Why are you always asking me that?
Doyoufeel different?
Does she even realize where she is? Does she remember that she’s dead?
I’m so frustrated, tears are welling up.I’ve tried nearly everything! Am I ever going to get her out of there?
“Hey.” Greg puts a hand on my shoulder.
“It didn’t work!” I drop my phone in my lap and press the heels of my hands over my eyes.
Greg rubs my back, and we sit like that for a while as the waves crash. “It must be hard to have to just…try things,” he says quietly. “Shots in the dark. Rummaging through all the corners of your life.”
“Not as hard as it must have been to raise me alone! And I can’t even do this for her! What if—what if I never figure it out!” The dam breaks and I’m crying again. Mom would hate to see me like this.Have some character,she’d say,some dignity!But here I am, an undignified hot mess, losing another round of Trying to Be a Better Person.
“What if she’s trapped in there forever?”
“You know…” Greg starts again quietly, like he’s trying not to spook me, his knuckles tracing a slow path up and down next to my spine. “I wonder if my mom was wrong. When she said—” He hesitates, and I get the sense he feels bad saying something to contradict his mom, even though she’s not here. “Maybe your mom’s unfinished business doesn’t have anything to do with you. Maybe it’s not something you can fix.”
I don’t know what to do with this idea—don’t know where to put the things it makes me feel. I stand abruptly and brush the sand off myself, offering Greg a hand up.
“Thanks for coming,” I say as I pull him to his feet.
“You’re welcome.” Greg laughs, but there isn’t much joy in it. “You can stop thanking me. It’s okay. We’ve known each other forever.”
An uneasy silence hangs between us on the drive home, and when he turns into my driveway, we both sit there, not moving. I can barely stand to be around him right now, but I also don’t want him to go.
Greg stares at his hands on the wheel and takes a deep breath in.
“He’s not good enough for you,” he says finally, like he’s been workshopping that in his head, all the times he’s been silent over the past few days. “And—and I don’t know who is, but—” His voice is ragged, a way I’m not used to hearing him. “But he’s definitely not.”
I’m so surprised, I have to laugh. “What are you even talking about?” I’ve been thinking about Mark Winterson in aspirational terms for so long—the Guy Mom Would Want Me to Date, from the moment I laid eyes on him. “Seems like he’s better than me by most metrics.”
Greg’s eyes tick over to me. “Not by any of the ones that matter.”
The mood in this car has gotten weirdly intense, all of a sudden, and part of me is frustrated verging on angry.You’re dating someone else! I’m trying to move on from you! Why are you making it so hard?
So I give him a tight smile and say, “Good night, Greg,” before I clamber out of the car and shut the door.
Chapter
34
There’s nothing left on the list to try. I don’t know what else to do for Mom now. And things with Greg get weirder every time we hang out.He’s not good enough for youloops in my head, and I resolve to avoid him for a while.
It’s Sunday afternoon, and I’m lying on the couch, staring at the wall and moping when Tita Wendy stops by.
She slips off her shoes—sneakers a streetwear blog would envy—and breezes through the house to the kitchen, Tupperware in hand. I can see she’s made laing, another one of my favorites: taro leaves and pork in a thick sauce of spicy coconut milk. Even better as leftovers, because all the flavors have had time to mingle.
Guilt creeps over me like a rash as she finds a place for it in the fridge. I should learn to cook so I can bring her food sometime. I’ll add it to the to-do list, once I figure out how to free Mom from Slack.
“How’ve you been, Roobs?” Tita Wendy asks when I join her in the kitchen.
“Oh, I’m okay!” I sigh, wavering about whether to burden her with this. “I just…don’t know what else to do.”
Tita Wendy gives me a sympathetic look and rubs her palms up and down my arms. “Think about it some more. I’m sure it will come to you.”
I shake my head, and she pats my arms gently, clicking her tongue. “I’m so glad you and Greg made up,” she adds. “He was getting insufferable.”
