Hearts, Strings, and Other Breakable Things

by Jacqueline Firkins

  * * *

  Sunday afternoon, after Norah sent her outside for “making a racket,” Edie sat in the garden, strumming her guitar and trying to form words out of feelings, which was like trying to make pudding out of astronomy. Softly, quietly, to the birds, the trees, and the cupids that were kind enough not to laugh, she sang.

  “What would you say if I told you okay?

  Would you dress up my yeses in velvet and gold?

  What would you think if we went to the brink?

  Would you leave me uneasy with no hand to hold?

  How would you feel if your dream became real?

  Though people in deep will still wake up alone?

  What would you do if I broke my heart over you?”

  When a car door slammed to Edie’s right, she crept through the hedges and peeked toward the Summerses’ driveway. Claire was pulling away in her cute little convertible, tailpipe smoking, tires screeching. Sebastian stood beside his house and watched her leave, his hands jammed into his pockets, shaking his head. After a long and painful pause, when Claire’s car was well out of sight, he picked up a rock and weighed it in his hand. Then he flung it toward the street, cursing as the rock arced its way down the driveway and rolled to a stop near the mailbox.

  Edie stepped backwards, not wanting to intrude on a private moment. A branch caught her guitar string, announcing her presence with a sharp twang. Sebastian spun toward her. She waved, barely, as the heat flooded her cheeks. She was mortified to be caught spying. She hadn’t meant to spy but she could hardly claim she was doing anything else while she was basically hugging the shrubbery.

  Sebastian approached the fence, pointing over his shoulder.

  “I, um, we just, that was—”

  “Doesn’t matter.” Edie sidled out from behind the hedges. She set her guitar on a bench and stepped onto the gravel path. “You guys’ll work it out.”

  “I don’t know. Maybe.” He stared off toward the road as his face ran a gamut of indecipherable but joyless expressions. “Sometimes I feel like I’d do anything for her. Other times I wonder, if we don’t make each other happy, is it all worth it?”

  Edie shrugged, offering him the most noncommittal response she could muster since Hell, no, run screaming, she’s sucking your soul seemed hyperbolic, inflammatory, and less than helpful for Sebastian’s current state of confusion.

  “Sorry I went AWOL.” His gaze traveled from the street to his toes, avoiding Edie entirely. “Things have been weird since the pool party. I probably shouldn’t have mentioned the cookies. Or set up the poker game. Claire thinks, I mean, she got the impression”—he traced a groove in the driveway with his toe—“she just worries about things she shouldn’t. I didn’t want to make the situation worse.”

  Edie cringed as she silently rescinded her ungenerous thoughts. Claire wasn’t sucking anyone’s soul. She might’ve put undue pressure on Sebastian and done her utmost to make Edie’s life miserable lately, but she had her own problems, not the least of which was a boyfriend who wasn’t totally honest with her, or with himself.

  As Sebastian continued redrawing lines and as Edie scrambled for words that wouldn’t come, a silence stretched out that was far too complicated to be comfortable. It was finally broken when a group of kids rode their bikes down the street, daring each other to take their hands off the handlebars. They laughed and shouted, gloriously oblivious to anything more complicated than the need to be home before dark.

  “I used to do that,” Sebastian said. “I used to be fun.”

  “You’re still—”

  “No, I’m not.” He shook his head as his shoulders crept upward. “Not like I want to be.”

  Edie studied him, frustrated that he was beating himself up again. She knew better than to argue his point, but she wondered if she could show him he was fun, in his own way. She pointed to the giant sycamore in the back corner of Norah’s garden.

  “Remember our tree?” she asked.

  “Of course.” He peered past her shoulder, shading his eyes with a hand. “You used to tie Pixy Stix to the branches.”

  “Only the green ones.”

  “Because you knew they were my favorite?”

  “Because they made you look like you licked a frog.” And because they were his favorite.

  Sebastian smiled just enough to make Edie feel like she’d finally said the right thing.

  “I haven’t climbed a tree in years,” he said.

  Edie backed away from the fence, edging toward the tree.

