Page 45 of A Thousand Little Goodbyes

“Then fight back,” Scarlett suggested. “Right here. Right now. Show me what you’ve got.”

But Chrissie only looked at Scarlett long and hard, taking in the exhausted lines of her face and the way she was curling her arms protectively over her stomach as though expecting an incoming blow. To strike at her now would only be cruel—and that was the one thing Chrissie refused to be, no matter how strong the provocation.

“I won’t give you the satisfaction,” she said as she headed for the door. “You forget how well I know you, Scarlett. And how much better I know myself.”

* * *

Although the temperature was warm enough when they made it to the kidney-shaped pool, the sun decided it was tired of showing off. In May, this part of Minnesota was as mercurial as Scarlett, and the clouds blowing in from the west proved it.

Still, all three of them shimmied into their suits and flip-floppedout to the water’s edge, determined to pretend, if only for a few hours, that they were basking in the tropics instead of a chlorinated concrete hole across the street from a strip mall.

“All I need now is a cabana boy and a wool cap, and I’m set for life,” Scarlett said as she whisked off her towel and settled into the lounge chair. River had thoughtfully arranged them so they caught some of the steam rising from the hot tub. “Remind me again why we aren’t taking a road trip to Mexico?”

Chrissie was too busy taking a book out of her bag—I like to sit and read without interruption—to answer. The choices at the take-a-book, leave-a-book shelf in the hotel lobby had been surprisingly robust, assuming you enjoyed eighties-era Danielle Steel novels.

Which, Chrissie was happy to admit, she did.

“Oh, how cute,” River said as she watched Scarlett settle into her lounge chair. She was once again clad in her high-necked black halter bikini. “I love that suit. My mom had the exact same one. She said it cost a small fortune for a top like that, but it was worth every penny.”

Scarlett didn’t respond. Chrissie, afraid that her friend was taking her bad mood out on River instead of its true target—herself, stepped in to fill the breach.

“Good swimsuits always are. It took me a long time to realize that one should never skimp on socks, bras, or swimwear. I spent most of my twenties being stabbed by rogue underwire.” Then, when Scarlettstilldidn’t say anything, Chrissie turned toward her with her best warning scowl. Honestly, Scarlett had worse manners than Kat sometimes. “You’re the one who taught me that. Remember the first time you took me to La Perla? I took one look at the price tags and—”

But here she cut herself off. Scarlett’s own warning scowl was impossible to ignore, especially since it was being directed at River.

“What’s wrong?” she asked, looking back and forth between the two. “What’s happened?”

“Nothing is wrong,” Scarlett said. “I’m totally fine.”

To Chrissie’s surprise, River clamped her mouth shut and nodded. She thought she heard the girl mutter something under her breath, but the words were impossible to make out over the sound of the hot-tub bubbles kicking into action.

Scarlett yanked the towel she was lying on and pulled it up over her chest. The action was a childish one, but it didn’t make Chrissie soften. It only made her realize a thing she should have figured out days ago.

In the Scarlett Sanderson she knew, a boob job was an excuse to pull on skimpy tops and plunging necklines, to bend and twist until a nip slip was all but guaranteed. But, no.ThisScarlett Sanderson had been drowning in high-necked shirts and flowy tops the entire trip, looking thinner and paler the more the miles wore on.

And the pills in her purse. Chrissie couldn’t forget the pills in her purse.

That conniving, lying, sneaky little bitch. I can’t believe she’s doing this to me…again.

Chrissie sat bolt upright on the lounge and stared—not at Scarlett, but at River. “River, when you say that your mom had a suit like that, do you mean before or after her cancer diagnosis?”

“Um…”

“Don’t answer that, River,” Scarlett warned. “It’s none of our business.”

“Did she have breast cancer?” Chrissie persisted. “Is that what took her life? Do you recognize the pills Scarlett is taking?”

“River, I mean it.” This time, Scarlett’s words held less of a warning and more of a snarl. “Proceed at your own risk.”

Unfortunately for Scarlett, River was made of sterner stuff—a thing Scarlett would have realized for herself if she’d taken any time to consider the girl’s situation. An eighteen-year-old was practically achild, yes, but this was a child who’d been through hell and back again, who was even now trying to claw her way free of it. Vague threats from a woman wearing a mastectomy bikini top would hold very little sway over someone like that.

“Yeah, uh. I think I’m gonna go get dressed.” River took one look at Scarlett’s furious face and Chrissie’s even more furious one and added, “And then I’m going for a walk. Alongone.”

Chrissie hated the thought of leaving that poor girl to her devices for the entire afternoon, but not as much as she hated Scarlett right now. They had one rule—one freaking rule. Months could pass without communication between them. One of them could get fake-proposed to at a baseball game without telling the other. Another one could spend every Saturday night in her pajamas binge-watchingSchitt’s Creekfor the fifteenth time without judgment.

But when it came to the big stuff—the health stuff—they were supposed to be honest with each other.Always.

“When were you going to tell me?” Chrissie asked, her voice flat.