by L. E. Flynn
“There’s something I’ve never told anybody before,” she started. But then the screen door opened behind us and she whipped her head around. A man was standing there and I knew he must be her dad, but he wasn’t who I pictured her dad would be. His hair looked like it had never seen a comb, and he was wearing white linen pants and a tie-dyed shirt and sunglasses. His face broke into a huge smile when he saw me sitting there.
“Who’s your friend, pumpkin?” he said.
She blew another petal off the palm of her hand. “Fiona,” she said. “Dad, Fiona. Fiona, Dad.”
“Nice to meet you,” I said.
Her dad came and sat down beside us. “So, I finally get to meet one of your friends. Fiona, you’re welcome here anytime.”
“She already knows that, Dad.”
Something swelled inside me. Maybe I did already know that, but it was different hearing her tell someone else.
“How about dinner tonight?” he said. “I’ll put some steaks on the barbecue and make some of that guacamole that you love so much.”
It sounded perfect. I couldn’t remember the last time Mom had cooked a dinner for the two of us that wasn’t boring health food. She used to like doing things like that when I was little, trying new recipes from cookbooks she’d find at used bookstores. I would stand on a stool beside the counter and open my mouth and wait for her to ask me to taste this or try that, and I would always tell her it was great even if it tasted like shit.
Those were the first lies I told her. Back then, she couldn’t tell when I was lying either.
“We have plans,” Trixie said, flicking another petal off her fingertip. “Maybe next time.”
“Definitely next time,” her dad said. “Fiona, do you like guacamole? Never mind, don’t even answer that. Just promise you’ll try mine.”
“I promise.”
“We should probably go.” She flicked the last petal into the grass. “Otherwise, we’re going to be late.”
Late for what? I wanted to ask. We didn’t have plans. But then again, she always kept me on my toes.
She was still holding the daisy stem when she stood up, and I watched her tuck it into her pocket.
“Which one was it?” I said. “Loves me, or loves me not?”
She pulled the stem back out and twisted it around her finger. “Doesn’t matter,” she said, breaking it in half and throwing it on the deck.
Her dad stood on the front porch and waved as we drove away. He waved the same way Trixie did, with his fingers parted in a peace sign.
“Your dad’s cool,” I said, waving back, my boring regular wave.
“He’s such an old hippie.” She stared at her fingers. “It’s embarrassing.”
“What were you going to tell me? Before he showed up.”
She shook her head. “Nothing. Just something dumb. Forget I mentioned it.”
I didn’t forget, though. And now it’s too late for me to ever find out what she was going to say, and if it would have changed anything.
62
I BARELY WAIT until I get home to turn on Trixie’s laptop. It’s bigger than mine, one of the old-school models, too cumbersome to carry around. I hold my breath as the machine boots up and the screen comes to life. And I see what Trixie’s dad meant when he said she erased all the memories.
Her desktop background used to be the beach. Now it’s nothing. Just the generic charcoal-gray backdrop that came with the computer. I quickly open Word, planning to comb through the files she left behind. Maybe there’s a clue buried in one of them. But there’s nothing, not a single leftover homework assignment. The only other icon on the desktop is for the internet, and when I click on that, it takes me to Google. Of course, there’s no search history, no recently visited pages. What did I expect?
I’m about to shut it down when the Gmail icon in the right-hand corner catches my eye. I click on it and her email address doesn’t come up. But it doesn’t matter.
Her email address. I know it from sending her emails during class when I was bored. Wickedtrix00. What if wherever she is, she’s still using it?
I quickly type in her email address, and in the password box, I type his name. Tobyhunter. Wrong password. Try again. I try again. TobyHunter83117. Nothing. I try every single combination of his name, birthday, and deathday as I possibly can, and none of them work. I slump back in my chair and stare at the ceiling. Maybe this is another dead end, another red herring. Trixie could have picked one of those obscure passwords with numbers and special characters, the kind I wouldn’t have a hope in hell of guessing. But everything had some sort of meaning to her.
