Things We Know by Heart

by Jessi Kirby

  “Are you?” Dad asks.

  “I’m working on it. . . .”

  I’m still trying to process that someone broke up with my sister. No one’s ever broken up with my sister.

  “Atta girl,” he says. “That’s all you can do.” He wraps an arm around her shoulder. “I never liked that guy anyway. Kind of a douche.”

  That makes her laugh.

  Dad puts a hand on Ryan’s back. “You want me to find him? Knock him down a peg or two?”

  “No, I kind of already did, I think.” A slow smile spreads over her face.

  Dad raises his eyebrows. “Oh yeah?”

  “What did you do?” I can see my sister, angry, in the middle of an airport, and the possibilities are endless.

  “The details aren’t really important. Let’s just say I was escorted out of the boarding area by some nice men with walkie-talkies who were very concerned about where one of my shoes was, but not enough to let me go back and get it.”

  “You threw your shoe at him?” I ask, even though I’m sure she did.

  “Among other things—my Starbucks, my phone . . .” She shrugs. Lets out a puff of breath. “I’m just glad I didn’t make it all the way to Europe before I found out what an ass he was.”

  “There you go,” my dad says. “Live and learn.”

  “Exactly,” Ryan says. She looks at me then, and I know as soon as she says the words that she’s not talking about herself anymore.

  “And then you move forward.”

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  “Write it on your heart that every day is the best day in the year. No man has learned anything rightly, until he know that every day is Doomsday.”

  —Ralph Waldo Emerson

  I DON’T KNOW how to answer Colton’s texts. I pace my room, full of more energy than I’ve had in a long time, then grab my phone and sit down on my floor and read them again. What do I say? Was it really an invitation to hang out? What time does “later” mean?

  I need help with this, so I get back up and cross the hall to Ryan’s room. When I poke my head in, I can hear her shower, so I tiptoe in. Take a look around at what was a neat and orderly room just a few days ago. Now her bags lie in the corner spilling clothes and makeup. Books and magazines litter both sides of the bed, and she’s even pulled out all her old canvases from the closet and leaned them against the wall like a minigallery, and I know as soon as I see them she really is serious about putting together a portfolio for that art school.

  My eyes fall on the dresser, the one neat spot, where Ryan’s completed vision board now sits leaning against the mirror, an artful, color-filled collage of her wants and goals. Of her plans to move forward. She must’ve stayed up into the wee hours of the morning to finish it. Either that, or she never went to bed. She has that kind of manic focus about her, like if she just keeps moving, the things she’s upset about can’t catch her. The opposite of me. It makes me wonder whether, if she hadn’t been away at school this last year, it might’ve been different for me. More like today.

  In big, bold letters across Ryan’s board are the words New Beginnings, and below those, scattered over various pictures of places she wants to go, Italy included. Over all the images are words that sound like things my sister would say: Get gloriously lost, find yourself, trust, love, hold your breath and take a leap—all the things I think of her doing naturally.

  I remember the one picture I found, of the heart in the bottle. I stashed the magazine under the bed, hoping she wouldn’t find the picture and cut it out for herself. When I crouch down and look, it’s still there. In her bathroom, the shower shuts off and I flip through fast. Find the dog-eared page opposite the picture of the heart in the bottle and slip out of Ryan’s room with the magazine. Not that she’d care. She’d probably even send me off with the stack of magazines to finish my own board. But something about this particular picture makes me want to keep it to myself.

  In my room, I sit down in the bright square of sunshine on the carpet. I open the magazine to the page and carefully cut out the picture, holding it there a moment. I’m not sure of what it represents for me—only that it feels like something I need.

  I go to my own dresser mirror, where the pictures of me and Trent are tucked all around the edges, and the dried sunflower from that first day we met hangs from the top corner. I don’t take any of them down like Ryan seems so set on me doing. I’m not ready for that, not yet.

