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My left eye twitches.
“Andwe were talking about taking a group road trip to the Grand Canyon.”
“Oh yeah?”
The Grand Canyon trip is something I could get behind. I’ve always wanted to travel. Remaining in Brookfield was never my plan. At some point—and I could probably pinpoint it to an exact moment if I really wanted to—I stopped planning. Stopped pursuing. I sat back and took the easy path. Lived in the house I’d inherited. Went to a state school for a degree. Took a job at the high school I had gone to.
I haven’t turned out like my dad, which was always my worst fear. But looking at Sutton earlier, I realized she had done it. She went out and accomplished exactly what she’d wanted to. I never did that. And knowing she had achieved it all elsewhere was different than seeing her back here.
I would have held her back.
She was right to turn me down back then. Maybe she knew I’d end up here, still stuck in the same place all these years later.
But being stuck, having visited the Grand Canyon, is slightly better, I guess.
“Yep. I talked her out of the costumes and said I’d talk youintothe Grand Canyon.”
“Yeah, sure. I’ll go.”
Tanya beams. It erases the lingering confusion—and suspicion—that’s been on her face ever since we ran into Sutton. I’m hit with a strong blast of déjà vu.
There are a surprising number of parallels between my relationship with Ellie and my relationship with Tanya. There’s the obvious: They both began at Brookfield High. Both of them pursuedme. And they both seemed secure in our relationship—until Sutton Everett showed up.
Ellie hated how Sutton and I had lengthy conversations and inside jokes. Based on Tanya’s, “My students love your music,” comment—I know for a fact thatsheis a fan, thanks to an off-key karaoke performance a few months ago—she felt threatened enough to suggest otherwise. Because of an interaction that only lasted a couple of minutes.
I pull up outside Tanya’s three-story apartment building.
She arches a brow when I don’t shift into park or turn off the engine. “You’re not coming in?”
“I’ve got a few errands to run. I’ll pick you up at three.”
She wants to argue. I see it in the subtle rise of her shoulders. The twitch of her lips.
I wait for her to call me out. To ask what changed in the half hour since we left her apartment to get bananas from the store.
But I think she already knows. Maybe that’s why she doesn’t ask. Just says, “Okay,” and climbs out with a bunch of green fruit that she’ll have to pummel with a sledgehammer to turn into banana bread.
My grip tightens around the steering wheel as I watch her leave. Another parallel with Ellie: Watching Tanya walk inside, alone, I feel relief. No regret. No second-guessing. No uncertainty.
How do I know Sutton Everett?
She’s endless complications.
My favorite dream.
The only girl I’ve ever loved.
The one who got away.
And my one regret in life is walking away when she told me to.
Joe Everett’s memorial service is somber. It’s the first death-related event I’ve been to since my Grams passed. It brings up memories of that day.
Not of unearthed dirt and floral displays.
Of wet blonde hair in the moonlight. Black writing on white paper. The perfectly round shape of a CD.
The service is held beneath the proud oak with branches so broad that they shade half the main pasture. The herd of dairy cattle is out grazing now, lazily flicking away flies as they chomp at clumps of clover. If I squint, I can perfectly picture Joe himself patting flanks and whistling as he wandered about.
