrugs his shoulders. “Well, no. But I would.”

  “Don’t,” I simply say.

  The sides of his mouth turn down, and his shoulders slump.

  “I need you to come with me,” I say.

  Blake narrows an eye at me. “That’s it?”

  “Yeah.”

  “When do we gotta go?”

  “You don’t even know where we’re going,” I say.

  “Really?” he asks. “I graduate in less than two weeks. I could give two shits about class. I care even less about finals. I could not take the finals and still pass the classes. Come June, I start a job at my dad’s firm that will basically strip me of my balls and my freedom. So, the way I see it, since my life is ending in a month anyway, anywhere sounds pretty damn good to me.”

  I lower my head and chuckle to myself. “Nashville,” I say when I look up.

  He nods and starts to grin. “When do we leave?”

  “Tomorrow?” I ask, a little hesitant.

  “I’ll be here.” He stands up, grabs a can of soda from the refrigerator and heads to his room in the back of the house. “I’m gonna go throw some shit in a bag.”

  I watch him walk down the hallway and then stop before he gets to his door. “Why Nashville?”

  I grab the back of my neck and take in a sharp breath. I was hoping he wouldn’t ask until at least we got halfway there—or maybe even never.

  “I’m trying to find someone,” I say.

  “Oh, God, we’re taking someone out, aren’t we? What did he do? Do I need to get us an alibi?” He snickers and gives me that weird wink he always does. I don’t know how many times I’ve told him it creeps me out.

  “Jeez, Blake, no.” I shake my head, but I can’t help but grin. “Well...maybe.” I think about seeing Brooke with another guy. And it makes me think I might very well need that alibi.

  Blake laughs. “We’re stalking a girl, aren’t we?”

  My eyes immediately dart to his, and I sigh inwardly. I have no idea how he comes up with this stuff. “Yeah,” I confess softly, bobbing my head.

  “I knew it.” He pumps his fist in the air.

  I try to hide my lopsided grin by lowering my head, while Blake opens the can of soda I bought and takes a big swig.

  “Just bang on my door tomorrow morning to get me up. I’ll be ready.” And with that, he disappears into his room.

  The truth is I wanted to do this alone, but the thing is, what I fear most is that I’ll see something I don’t want to see. And that’s where Blake comes in. Blake and I became fast friends our freshmen year of college. And I probably shouldn’t, but I trust him with my life. And if my life is going to end on a little street in Nashville, I need Blake there to pick up the pieces. I couldn’t ask Tim. Tim’s too much like me—whether I’d ever admit that out loud or not. Tim will fight even when there’s no fight to fight. We don’t really know the meaning of giving up, I think. And I think that especially holds true when it comes to Brooke. Right now, I need a voice of reason, and while I don’t exactly have that in my close friends, I do have the next best thing—someone who will tell me like it is. And that’s Blake.

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  I Hope You Find Her

  “So, who was this girl to you exactly?”

  I look over at Blake in the passenger’s seat. We’ve been driving for hours already and haven’t said much to each other. The radio has been up, but I haven’t really been listening to it. I think Blake has had to change the station at least twice already when the previous one fuzzed out. I’ve been thinking about Brooke—not so much about what I’m going to do if I see her. I’m too terrified to think about that. I’m mostly just thinking about that last summer we spent together when Blake interrupts my thoughts.

  “I mean, did she ever tell you she loved you or any jazz like that?” he asks.

  I nod my head. “Yeah,” I confirm.

  He bobs his head too. But out of the corner of my eye, I notice him raise an eyebrow. It looks as if he’s thinking about something still.

  “I mean I know we were young.” I feel as if I have to admit that all of a sudden.

  He gives me a suspicious look. “How young?”

  “Thirteen,” I say.

  Blake looks over at me with big eyes.

  “You’re driving to Nashville to find a girl who told you she loved you before you hit puberty?”

  “It was more than that.” I rest both hands on the wheel for a second. “Trust me.”

  He sucks in a big, uneasy breath. “Okay, buddy,” he sighs. “This is your show. I’m just along for the ride.” He snickers to himself and then goes to finding another radio station. I just set my eyes back on the road and drift slowly back to my invisible memories.