  Instead I slide the picture between the mirror and its frame. Front and center. And then I let my eyes fall on the sunflower that Colton gave me just two days ago. It lies on top of my dresser, the petals still deep gold, with just a hint of wilt along the edges from not being put in any water. I pick it up and twirl the stem between my thumb and forefinger, setting the flower spinning into a bright blur before I go to my bookshelf and find the glass bowl left over from Ryan’s graduation-party centerpieces, with their flower petals and floating candles.

  I take the bowl to my bathroom sink, rinse and fill it, then come back to my dresser and the flower. The stem is thick, and it takes a few tries to cut through it with the scissors; but I cut it off close to the base of the flower, and once the flower’s free I set it in the small glass bowl of water. It floats there, bright, and alive, and brave in its own little sea beneath the picture. Like I felt on the ocean.

  Like I want to feel again.

  Before I can talk myself out of it, I’m in the car. On the passenger seat is my bag, packed again for a day at the beach, and again it’s mostly a pretense. In my pocket is money from my dad for lunch and my kayak lesson. I tried to leave without taking it because doing so felt like such a lie, but he wouldn’t let me out the door without it. He, like Mom and Ryan, seems to share the hope that this will be the magic thing for me, and now I feel a responsibility at least to pretend it is.

  It’s still relatively early when I head down the driveway and pull onto the road. I roll down the windows and breathe in the air and the already-heavy heat coming off the hills. As soon as I hit the highway, the air rushes past, fresh and cooler, and it feels like I’m dipping a toe back into the flow of life that’s been going on without me this whole time. I have no plan, and I don’t know what I’m going to say when I get there, but I do like Colton told me yesterday and dive in without thinking about it.

  The momentum is enough to carry me down the winding road to Shelter Cove, past the bluff where Colton and I were just yesterday, and onto the little main street, where right away my eyes find his turquoise bus parked in front of his family’s shop. This time there is no open spot near it, or anywhere on the street, so I drive all the way to the parking lot at the base of the pier, and I park there. It isn’t until I shut off the car and sit in the quiet a moment that I really think about what it is I’m doing here.

  The rush of energy I felt when I left the house fades out like the end of a song, and there’s a gnawing guilt left in its place. I do know what I’m doing. I’m using my half-truth about the kayak lesson, and Colton’s texts, as reasons to be back here. But they’re more like excuses—to forget my own rules, to ignore the tug of my conscience. To see him again. All these things I want are so much stronger than my rules and reasons. Strong enough that they bring me right back to his shop, where I can see the kayaks all lined up in their racks and silhouettes moving behind the window.

  My stomach flutters and I stop midstep, almost turn around, but then I see a flash of his profile. He’s carrying a stack of life jackets, but as his eyes sweep over the street out the window, he stops. I know he sees me, because he smiles right at me. And now it’s too late to turn around. I swallow down all the butterflies that have taken flight in my stomach and force my feet to move.

  He’s out the doorway in less than a second, shaking his head like he can and can’t believe I’m standing there. “You’re here,” he says, unable to keep his smile from spreading over his whole face, right up to the green of his eyes. He holds his hands out wide at his sides. “Here it is, anot
her day and . . . ,” he pauses, “here you are.”

  The breeze lifts a few stray strands of my hair around my face, sending chills down the back of my neck. Colton takes a step toward me and lifts his hand like he might brush them away, but he pauses, just barely, and runs his hand through the waves of his own brown hair instead. “That’s unexpected,” he says.

  “I hope it’s okay; I—”

  Before I can finish, a cute blond girl who looks vaguely familiar steps out of the shop. “Hey, Colt, can you get the—”

  She stops short when she sees me, looks from me to Colton and back again. “Oh hi. I’m sorry. I didn’t know there was anyone else out here. Can I help you with something?” Her tone is friendly and helpful, like I’m a customer.

  My stomach drops, and I stand there without saying anything for a moment. This is Shelby. The Shelby whose words and thoughts I’ve read. Whose joys and fears I’ve seen. Who I feel like I know, maybe even better than Colton.

  My conscience comes rushing back at me, the full weight of all my rules and the reasons I’ve broken them behind it.

  “I was actually just going,” I say quickly. Meeting Colton was one thing, but this is a line I didn’t even anticipate crossing.

