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One
Alba
Sure, he sent me mail. When Dalton first went on tour, when he was just starting to make it big, he wrote me a postcard from every town he stopped in. Did that for a long time.
Then there were the letters every New Year’s Eve, explaining his hopes and dreams for the coming year, and asking about mine. Another one of our traditions.
There were birthday gifts, and care packages when I was sick. Sometimes a funny little stuffed animal or an ugly fridge magnet just because.
For years and years after he left, Dalton sent me mail.
And I wrote back. Like an idiot.
Early on, I sent him cut-outs from my college campus magazine, and articles from the local newspaper I knew he’d like. ‘Goose terrorizes middle school over recess’, stuff like that. Dalton always loved anything absurd.
I sent birthday gifts and holiday cards. I wrote out my hopes and dreams too every New Year’s Eve. One humiliating year, I sent a Valentine. Did his agent roll her eyes as she sorted his mail?
On and on, we kept up this charade—this shared lie that Dalton was just off to seek his fortune, but someday, somehow, we’d meet again.
I should have stopped it all sooner. For my heart, if not my pride. But you have to understand that for all those years as Dalton and I grew up next door to each other, changing from scabby-kneed kids to awkward, gangling teenagers, he wasitfor me. The sun in my sky. My best friend and my crush.
And boy, did he crush me.
Yeah, I should have stopped the letter thing sooner.
Maybe it would have been less weird if we were texting or emailing too. Keeping in contact in the normal ways. But it’s like as soon as Dalton Meadows hit it big, burning a meteoric trail through the charts, he lost my number. Ghosted by a rock star. Well, I can’t be the only one, can I?
And still I wrote back. Still I hoped. On and on and on.
Until three years ago at my college graduation, I swore to myself: no more. This was my fresh start, my first step into real-deal adult life, and I couldn’t bring the Dalton thing with me. It was too heavy, dragging around all that unrequited love.
So I stopped opening the things he sent. Stopped writing back. Kept his unopened letters and packages in a box at the back of my closet, buried under a mound of scuffed shoes.
Ancient history.
* * *
It takes forever to get off the plane, and everyone’s hot and cranky and tired. We’re jammed in like sardines, passengers wrestling carry-on cases down from the overhead lockers and huffing when they clip each other’s heads, waiting for the air steward to open the plane doors already. The recycled air is stale.
I don’t have a case. Only my battered college backpack, grabbed in a hurry from my closet and stuffed with my passport, my laptop, a few handfuls of clothes, and the printed out manuscript I’ve been reading for work. The crinkled pages are scrawled with my notes in red pen.
Don’t know why I brought it, because I didn’t read a single word of it on the flight. I only read the piece of card in my pocket, over and over and over, until I got lightheaded and had to stare out of the window at the clouds.
RSVP.What the hell?
The rumble of the plane engine dies, and the nearest door swings open. Sunlight! Fresh air! I’m a dozen rows of seats away, and it feels like a mile. We all shuffle forward, inch by cranky inch.
Everyone else grumbles about baggage claim and running for connections, but it all washes over my head. I’m in my own world, chewing on my thumbnail as I file toward the exit.
What on earth is Dalton thinking? Is this some kind of prank? When I get to this Sweet Cherry Cove place, will a reality TV crew jump out at me and film my reaction? I can’t think of any other explanation.
Dalton was never cruel, not once when I knew him. But maybe fame has changed him, you know? Twisted him up into someone who’d mess with their childhood bestie for money and attention.
If so, this prank is pure evil.
I grip the invitation in my clammy hand. I’ve held and squeezed and thumbed it so much the words are blurring, but you can still read them:You are cordially invited to the wedding of Alba Hernandez and Dalton Meadows. RSVP.
RSVP my ass. I don’t care that Dalton’s a big time rock star these days, I’ll kill him for this. No security detail will stop me.