“I took her computer,” I admit to Jasper the next day at school. “There was nothing on it, but now I’m trying to get into her email. If she was going to have a hiding place, maybe that was it.”
The bell rings and Jasper stiffens against his locker. “Maybe.” He fingers the lock absentmindedly. “But I doubt it. Trixie barely responded to any of my emails. I don’t think it was her thing. We could always go back to Tijuana and try again.”
“She’s not there. I know she’s not. What we have to do is find the Preacher. I know you think the people at the beach are a dead end, but if there’s a chance of finding him, we need to know for sure.”
Jasper blows out a breath. “I don’t want you to go by yourself. I’ll go with you. Just promise me you’ll wait for me to go, okay?”
I promise, but he doesn’t bring it up again, and over the next few weeks, I almost forget about it too. Assignments and essays pile up, plus another appointment with Dr. Rosenthal and the inevitable checking of the mail for college acceptances. I think about the places I applied. Florida State. Texas. Princeton. Arizona. Places far away from here. The last application, which I submitted hastily, before I could talk myself out of it. UCLA, just because I knew that was where Beau would end up, even though the only thing worse than staying for a boy is staying for a boy who doesn’t care. His dad’s alma mater, and his sloppy, drunken words at the party. I have to go there. I don’t have a choice.
I try not to think about Beau, but he’s in my head all of the time: Why was he at the beach that day and what was he paying for and what does he know that he isn’t telling me? I picture him as a wet sponge that I thought was already wrung out, at its limits. But now I know that he’s holding in more that I might never be able to wring out of him. I’m still mad at him for what he did with Trixie, but maybe he’s mad at me too. I’m the one who didn’t show up that night after I told him I would. I know the food poisoning wasn’t my fault, but it’s just another example of the cosmically shitty timing Beau and I are constantly battling.
Jasper starts showing up everywhere. At my locker after each class. At my car after school. I can’t shake the feeling that everything he felt for Trixie, all that lust and passion and maybe even love, is just being transferred onto me because I’m here and she’s not. Like whatever kind of relationship we have, it’s not just the two of us but the four of us. It’s a square, with Trixie and Beau making up two of the corners, even though they don’t know it.
The day before Christmas break, I find a single white rose tucked under my windshield wiper. It’s perfect, with soft petals and a long stem with no thorns. I reach over to pick it up and a set of arms loops around my waist.
“I missed you,” Jasper says, tipping my head back and kissing me. There’s no hesitation, no gentleness, just a crushing of his mouth to mine. I’m so surprised by the intensity of it that I keep my eyes open, and over Jasper’s shoulder, I see Beau standing there. Watching. The hand dangling at his side clenches into a fist, and as horrible as it sounds, the sight of that sets off fireworks in my stomach.
I close my eyes and kiss Jasper back. It’s revenge. Beau gets to pretend I don’t exist when it’s convenient for him. He doesn’t want me, not anymore, so he can’t stop someone else from having me.
By the time I open my eyes and Jasper pulls away, Beau and his clenched fist are gone.
&n
bsp; “Thank you,” I say to Jasper, my cheeks hot. “For the rose. It’s beautiful.”
The corners of his mouth turn down. “What rose?”
The heat leaves my face, drains from my body. “This one.” I gesture to my windshield. He must be joking, because who else would leave me a flower?
“I didn’t leave that,” he says, taking his hands away from my sides and jamming them in his pockets. “You must have a secret admirer.” His voice is flat, monotone, more angry than jealous.
I look over Jasper’s shoulder to where Beau was standing. I can’t allow myself to hope that Beau left me that flower. That he doesn’t hate me after I tried to make him go to AA. That he remembers the rose from that night.
I can’t hope for that … or can I?
63
THERE WAS A vase on the counter, pushed to the side to make room for more alcohol bottles. There was a single white rose in it, its head drooping slightly.
“It needs a drink,” I told Beau. “It’s dying.”
“I need a drink,” he said. “I’m dying.”
I filled his cup and left the rose, but he remembered.