  ***

  “You have reached your destination.” A stern, smooth voice of a woman tunnels through the truck cab like an ominous warning. I changed the GPS voice to a female one a few weeks after I got it. She’s scary, but it sure beats the hell out of the alternative. The male voice sounded too much like a British version of my Uncle Joe.

  I tap the brakes and slow up as Blake and I both look around at the houses that line the street.

  “1007,” Blake says, pointing at a two-story white house on the right.

  I glance at the envelope’s return address and nod my head. “That’s it.”

  Blake sits up and stares at the house. “Is her dad big?”

  I gnaw on my bottom lip and shake my head. “I don’t know.”

  “What?” His head whips back to mine. “You’re gonna go up to some stranger’s door and ask to see his daughter...and you don’t even know how big he is?”

  I empty my lungs of whatever air is left in them. “Yeah, pretty much.”

  “Dude, you must have a death wish.”

  I tap the envelope’s corner against the steering wheel a few times. “Maybe,” I say. Then I reach for the door handle. “Well, here goes nothin’.”

  “All right.” He gives me a half-worried, half-encouraging smile. “Go get ‘em, tiger.”

  I smile, or at least, I think I smile. I’m nervous as hell. She could still be here. She could answer the door. The more I think about it, the more my heart races. I step onto the street and close the door behind me. I match up the numbers from the envelope to the numbers above the front door one more time. 1007. This is the house. This is the house Brooke moved to after that little town in Illinois. This is it.

  I walk up the concrete path to the wooden door of the house. I’m just trying to find a friend. I tell myself this over and over again, so I don’t feel so crazy because I know I’m about to look pretty damn crazy. I never met Brooke’s parents, and she never met mine. She did meet Grandpa and Tim, but that’s it. We spent all our days at that creek that summer, and before we even had a chance to do anything else, she was gone.

  I look back at Blake. He’s watching me like this is some reality TV show he can’t keep his damn eyes off of. Hell, I guess it might as well be.

  He gestures for me to go on. So I turn back around and lift my knuckles to the door. But before I do anything else, I say a little prayer. Then all of a sudden, my knuckles hit the wood, and I knock three times. It’s almost as if someone else took my hand and started it knocking. I guess that’s what pure courage is. Sometimes you just do things, and you don’t even think about it. It’s as if your brain isn’t telling you what to do anymore. Instead, it’s courage. Courage takes over. And it acts alone. And usually, I’ve discovered, it’s as crazy as hell.

  I don’t hear anything for a few seconds. Then something makes a noise behind the door, and every muscle in my body stiffens. Pretty quickly, I can tell it’s footsteps—heavy footsteps—and they’re getting closer to the door. I try to suck in one more b
reath before the door flies open. And within an instant, a tall, older man with gray hair is standing on the other side of the threshold just staring at me. Is this her dad? He looks as if he could be her grandpa. We stare at each other for a good while, I think. I think we’re both just trying to figure out if we know the other.

  Eventually, though, I clear my throat. “Um,” I start, as I stuff the envelope into my back pocket. Then I take my cap off and run my fingers through my hair; the nerves are getting to me. “I’m looking for Brooke.”

  The tall man narrows his eyes at me, and my heart jumps to the next speed up. I don’t know if he’s trying to figure out if he’s got room in his backyard to bury me or if he’s just hard of hearing.”

  “Brooke?” he asks.

  “Yes, sir. I’m looking for Brooke Sommerfield. She lived her about nine years ago now. ...I’m a friend,” I add, just to be safe.

  The man sits back on his heels, tilts his head up and plays with his glasses.

  “Nine years, huh?”

  “Yes, sir,” I say.

  “Well, we bought this house about four years ago, I guess. And I think the previous owners had it for at least that long.”

  I perk up. I still don’t know who he is, but maybe he knows where Brooke is.

  “I believe the guy said his daughter was starting college,” he goes on. “They only had one—one kid. And him and his wife wanted to be closer to her.”

  “That sounds about right,” I say, unable to control my excitement.

  The man laughs. “I have no idea how I remember that. You know, it’s funny what your brain chooses to remember.” He slowly shakes his head back and forth. “Even after all these years and not once thinking about that day, I can still recall it—just like it was yesterday.”