  “Maybe it’s time to renew old habits,” she hinted.

  “Right now?”

  “Why not?” She continued backing up. “Carpe diem. Or carpe tree-um.”

  His smile widened but he made no move to follow her.

  “You’re serious?” he asked.

  “Serious enough to get there first!” She spun on her heel and took off.

  Behind her, Sebastian leapt the fence and chased her through the garden. They hurdled over flower beds and careened around hedges, laughing like they were ten again.

  “That tree is mine, Price!”

  “In your dreams, Summers!”

  She peeked over her shoulder. He skidded on the paving stones near a leaking sprinkler. His stumble bought her just enough time to sprint across the open green and beat him to the tree. She began to climb, bracing a sneaker against the trunk and hauling herself onto the lowest branch. The bark was rough against her palms but easy to grip as she shimmied to her armpits and onto her stomach. Seconds later, with a grin wider than Montana, Sebastian flung a leg over the bottom limb and pulled himself to her side.

  “You cheated!” he teased.

  “I had to cheat. Your legs are twice as long as mine now.”

  Shoulder to shoulder and elbow to elbow, they climbed their way upward until they were twenty feet off the ground. As Edie straddled a thick, Y-shaped branch and caught her breath, she was thrilled to see that a few remnants of their childhood treasure trove remained: a pair of carved initials, a rusty compass dangling from a nail, a shredded loop of magic string that was supposed to give the tree a human voice, and three plastic guitar picks wedged firmly into the bark.

  Sebastian perched in front of her and extended a hand.

  “I declare this race a draw.”

  “Agreed.”

  They shook on it. As his fingers wrapped hers and as hers wrapped his, Edie felt the same thrill of connection that’d coursed through her the last time he held her hand. Only this time it wasn’t The Age of Innocence. It was the Age of Confused. Her crush was still palpable—her inexorable pull toward him, the flutter of joy she felt whenever he smiled at her—but something else was distracting her, drawing her in another direction.

  Sebastian’s hand slipped away and rested on the limb between them, leaving Edie’s hand empty, but strangely . . . not.

  “You haven’t changed,” he said.

  “Yes, I have.”

  “Okay, you probably don’t hide Lego pirates in trees anymore.”

  “No. I don’t hide those.”

  As Edie ran her fingers through some ratty strands of Mylar ribbon that were still tacked to the branch, a bird chirped at the end of a nearby limb, a motorcycle rumbled by out on the road, and a trickle of laughter echoed from half a block away. This wasn’t a moment for silence. All of Mansfield seemed to sense it, conspiring to fill the quiet, making the moment simply a moment.

  Edie and Sebastian settled in back to back, legs straddling the branch, feet dangling. They looked nice, those feet, hers in torn gray canvas, his in gently worn brown leather, softly swaying to and fro, unaware of how close they were to each other. For almost two hours, Edie and Sebastian sat in their tree. They talked about books, music, and cloudy night skies that let the stars keep their secrets. They vented about their families. They laughed about their dumbest mistakes. They shared their hopes for change once they got to college, for the promise of blank slates and blank pages. They also mourned the absenc
e of the parents who wouldn’t get to see who their children became.

  As the sun began to set, Edie had grown so at ease with their conversation she found herself telling Sebastian about Shonda—but not about their antics at the Burger Barn, or their early band practices, or any of the other humorous stories she’d shared with Maria, Julia, or Henry. Instead, she confessed to kissing her best friend’s boyfriend, describing the profound regret and the gaping void left by Shonda’s retreat. After holding everything inside for weeks, it felt good to say the words aloud, as painful as they were. A weight lifted off Edie’s chest, reminding her how badly she needed a friend more than anything else, a real friend, one she could share the ugliest parts of herself with.

  “I assume you’ve tried apologizing?” Sebastian asked when she’d finished.

  “Many times, many ways.”

  “If you guys were so close, surely she’ll forgive you.”

  “Not necessarily.” Edie adjusted her posture so her shoulders nestled more naturally against Sebastian’s. “That’s the hardest thing about loving someone. You only get to choose how you love them, not how they love you back. The apology was mine to offer. The forgiveness is up to her.”

