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“Three months,” she parrots with a slight quaver. “But, Ivy, if anything happens with your dad—”
“Let’s not.” The words are a choked plea.
She squeezes me with a quick nod. “Okay. I’ll be on the first plane home if you need me. If you’re going nowhere—”
“You’re coming with me. I know.” My chest trembles against her at the exchange of our promise to always stick by one another, metaphorically anyway. “But go now because there’s a lump in my throat that’s about to make this very awkward.”
“You can rock anything, girlie, even awkward. Love you.”
“Love you too.”
After one last embrace, she turns and walks toward security without looking back—a gift to me—her dark brown tresses bouncing with her stride.
Swooping my own ginger mop into a messy bun, I bolt out the automatic doors, running all the way to short-term parking, attempting to distance myself from the stark realization that I’ve never felt so alone. Fleeing the airport doesn’t leave the feeling behind though. It hooks into my skin, like a bur refusing to be uprooted.
On the drive home, the foreboding loneliness sinks its teeth deeper because I know the emptiness that awaits. My father, my favorite person in the whole world, won’t be there. He’s lost inside his own brain, living at Shady Pines Stroke Rehabilitation Center for severe stroke victims, which in itself is a tragic, poetic irony. One of the world’s most renowned neuroscientists and neurosurgeons, who dedicated his life to freeing those with brain trauma, is now a prisoner of his own.
My speed slows as I enter the limits of Royal Oaks, my northern Ohio town. The trees stop blurring and enliven to a vibrant, tunneled canopy, welcoming me with all the charm of stepping into a Monet painting—choppy, flirtatious brushstrokes of petals and growth and light. These quaint, picturesque streets once felt warmand inviting with the scents of fresh-cut grass and Dum Dums lollipops, asphalt and sweet corn. Now, they’re glazed with the chill of loss, but my heart still thumps with a longing for what was. That which can’t be held.
Grains of sand.
Being Labor Day weekend, there’s the added ache of barbecues and bonfires wafting in the air—a reminder of happier days tucked away. And just like that, my hour drive is over. Wallowing is a sure way to suck the time—a conquering shadow.
The guard waves me on, my silvery-blue Ferrari Roma easily recognizable. As I pass through the iron gates, a neighbor waves with a bright, plastic smile. Wealthy people, who live in grand ten-thousand-plus-square-foot mansions, are never home. Except on rare holiday weekends when socializing and entertaining are expected. There will be countless gatherings over the next three days, none of which I’ll be attending. Without Celeste or my father as buffers, the idea is ludicrous. My mother will most certainly make an appearance, and while I adore her, hanging with the society ladies isn’t for me.
I park the car in our six-car garage and enter through the mudroom door, passing through the butler’s pantry and into our kitchen. Dropping my purse onto the island, I wash my hands and make myself a cup of coffee with the Keurig attachment on the fridge. Two tablespoons of vanilla creamer and a pumpkin-flavored coffee pod later, I’m inhaling the scent of fall.
Tiny blossoms among the thorns.
My mother rounds the corner. Her bright blue eyes catch me—our only shared feature, which is precisely why Celeste and I completed one of those ancestry kits last month. Unlike Celeste, my appearance doesn’t favor one parent over the other, but falls somewhere in the middle. While my mother is a fair-haired beauty—her bleach-blonde strands currently swept into a polished updo—my father has brown hair, speckled with gray now, and hazel eyes. None of that matters though. It seems you can have one parent who is onehundred percent Italian and one who is one hundred percent Irish and still end up eighty-five percent Irish and ten percent Italian with a sprinkling of confusing other nationalities that no one can ascertain who they originated from.
I’m currently waiting for my results. Sadly, it’s the most exciting event on the horizon.
“How did everything go with Celeste?” my mother asks, her mouth slanted with both curiosity and concern.
“Good. She’s really excited. I’m a little envious.” My eyes flit to hers, and I know she sees the lie in my words. “A lot envious, okay? But still happy for her.”
“I wasn’t judging.” She pulls out a high-back stool, lowering herself into it with all the air of a cultivated lady. Natasha Kingston is always the picture of elegance. “This is the time you should be taking adventures. I’d love to tell you to go find one, but unfortunately, we need to discuss something that will make that challenging.”
My heart stutters, and my hands shake so that my coffee sloshes up the inside walls of my oversize mug. “Is it Dad? Is he worse?”
Her fingers reach across the countertop, skimming over mine. “No, honey. Your dad’s the same, but he did something you might not like.”
A pause to process precedes the scrunching of my forehead. “How could he have done something when he can’tdoanything?”
“Before the stroke,” she says, releasing a heavy sigh with a slump of her shoulders before regaining her perfect, ramrod-straight posture. “Your father’s lawyer brought it to my attention that your trust kicks in when you turn twenty-three.”
“Oh.” That has me pausing again. It’s not that I didn’t know about my trust or ever consider it, but before my father fell ill five months ago, he took care of everything. And after … well, after, all I’ve been thinking about is him. But the real culprit of my hesitation is the frown on my mother’s face. “You’re not happy that I’ll receive the money?”
“That’s not it at all. The money is yours. You’ve always done asasked and worked hard. You deserve it.” Unshed tears glisten in her eyes, not matching her words.
My brows wrinkle in question. “Then, what?”
She wrings her hands—a nervous gesture my mother can usually suppress, except when it comes to my father’s health or … that’s the only time actually. “There’s a clause that requires you to be married by your twenty-third birthday in order to receive it.”
“What? That’s ridiculous.” I laugh, certain she’s confused. “My birthday is in three months.”
“I’m aware.” Her face is a chiseled stone of distress, causing my laughter to die.