64
USUALLY, I LOVE Christmas. Not for the presents, but for all the food. Turkey and stuffing and cranberries and mashed potatoes and pumpkin pie. Mom always goes all out, even when Aunt Leslie doesn’t visit and it’s just the two of us. We unwrap gifts and eat too much and watch Christmas movies on TV all night with a giant bowl of popcorn. But this year is different. Mom is making a Tofurky and her bags are already packed because she’s leaving the day after Christmas for a business trip in Portland. I can’t really focus on being festive when all I can think about is that I have time off from school and can finally do what I wanted to do weeks ago. Track down the Preacher, if he even exists.
“Are you sure you’ll be okay for four whole days?” Mom says on Christmas morning, scrunching up her forehead at the Tofurky, which comes in a box and doesn’t even look edible.
“Of course,” I say, pasting on a smile. You left me here all summer, I want to add, but I don’t, because I need to be alone. Jasper and I already have it planned for the day after Christmas. We’re going to the beach to see what we find, and if we find nothing, it may be the closure Dr. Rosenthal was talking about, the final dead end in this mission.
Aunt Leslie comes over at noon, with her yappy little dog in tow. She’s ten years older than Mom, but lately they look close to the same age. Aunt Leslie seems to age in reverse. Mom once told me Aunt Leslie couldn’t hold down a job before she started AA and stopped drinking. Now, Aunt Leslie is all about clean living, to the point where Mom practically idolizes her. Salads and granola and organic juices that look and smell like someone just puked them up.
“Oh my god, look at you!” she says when I open the door. She grips me in a bony hug, then pulls away with her hands on my shoulders. “You look gorgeous. You’re all grown up.”
The dog pisses on the floor and I’m stuck cleaning it up, because Aunt Leslie is already on her way into the kitchen. I stoop over and mop it up with a wad of toilet paper. I should be happy that Aunt Leslie gave me a compliment, but I know it’s not true. I’m not gorgeous and I’m not grown up. I’m a stupid girl who’s in over my head, trying to solve a mystery that doesn’t want to let me.
Mom and Aunt Leslie and I sit in the living room, and Aunt Leslie talks about a new guy she’s dating, someone she thinks might be “the one.”
“After everything,” she says, sipping ginger ale out of a champagne flute, “I think I might actually get that happy ending.”
“You deserve it, Les,” Mom says, leaning over to give her a hug. “You’ve been through so much.”
They don’t bother to elaborate on what “so much” is. They still think of me as a kid, someone who wouldn’t understand. I wonder what Aunt Leslie would say if she knew how much experience I have had with drinking, how it has already changed my life. If I hadn’t been drunk at the party, I might have been able to stop Trixie from leaving, or at least followed her to see where she went. If Beau hadn’t been drinking—well, his entire life might be different too.
“What a beautiful girl Fiona is turning into, Delores,” she says to Mom. “She looks so much like you did at that age.” She gives me a wink and a cryptic smile. “How about you, Fiona? Do you have a boyfriend? I bet boys are lined up to ask you out.”
I’m about to say no and tell her nobody is fighting over me, even though I think about the white rose on my windshield and hope that maybe I am worth fighting for. But Mom answers for me. “Fiona’s focused on school. She’s much smarter than I was at her age.”
“That’s good,” Aunt Leslie says. “You’ll have plenty of time for boys later.”
At dinner, the Tofurky tastes like plastic and has a gummy texture that makes my teeth hurt. Even though I’m starving, the idea of eating it makes me nauseous. I push it around my plate instead.
“You aren’t very hungry,” Aunt Leslie says, filling her plate with salad and beans.
“I just miss having a real turkey,” I say, and immediately regret it because Mom’s whole face falls and the table lapses into silence, punctuated by the sound of forks hitting plates. I know she’s trying hard to make us better versions of ourselves, healthier and happier, but nothing she does is working.
“Are you still designing clothes, Fiona?” Aunt Leslie asks between mouthfuls of food. “I used to love what you wore. You have such unique ideas.”