  Sebastian tipped his head against Edie’s. They sat quietly for a minute while the breeze rustled the leaves and fluttered the Mylar ribbon. It cast dancing spots of light on the trunk, like fairies or fireflies.

  “Don’t give up,” Sebastian said. “If your friend is as important as you say she is, you’ll push through this. You just have to find the right way to reconnect.”

  “‘All human wisdom is contained in these two words—Wait and Hope.’”

  “Who said that?” He twisted to the left, making his hair brush the top of her ear.

  “Alexandre Dumas.” She shifted again, bracing herself near the spot where his hands wrapped the limb, wedged in the space between her hips and his. “It’s from The Count of Monte Cristo. I’m reading it for class.”

  “Five to one.”

  “You’re not counting your quote?”

  “I’m not really a—”

  “Yes, you are.” She nestled the back of her head against his neck, hoping her words found an equally cozy spot in which to settle. “Want to make it five to three?”

  “I don’t keep as much on my shelves as you do.”

  “Not even your own words?”

  Sebastian drew in a breath, let it out, ran a hand through his hair, inhaled again, coughed, and pulled a knee against his chest. He repeated the routine with only slight variations until he ran out of tics and twitches and finally went still.

  “A few thoughts about words,” he murmured to the leaves that were glowing orange in the sunset. “When I write, I spill. I strew. I make messes. I remind myself how little I know. But when I read, the words march on their black-booted feet, parading from the page to attack my ignorance. The i’s wield their dots, the t’s their crosses, the q’s and p’s their tongue-tipped tails, strutting, well armed, into my defenseless soul.”

  Then and there, in measured breath sensed through shifting shoulders, in a connection that felt so natural it didn’t demand a definition, and in the kind of silence Edie only shared with Sebastian, the world, for a moment, was perfect.

  “So,” he said after a long but beautiful pause, “you and Henry, huh?”

  And then the world was not so perfect.

  Right, Edie thought. That other guy.

  With the mood shattered, Edie edged away from Sebastian and assessed her means of climbing down. Despite all she’d shared that evening, three subjects remained on her Do Not Discuss list: her crush, his girlfriend, and her . . . friend.

  While she swung a leg off the branch, he spun to face her.

  “I thought you didn’t like him,” he said.

  “I didn’t.”

  “What changed?”

  Edie didn’t answer. The question was far too complicated. What had changed? And yet, what hadn’t? She needed weeks to figure all that out. Maybe more. She lowered herself onto the next branch, frustrated she’d stuck herself in a spot without a safety exit. As someone prone to bolting, she was usually smarter about that. Next time she climbed a tree with Sebastian, she’d bring rappelling gear.

  “What did I say?” he asked.

  “Nothing. I forgot I promised Norah I’d . . . make something white whiter.”

  She continued her descent with Sebastian following. As she wrapped her arms around a thick limb and found her footing on the bottom branch, her locket caught on a curl of peeling bark. Sebastian stepped on it and Edie pulled away, splitting the chain, busting the hinges, and sending the locket flying to the ground.

  She jumped down and gathered the pieces, feeling the fragility of the broken locket echo through her bones, as though she too were about to shatter. In that moment it was all too much to take. Her mom smiled up from the photo, reduced to a memory. Sebastian crouched nearby, committed to someone else. The house and gardens sprawled out to her right, a far cry from home. Edie’d trapped herself in a lie about a relationship with Henry, one that was confusing the hell out of her. She’d ruined her closest friendship. She wasn’t being completely honest with her cousins. She didn’t fit in at school. She was sick to death of biting her tongue, playing her music where no one could hear, and eating food she despised. She couldn’t even write a stupid essay, a task that’d seemed so simple when she started it. Nothing was as it should be.

  Sebastian handed her the heart-shaped lid and a bit of chain, cupping his hands around hers.

  “I’m so sorry.” He leaned down and tried to meet her eyes. “I’ll fix it. I swear.”

  Edie shook her head and turned away, fighting back tears.

