That's the Way I Loved You

by Carrie Aarons

  “We sure were happy, huh?” I don’t catch myself before I blurt it out.

  “Everyone used to want to be you two. I just wanted y’all to adopt me.” Cecily rubs my shoulder.

  “Sometimes, I wish I could go back to that moment in time, when everything was perfect.”

  “Was it, though? I mean, you still had braces, and sex hadn’t even gotten good yet.” She laughs, and I join her.

  “You’re right. That was saved for senior year.” I can’t help but bite my tongue at the hilarious image of Jason and I losing it to each other.

  We had no idea what we were doing, and it showed. Eventually, awful became decent, decent became good, and good became phenomenal. We practiced a lot.

  Cecily pulls the other book in front of us. “Then I guess we’re ready for this.”

  Together, we flip the pages of our senior yearbook, laughing at the memories and hilarious pictures of classmates. We find her senior picture, beautiful in her grandmother’s pearls with that black cape they put on you. Then comes mine, with my mother’s locket around my neck. I reach up, realizing I left that locket buried in some jewelry chest back in New York. I’ll have to pull it out when I go back.

  The quote under my picture is what gets me.

  Some things tie your life together, slender threads and things to treasure.

  Days like that should last and last and last.

  They’re lyrics from the song “Dusk and Summer” by Dashboard Confessional, off the album that defined my senior year into the summer that defined us forever.

  The melody of that song plays in my mind now, a heartbreaking summer ballad that reminds me of sunsets and tall grass and sneaking out and drinking on the field behind Cecily’s family farm.

  “We really did live the life then, huh?” I bump her shoulder with mine.

  She takes a sip of tea. “They were the best of times. But we can have more, ya know.”

  “Oh, yeah?” I know she has an idea on the brain.

  Ceci jumps up like an agile jaguar.

  “Come on, you need a nice, relaxing day at the salon.” She pulls at my arm.

  “Oh, no you don’t.” I back up, trying to escape her.

  “Savvy, you deserve it! You’ve been cooped up in here for a week, and your nails look like a wreck.” She blinks down at my hands.

  Defensively, I pull my hands back. “How rude!”

  She shrugs. “Just being honest. And you know that these girls are already gossiping about you. Imagine if they saw those cuticles.”

  The sparkle in her eye is the only thing that makes me smile. Because what she’s proposing is a social suicide bomber mission. I’ll be walking right into the belly of the beast going to the salon.

  “If even one of them makes a comment about my Yankee hairstyle or lack of hairspray …” I point a finger at her.

  Cecily loops her arm through mine, barely giving me time to change out of my slippers.

  “Don’t worry, I’ll block the busy bees and their stingers. This is going to be fun!”

  19

  Savannah

  We walk into Stacy’s Salon, which is basically just like every other southern hair salon you’ve ever imagined. If you picture Truvy’s in the movie Steel Magnolias, then you’re pretty much ninety percent of the way there.

  Stacy McManus has owned the salon for nearly thirty years, almost as long as I’ve been alive. According to Facebook and Cecily, two girls who dropped out of our high school class and went to cosmetology school currently work there, as well as Bertha and Janice, the two stylists who are as much of a staple as Stacy.

  I remember coming in here every third Saturday with my mama, so she could get her roots dyed. My sisters and I would ask for manicures for every birthday or special event, and Cecily and I practically grew up on Stacy’s swing set in the backyard. Our mothers would gather with the other local moms to gossip, drink tea, and get beautified.

  And apparently, it’s the same thing that happened on a random Thursday nowadays, as well.

  “I wondered when you’d be by to see me!”

  Stacy comes barreling at me, her large chest almost bouncing out of the tank top she’s sporting. She engulfs me in a bear hug, and my initial shock dissolves into a warm comfort. She’s of my mother’s era, and something about her embrace has me struggling through the grief I feel for Mama every day.

  Clearing my throat, I back out of the hug. “You were on my list of must-see stops.”