  “Wait—what about kayaking?” Colton says, like it’s something we were in the middle of discussing. His eyes catch mine for a tiny moment, and something flickers through them.

  “I, um . . . I changed my mind.” My mouth goes dry, and I take a step back. “Maybe another day? I didn’t mean to bother you at work.”

  “Wait,” Colton says again. “You’re not—it’s fine. I was off work a half hour ago.”

  Shelby laughs at this. “Wait—all that aimless pacing earlier was work?”

  Colton shoots her a look, then turns his eyes back to me. “Quinn, this is my little big sister, Shelby. Shelby, my friend Quinn. She had her first kayak experience yesterday, and now she’s back for more. Think we might head over to the caves again.”

  Shelby raises an eyebrow at Colton, then smiles and reaches out her hand “Always nice to meet a friend of Colton’s,” she says, a hint of something in her voice. It’s the same tone I got from the nurses at the hospital at first, and I deserve it. She gives me a quick smile, then turns back to Colton.

  “That’s awesome, but you’re booked already, Colt.” I can hear it in her voice. She doesn’t want him to go anywhere with me.

  “Booked?” Colton laughs. “I’m not booked. I’m not even allowed—”

  Shelby gives him a look. “Exactly.”

  “C’mon,” he says, stepping toward her. His eyes plead, and there’s something in his voice that sounds like it has to do with more than just me.

  She puts up a hand. “Don’t. Mom and Dad would kill me—you know that.” Her eyes, level and serious, stay on his.

  Colton sighs, exasperated, then seems to remember me and smiles, but this time it’s tighter, more for show. “Dad’s not here, Shel. And besides, she’s not a customer, she’s a friend.”

  “Colton, I can’t because they’re not here. And he left me in charge. And if something happened—”

  “Nothing’s gonna happen. We won’t take a shop kayak. I’ll take Dad’s—it’s in the back.”

  Shelby heaves a heavy sigh and chews her bottom lip, clearly debating. “That’s not the point.”

  “Then what is?” Colton says, with more force behind his voice than I’ve heard him use yet. “It’ll be fine. I’m fine.” He brings his hand to his chest for a moment, which maybe wouldn’t be a noticeable thing for anyone else, but I understand it and so does she.

  “Colton—” There’s a waver in her voice, like she’s torn.

  “Say yes,” he says, flashing a dimpled smile. “Please. Quinn wants to kayak, she’s a beginner, and it wouldn’t be right to let her go alone. Dad would be pissed if we did and he found out about that.”

  Shelby looks at Colton for a moment longer, and I can see her reluctance turn to resignation, and it makes me think of the post she wrote about Colton’s first time back out on the water, and how proud and happy he was to be back doing what he loved, even though it made her whole family nervous.

  “Fine,” she says after a long moment. “But you have to be back in a few hours. I have a four-person tour at three o’clock, and you really do have an appointment.” She holds his eyes for a long moment. “Don’t forget your—”

  “Got it,” Colton cuts her off.

  “And make sure you take your phone with you,” she adds, “and if anything happens—”

  He wraps an arm around her shoulders and gives her a squeeze. “We’ll be fine, I promise. Right?” He looks at me, and all of a sudden I feel this big sense of responsibility. This is his sister I’m talking to, the one who’s been with him and supported him and helped take care of him all along. Who worries about him more in the way a mom would than a sibling.

  I glance at Shelby, asking for some kind of approval, but the smile she gives me doesn’t seem to grant it.

  “Right,” I say finally, and the word feels heavy on my tongue. Laden, somehow, with responsibility and the knowledge that I’ve just sunk myself in even deeper.

  Colton claps his hands. “Good. I’m gonna pull around back to load the boat up, and I’ll meet you out front in a minute.”

  “Okay.” I nod. “I’ll just . . . I’ll go get my bag.” I turn to head back to my car, not wanting to stand there alone with Shelby, but she stops me with a gentle hand on my arm.

  She glances down at the stitches in my lip. “You’re the girl Colton took to the hospital the other day?”