  “It’s not just the necklace.” Her voice strained past the heavy lump in her throat.

  “I don’t understand.”

  “I know you don’t.”

  “Then talk to me.” He brushed her hair off her face and tucked it behind her shoulder. It fell forward again, as tangled and uncontrollable as the rest of her.

  “It’s nothing. Forget it.” She leapt up and hurried toward the house, desperate to be alone before she had a complete meltdown.

  “Edie!” Sebastian called after her. “What can I do?”

  She spun around as the tears began to flow.

  “Wait and hope, Sebastian. Wait and hope. It’s what I do.”

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  * * *

  Edie sat at the kitchen table, ignoring the rancid kale chips she’d made the mistake of trying. She stared at her laptop and attempted to figure out who she’d be if she could be anyone. She was running out of time to complete the task. She was running out of ideas, too. She was randomly alternating between Mary Shelley and Mary Poppins when Maria stormed in.

  “eBay? Seriously?” She dropped a large package next to Edie’s laptop. “Please tell me this isn’t what you meant when you said you bought yourself a prom dress.”

  While Edie pushed back her chair and stood up to examine the box, Julia scampered in from the hallway, slipping on the tiles in her stocking feet.

  “Oh, my god!” she exclaimed. “Is that your ballgown?”

  “Looks like it.”

  “Let me see!” Julia clasped her hands and bit down a smile.

  “If I get one whiff of mothballs or BO, I’m shredding that thing.” Maria let out a huff. “I’ll never understand why you like wearing other people’s sweat.”

  As Julia danced around and Maria poured herself a glass of juice, Edie found the kitchen shears and carefully opened the box. She pulled out a 1950s ivory cocktail dress with a strapless, drop-waist satin bodice and a massive tulle skirt that expanded as it escaped its confines. The dress was horribly wrinkled and it did smell a little musty, but to Edie it was beautiful. It held a story in its threads. Another girl might’ve had her first kiss in this dress. She might’ve danced under moonlight. She might’ve run barefoot along a beach while sand caught in the hem and then,
decades later, made the journey from Charleston all the way to Mansfield, along with a fair share of cat hair.

  Julia ran her hands along the satin bodice, smoothing out the worst of the wrinkles where the fabric puckered over the corsetlike understructure.

  “It’s totally Cinderella,” she said.

  “You mean Cinder-smell-a,” Maria amended.

  “I’ll get it dry-cleaned,” Edie assured her.

  “You’ll get it fumigated.”

  Edie cut Maria a look. Then she reached into the box and pocketed the receipt without glancing at the cost. Wearing what she wanted to prom was worth chipping into her savings, especially if she was going to walk in alone and face a sea of couples.

  “Good thing you didn’t ask Henry to prom,” Maria said. “He’d have to strap you to the roof of his car so he could reach the hotel without passing out.”

  “I’m sure he’s grateful I’ve spared him the trouble.” Edie kept her voice clipped, hoping to end the topic there. She’d considered asking Henry to prom but she knew if they went on an actual date, all the lines she was struggling to maintain between sex, love, and friendship would be erased, and they weren’t the sort of lines a guy in coveralls could paint back on. She’d had fun with him over the past couple weeks but once she kissed him, there was no going back, even if she found out afterward that he’d only been playing her. She’d watched her mom wrestle with feeling disposable for years. Edie didn’t want to risk it. Even though she also kind of did.

  As she collapsed the box, Maria rubbed at the lipstick on her glass. Hard.

  “What do you guys do together, anyway?” she asked.

  “Play guitar, poke around in shops, eat nonorganic food. Mostly we talk.”

  “Oh, please.” Maria scoffed. “Talking with Henry is like ordering a banana split and only eating the banana.”

  “Maybe I only want the banana.”

  “Whatever. Wrong analogy, because I know you want ‘the banana.’”

  Edie jammed the box into the recycle bin, shoving it down with more force than necessary. She was getting really sick of Maria’s prodding about Henry. She’d done her best to be discreet, but it wasn’t easy when Maria brought him up every chance she got.