  “And it’s a good thing, too. Your ends are dry as a Texas summer, sweetheart.” She picks at my hair even though I’ve given her no permission.

  I shoot a death glare at Cecily, who shrugs, because we’re only five seconds in and already there have been comments about my hair.

  “We’re just here for manicures, Stac. Hi y’all!” Cecily wags her fingers at the stylists and all the women in the salon.

  I recognize … well, everyone. Jenks wife, Nancy, who we went to high school with, sits in Bertha’s chair. And then there is Kaitlyn Meyers, Olivia Bloom, and Franny Welden. All girls we went to school with, who were in our friend group, and are actively looking me up and down. I feel the judgment swirling, the gossip gathering behind their tongues, and for a moment, I’m terrified.

  And then I remember who I am. Then it all becomes entertainment and pastime. Gossiping in the salon is a southern pastime, one I forgot I loved. In New York, I plug my headphones in whenever I get my hair or nails done, and barely make eye contact with the person working on me.

  “All right, loves, choose your colors and then sit at those stations,” Stacy instructs us.

  Cecily goes with bright Barbie pink, while I pick a mauve-gray that has no business in the kind of weather Texas is bringing right now.

  We sit down next to each other, and without a word, Stacy brings us over two cold glasses of tea.

  And before I even get my hands in the bowl of soaking water, they start up.

  “Did you see what Hannah was wearing at church last weekend?” Nancy says.

  “Someone could have seen straight up to her cooter when she went for communion. Nicholas really needs to teach her what’s what,” Olivia agrees.

  “Who is Hannah?” I ask Cecily.

  Kaitlyn cuts her off. “Remember Nicholas, the outfielder on the baseball team our senior year?”

  I nod, vaguely remembering his face.

  “Well, he married this girl named Hannah from Chile, we suspect because she was pregnant. But there was never any baby, and now he’s locked in. Anyways, she’s a typical Chile girl.”

  Stacy and Janice sit down across from us, prepping our cuticles and nail beds. The massage Janice is working over my fingers feels heavenly, and I’m glad I let Ceci talk me into this.

  The rest of the salon snickers, because we all know what it means to be a Chile girl. The town over was, for lack of a better term, trash. A lot of drugs, a lot of unemployment, and the people there were a product of their environment. It wasn’t nice, the way they were patronizing a girl from Chile, but I could only imagine the outfit she’d worn to church.

  “If it wasn’t her ass, it was her boobs hanging out. I swear, I almost had to take my Jimmy out of that church.” Nancy scoffs, and I still can’t believe that people I graduated with have kids that are of the age of noticing a woman’s curves.

  “Are y’all going to the vineyard opening weekend?” Cecily asks, joining in on the local newswire.

  “Wouldn’t miss it. A night of getting drunk without my kids? I’m in.” Olivia giggles.

  “Jason does such a good job. I just can’t wait to have some of that Tex Mex they bring in from Austin. I’ve been craving that street corn they make. Oh crap, I might be pregnant again,” Kaitlyn whines.

  His name registers in my brain, but I keep my mouth shut. I want to know what the opening of the vineyard is about, and how Jason is involved. Maybe I can ask Cecily later, but it’s shark bait opening my mouth in here. Once I show interest in my ex-boyfriend, they
’re all going to pounce.

  Stacy rumbles a laugh. “You and Landry really don’t take no breaks do you?”

  “The man is a fiend. I gotta get me some birth control.”

  Olivia gasps. “Don’t even joke.”

  I can’t stop from rolling my eyes, and Cecily swallows a snort next to me. Here we are, gossiping about everyone in the entire town’s vaginas, but these women think going on the pill is ungodly. If they only knew the two times I ran to CVS down my block to buy Plan B.

  Two seconds later, they’re onto the next subject. We spend the entire rest of the afternoon, long after our nails dry, just chatting at the salon.

  By the time Cecily drops me off back at my apartment, I feel in tune with the girl I used to be.

  Dropping my head back against the headrest, I smile over at Ceci. “Thank you for today. It was … entertaining.”