  My heart pounds in my chest under her direct look. “Yes.”

  “Be careful,” she says, looking me right in the eye. “Those aren’t supposed to get wet.”

  I know she’s talking about the stitches, but I can’t help but hear the echo of the nurse’s be careful when she says the words. I nod like I would to my mom telling me something.

  “I will.” I take a step back. “It was nice to meet you.”

  “You too.” She smiles but doesn’t go back in the shop.

  I turn and cross the street, trying not to look like I’m hurrying off, and picturing her watching me the whole way. When I reach my car, I chance a tiny, sidelong glance back and she waves. Message received. Loud and clear. I open the door and run through the whole exchange in my head—her worry, his insistence that he’s okay, what he’s not allowed to do—and it makes me nervous. Is he not okay? Shelby hasn’t posted anything for a long time, so I don’t know if there’s anything to be worried about medically. . . .

  What am I doing, what am I doing, what am I—

  I hear the idle of an engine at my back and know it’s Colton in his bus, with the kayak loaded on top and his sister’s concern and my promise to be careful trailing after him. “That was fast,” I say.

  “We gotta get out of here before she changes her mind,” he says, smiling through the open window. “Get in.”

  And once again, in spite of all the voices in my mind that say don’t, that there’s too much at stake, that it’s not fair to Colton, and that I don’t know what I’m doing, I listen to the tiny, soft voice that comes from somewhere deeper, the one that insists that maybe I do.

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  “Nobody has ever measured, not even poets, how much a heart can hold.”

  —Zelda Fitzgerald

  WE STAND AT the edge of the bluff, looking at the waves that thunder down onto the rocks with a force I can feel in my chest. “Um. I don’t . . .” I shake my head, this time choosing the voice of logic and self-preservation.

  “Kayaking may not be in the cards after all,” Colton says. We watch as another wave pounds and swirls over the rocks that seemed so peaceful yesterday, and I couldn’t agree more. “I’ve got a better idea,” he says. “C’mon.”

  We hop back into his bus, and I settle into the cracked vinyl of the seat, getting used to the feel of it beneath my legs. Colton twists to see over h
is shoulder as he backs up, and puts an arm on the back of my headrest, his fingers just barely brushing my shoulder. It sends a little shiver through me, one he sees when our eyes catch as he turns and takes his arm away.

  Heat blooms in my cheeks, and I laugh.

  “What?” Colton asks.

  “Nothing.” I shake my head and look out the windshield, over the dashboard, behind us, where a surfboard lies on the bed, down to the sandy floorboards beneath my feet—anything not to look at him right then, because I’m afraid of what he might see on my face. When I glance down, something catches my eye. It’s a clear pill counter box like my mom sets up for my dad every morning with his medications and a whole slew of vitamins. This one has two rows, every box has at least one pill in it, and instead of the letters for the days of the week, there are times written on them in Sharpie.

  The question is on my tongue when Colton sees what I’m looking at. He reaches over and scoops up the box, tucking it into the pocket of his door with a tight smile. “Vitamins,” he says. “Sister’s big on them. Sends them with me everywhere.” Something in his tone, and the way he looks back at the road right away, warns me not to ask any questions, but I don’t need to. I know they’re not vitamins.

  We zip along the coast highway, windows down so our hair blows wild around our faces, music turned up loud so no words are necessary, and it feels good. We leave that tense moment behind.

  “So where are we going?” I ask over the music.

  The highway makes a wide arc inland, and we take the exit. Colton turns the music down a couple of notches. “Another one of my favorite places,” he says. “But first we need some provisions.”

  We pull into the dusty parking lot of the Riley Family Fruit Barn, a place my family and I used to come every fall to pick apples and take pictures with the mountains of brightly colored pumpkins every different shade of orange imaginable. I’ve never been here in the summertime, but clearly I’ve been missing out. The parking lot is crowded with families—getting in and out of cars, unpacking strollers, loading full baskets of produce into their trunks. A tractor pulling a flatbed trundles by, packed with kids and parents, some holding full, round watermelons and others taking bright juicy bites from fresh-cut wedges.