PROLOGUE
Jamie – Ten Years Ago
Her grandparents told me not to bother looking for her. That she’d moved on from our summers on the Isle of Skye. That I’m better off without her. That they are too.
But they wouldn’t tell me why. They wouldn’t tell meanything.
What am I supposed to do? Spend my final summer on Skye without her? Pretend last summer didn’t happen? Pretend I haven’t spent this entire year regretting the way I left things? Never speak to her again?
No. I can’t do any of those things.
Even if our years-long friendship is damaged beyond repair, the last time I saw her cannot be thelasttime. I refuse to accept that. I can’t allow the shame of what I said to haunt me forever. I have to at least attempt to set this right. Even if it won’t matter—even if nothing changes—at least I’ll have tried.
I make a conscious effort to look right before left, then step off the curb to cross the street. The Green Gables Pub looms ahead of me with its whitewashed stone upper floors standing out against the luscious green of the street level. It’s her parents’ pub. The one named after her mum’s favorite story—the same story that inspiredhername. It’s also in Glasgow, a five-hour drive from Skye.
It was the first place I thought of to begin my search, but now that I’m here, I’m not entirely sure what to do. Should I go in and hope she just happens to be here? Do I ask for her parents? Will they know why she hasn’t talked to me in a year? If so, I wouldn’t be surprised if they tell me to leave before I get the chance to see her.
I scrub my sweaty palms down the sides of my thighs, the denim abrasive and rough against my skin, and suck in a deep breath. On my exhale, I wrap my hand around the brass handle of the ornate green door and pull it open. I’ve never been here before, but she spent years sharing stories of finishing homework in her dad’s office and making shortcrust pastry with her mum in the kitchen.
And it’s exactly like I imagined.
Music surrounds me in a wave along with the rich aroma of hearty food, making my mouth water. There’s something about the smell of a Scottish pub that can’t be recreated anywhere else. It smells like home—as it should, considering I practically grew up in one for fourteen years. Well, not in the pub exactly, but the inn it’s attached to.
I bypass the empty hostess stand, moving farther into the dim-lit space. A haggard looking barkeep runs a rag over polished mahogany and offers me a wry smile from behind his beard. I could get myself a pint, considering I’m eighteen, but with one goal in mind, I won’tbe able to enjoy the experience of buying my first legal beer without first getting some answers.
Awkwardness prickles against my skin as I turn on the spot like a top. I know what I’m looking for, but I almost don’t expect to find it. I feel like a buoy lost at sea—by definition, I’m where I should be, but I’m untethered and adrift.
The overhead music fades with a crackle of static and the screech of a microphone’s feedback, drawing my attention to the stage in the back. To a man sitting on a stool with his guitar. On cue, the patrons of the pub shift, pulled toward the stage and the promise of live music, and a table in the corner appears…
And she’s there.
She’srightthere.
Her blonde hair, falling in waves around her shoulders. Brown eyes that I can picture in detail, even if I can’t make them out through the gloom. They’re rich and warm, inviting and deep. How many times have I looked into those eyes and understood exactly what she was thinking? How many staring contests have I forfeited, just to call best out of three and do it again? How many times did I happily lose myself in them?
What I wouldn’t give to be back in my grandparents’ old campervan, tartan blanket spread beneath us, rain falling heavy on the roof, the golden flecks in her irises as warm as her skin against mine.
God, I can’t believe it.She’s right there.
Her head falls back on a laugh and my chest constricts. I wish I could hear it. It’s a sound I took for granted, and I haven’t forgiven myself for that. Not yet… Maybe not ever.
The rest of the table is obscured, so it’s only herI see.
But hasn’t italwaysbeen her? Or at least it should’ve been, but I was just too oblivious and cavalier to see it.
I take a step, and then another, my shoes sticking to the concrete floor. The crowd shifts again, and instead of seeing more of her, I see a guy. Was he the one who made her laugh?
Envy coats my throat, its viscous texture so real I force myself to swallow hard.
It used to be me who made her laugh like that.
When her grandparents said she’d moved on, had they meant she was seeing someone? It would track that he’d be the reason she didn’t come back to Skye for one last summer like we’d promised each other. But could this also explain why she hasn’t returned a single attempt of mine to contact her?
The musician starts to play and the raucous noise creates more movement in the sea of people, obscuring the corner table completely. Only when it parts a moment later do I see the whole picture for the first time, and it stops me in my tracks.
Somewhere in that moment, the world shifts. I’m sure no one else feels it, but I do. Because the girl I’m in love with—my best friend, my favorite adventure partner—is settling a tiny baby in her arms. And the guy who just made her laugh? He leans over and presses a kiss first to the baby’s head and then to hers.
And the smile she gives him? That used to be mine.