  “My pleasure. Now your nails and your ears are up to Hale standards.”

  “Ears?” I raise an eyebrow.

  “Don’t pretend you weren’t engrossed in that story about Mrs. Jires having an affair with her next-door neighbor.”

  “You caught me.” I chuckle. “It was too good not to ask about the entire situation.”

  “She’s still in there, you know,” Cecily says.

  “Huh?” I’m confused.

  “The girl you used to be. I love seeing this strong woman you’ve become, but that wild, carefree girl is still in there, too. I know you’re doubting that. I had a hard time letting some of that side of me go as well. I’m sure it’s been harder for you to be back here because everything feels foreign. But I can still see that love you have for everyone here. You can take the girl out of Texas, but you can’t take Texas out of the girl.”

  My old best friend winks at me, and I feel so much relief that I want to cry.

  Wiping at my eyes, which are getting misty, I reach out to grab her hand.

  “I thought I knew who I was. For the last ten years, I’ve had this identity that I thought could not be tested. I’ve been strong, and self-sufficient. I’m used to doing things on my own, or closing myself off if things get too scary in terms of emotions. The minute I stepped foot back here, it was like all the concrete I thought I was standing on turned into quicksand.”

  Cecily nods, chewing on her lip as her own eyes get misty.

  “Maybe it’s a good thing, you know? Going through this test. You showed me today that I can still be her, the girl I came from. My roots are still in here,” I rub my chest over my heart, “but my wings are, too. I can combine them, take the best of both and become the person I was always meant to be. How is it that I’m almost thirty and still questioning who I am?”

  My friend smiles wistfully. “I think that if we’re not questioning ourselves every single day, we’re not really alive. You don’t have to know who you are, not now, and not when you’re fifty. Hell, you could pick up some random activity some day when you’re forty-seven, like hiking every mountain trail in the continental United States!”

  We both giggle, because me doing any kind of voluntary physical outdoor activity is laughable.

  “But you could, and it might be the thing you realize you were put on this earth for. People find their calling at all different times. It’s not really about that. I guess we just have to take each day as a new opportunity to live fiercely and love without regret.”

  My voice is a whisper as it comes out. “Since when did you get so smart?”

  “Been reading a lot of Oprah.” She giggles, and we break into a fit of laughter.

  The day leaves me with even more questions, but a sense of peace I didn’t know I was searching for.

  20

  Savannah

  After my trip to the salon, and sit-down dinner with my family, I begin to settle into the routine of Hale like I haven’t in the weeks I’ve been here.

  I start to work down in The Whistlestop, chatting with Rudy or anyone who wanders in. I go to church for the first Sunday in more than ten years, and take Cecily out to dinner at Buddy’s, even though she puts it on the family tab. We get too tipsy on margaritas and then end up joking about going cow tipping. Stacy wrangles me into a knitting circle one night, and I think of Mama the entire time. Adeline gets our mother’s spare yarn out of her attic, and I make a little doll’s outfit for one of Noah’s girls.

  The South has been injected back into me, and I slow way down. Being on my own, in the apartment, is something I relish. I’ve been out to the house twice, to finish the painting, and don’t see Jason at all. But I don’t mind. I’m having a love affair with my hometown and remembering all the parts of me that I’d long ago abandoned.

  Before I know it, another week passes, and Perry is on me about what the hell I’m doing down here.

  “You need to get back here. They’re threatening to call the backup buyers.” His voice is angry and short.

  Stepping out of Gilo’s, the Mexican restaurant in Hale, I cover the receiver with my hand. No one on the street knows who I’m talking to, but internally, I’m embarrassed. My boyfriend is currently talking to me like I’m a petulant child.

  “I’m trying, Perry. Things here are more complicated than I thought. And if they’re that insistent, let them call the backups. There are hundreds of nice apartments in Manhattan, we’ll find one.”