“I don’t really have time for that anymore,” I say, really meaning I hate clothes because they remind me of all the ways I failed. I don’t meet Mom’s eyes, because she was furious with me when she found out I got rid of my sewing machine. That day, I didn’t have a lie to tell her that fit.
“Well, how’s Sarah?” Aunt Leslie asks. “I hope you’re still friends. She was such a nice girl.”
“Great,” I say, on autopilot. “Still friends.”
“I haven’t met her yet,” Mom says, taking a drink from her wineglass. “Fiona’s keeping her a mystery. I couldn’t even pick the girl out of a lineup.” She says it casually, but I can tell she’s getting frustrated that I have a friend she hasn’t met. I’m sure she wants to judge Sarah just like she judged Trixie, to make sure I’m not being molded wrong. I almost wish I could tell her they’re the exact same person, and I managed to do the wrong things all on my own.
Across the table, Aunt Leslie smiles and moves on to a new topic. Nobody mentions Sarah for the rest of the meal, but Mom’s words echo in my head.
I couldn’t even pick the girl out of a lineup.
Turns out, neither can I.
65
YOU THOUGHT IT was strange that I loved snow, that I could feel so strongly about something I had never even seen. You had to see something to fall in love with it.
It never snows in Morrison Beach. I always knew I should feel lucky to live in a place where it was constantly warm, where I could wear my flip-flops year-round if I wanted to. But I wanted to see real snow, to catch it on my tongue like they did in the romantic comedies Alison loved to watch. I wanted an excuse to wear a scarf and mittens. I wanted to make a snowman.
“I wouldn’t hold your breath,” Beau said after driving me home on the handlebars of his bike the week before Christmas break sophomore year. “I think there’s a better chance of me getting an A in algebra than any snow coming down here.”
I fiddled with my backpack straps. I had a gift for Beau, an old poetry book I had found at a used bookstore. It was in my backpack, but I was too nervous to give it to him. It was too intimate, too exposed. He didn’t have anything for me, and maybe he would look at the poetry book and laugh and I would know I had gotten it all wrong. So I lost my nerve and said goodbye without giving him anything.
The next morning, there was something on our kitchen table. A tiny little snowman, cool to the touch, with stubby pipe cleaners for arms.
“What is this?” I asked Mom.
“I was goin
g to ask you the same thing. I found it on our porch when I got the paper this morning.”
That was when I knew exactly where the snowman came from. Beau found out a way to get me snow.
Of course, it wasn’t real snow. It was baking soda and shaving cream, Beau told me when I texted him to say thank you.
One day we’ll make sure you see a real one;) he wrote.
As long as you’re there to see it with me, I wrote, but I never hit send. I chickened out again and didn’t reply at all.
66
THE DAY AFTER Christmas, Mom leaves early in the morning but Aunt Leslie hangs around. I would normally be glad to be spending time with her—I used to love dragging her into fabric stores and letting her pick patterns for me—but all I can think about is how badly I want her to leave so Jasper and I can go to the beach to try and find the Preacher. Plus, I have no idea what to talk to Aunt Leslie about anymore. She keeps asking me about college and I don’t know what to tell her, so I give her generic answers and hope they’re good enough.
Then I remember there is something Aunt Leslie might be able to help me with. I don’t know how to bring it up, so I casually mention it over breakfast, like I’m asking her to pass the milk.
“How did you know you needed help? You know, before you started going to AA.”
She drops the spoon she’s using to stir her coffee and her eyes get huge. I put up my hands in protest. “No, not me. It’s my sociology class. We’re talking about addiction, and trying to understand what makes people seek help.” I take a sip of my orange juice, hoping it makes the lie sound sweeter, more ripe.
“Well, if that’s the case, I don’t think there’s a right or wrong answer.” Aunt Leslie pats one of the rollers in her hair. “I think it’s different for everyone. The common thread is that a lot of people need to hit rock bottom before they realize they need help. And everyone’s rock bottom looks different.”