  I think I actually hear him choke on something on the other end of the phone. “You’re serious right now? What the hell are you talking about, Savannah? We have been waiting almost a year on this specific apartment, it’s the cornerstone in our plan. It hits every item on our checklist; his and her bathrooms, Italian marble countertops, a multi-thousand-dollar security system. And now you’re just willing to let it go? What the hell has gotten into you?”

  As he lists off all the things I thought were important just months ago, I’m kind of disgusted. Did we really need two separate bathrooms? Wasn’t the point of moving in with your significant other to share all spaces, to get to know each other on an intimate level?

  But his other point has my palms sweating. I was fixated on getting the penthouse. In fact, it was my number one goal this year; there had been nothing else more important to me. Hell, I’d gone down to Hale like a bat out of hell just to set my credit straight so we could snag the penthouse.

  There was just no fight left in me for it. In fact, I felt more at home in the small apartment above Rudy’s shop than I knew I ever would in the glass and marble monstrosity we’d been bidding on. I’m not sure when that changed, but it just had. And I couldn’t deny it now.

  I didn’t even know I was questioning anything until I got here. Part of me wishes I never came here, that I resolved it all from New York. The other part of me realizes that I could have had a complete breakdown four months from now when I moved into an apartment with Perry and finally had to face the fears and doubts that had been lying dormant for so long.

  “I just … coming down here showed me that some things are just different. We felt a lot of pressure on this property anyway, and the board was so stuffy and judgmental. I’ll get things settled here, and we’ll take our time finding a place that really is our own,” I try to reassure him.

  Silence greets my positive spin for a few moments.

  “That was the perfect place, and now we’re going to lose it. Because what? You went back to Oklahoma? This isn’t you, Savannah.” Perry never called me by a nickname.

  His lack of knowledge on me, or listening skills when I said where I was flying home to, wounds me. I guess it’s partly my fault; I’ve never told Perry much of anything about my childhood or why I came to New York. I never wanted to discuss it, and he never asked. It was like my life started over completely when I moved to Manhattan, and that’s the only version of me he wanted to know.

  “I’m in Texas,” I mutter, knowing he won’t care.

  “Fine, Texas.” Perry is quiet for a second. “I feel like I’m losing you.”

  And then my heart fractures a little. Bec
ause I’m throwing our life for a loop. He’s been so good to me, and we’ve really built something together. What I’m doing isn’t fair to Perry; he’s done nothing but try to make my dreams come true. And I’m not even trying to accurately explain to him why I’m having this change of heart about so many things. This man loves me, and I love him.

  Not to mention keeping a gigantic secret about kissing Jason the other week. I’ll never tell him that, because it won’t happen again and there is no purpose in mentioning it.

  “I’m so sorry, Per. I don’t mean to be vague or short, it’s just that I’ve reconnected with an old part of myself down here and it’s opening my eyes to some things. You knew how broken I was when you met me, and part of that is about what happened here. You’re not losing me. I promise, I’ll be done here soon and then I’m coming back to you.”

  There is a sigh of relief on the other end. “Good, I miss you terribly. Just … get it done, okay? In the meantime, I’ll start apartment hunting again.”

  We hang up with mutual I love you’s, and then I know what I have to do.

  I haven’t been working on the house, keeping up my end of the deal with Perry. It’s time to, like he said, get it done. So, I head out, fully intending on spending the rest of the day fixing up as much as I can.

  When I pull up to the house, it’s such a muggy day and I’m so frustrated that I don’t even go inside. I bypass it, heading for the back of the house. My sandals trudge through the overgrown lawn and weeds as big as trees, a problem Jason will have to address if he puts this place on the market. But finally, I get through it, and the sparkle of the crystalline water instantly soothes my soul.

  The hills form on all sides, creating a valley filled with a large lake. It’s so big that you can’t even see the other end, and it’s what spurred us to buy the shack off Jason’s uncle. I imagined summers here, wading into the lake, spending nights skinny dipping in it.

  This lake has always been a source of comfort to me; after my mother’s funeral, I came here to be alone. I sat on the shabby dock and put my toes in the water, letting the salt of my tears mix with the inky black water.