Page 7 of Sawyer

“Yes, I am.”

“I’m your Uncle Alan,” he’d answered gently with a rueful smile.

“We have the same hair.”

He’d chuckled at that. “That we do.”

“My mom left.”

“I know. I’m sorry about that, Ivy. But I want you to know that you’re welcome here.” His smile had broadened. “We’re so happy that you’re spending the summer with us.”

I couldn’t remember anyone else ever being happy to spend time with me, and I didn’t know how to respond to his words. I’d nodded at him in wonder, he’d stood up and taken my hand, and that was how I’d started spending summers in Skagway.

My uncle’s warmth and kindness were a revelation to me from the start. In a way, I think it saved me. You only have to be loved bysomeone. A parent. A sibling. A grandparent. An uncle. As long as you truly matter to someone else, you can matter to yourself.

As I separate my cousins’ clothes into colors and whites, I wrestle with my feelings about that first summer with my aunt and uncle.

I was so relieved to be away from the chaos of my depressed, alcoholic mother and workaholic, absentee father. Uncle Alan and Aunt Priscilla were newly married, terribly in love, young, and fun-loving. Aunt Pris would brush out my hair after my bath and read me books before bed. Uncle Alan took me on nature hikes and taught me how to swim. They made me eat my vegetables at dinner and showed me how to catch fireflies in the midnight sun. They showered me with deep and consistent love and gave me the stability I craved. I was happy in Skagway. I was happier than I’d ever been before.

But I missed my parents, too. They were all I’d ever known, and they were flawed, yes, but I still loved them.(Kids are supposed to love their parents, right? Even bad parents. Evenbroken ones.)I’d always wished that my mother would get better, and we could be a happy family like the ones I saw on TV. Instead, she’d given up on me, on my father, and on the possibility of us ever being a normal family. I dreaded my return to Fairbanks. I had no idea what I’d be returning to.

It was hard to say goodbye to my aunt and uncle and harder still to return home, which felt lonelier and more remote than ever before. My father had enrolled me in a private Montessori school for third grade. Driven to and from school by chauffeurs, fed breakfast and dinner by housekeepers and loosely monitored by babysitters during my father’s frequent business trips, my life fell into a routine. I’d see my father now and then when he was actually around—on the occasional weekend between tee times and conference calls, and on holidays like Christmas. But the one thing I could count on was that every year, when school ended and Memorial Day rolled around, I was sent back to Skagway for the summer, for my favorite time of the year.

After spending this past summer in Skagway working my eighth and final season at the Kozy Kone, I returned to Fairbanks in September to pack up my belongings for my move to Juneau. With my father’s enthusiastic blessing and generous financial assistance, I had purchased an apartment with my fiancé, Clark Clement Rupert III, and I was starting an internship at the state capitol withhisfather, Clark Clement Rupert Jr., the current Lt. Governor of Alaska.

But those plans were placed on hold when I learned about Aunt Priscilla’s diagnosis. At the beginning of September, she was diagnosed with stage IIA cervical cancer, for which—thank God and every angel on high—there was a very promising survival rate. But after surgery, she’d have four to six months of chemo at home. She’d be sick and weak from the drugs and need help.

While my aunt took a sick leave from her job at the high school, my uncle still needed to show up for work every day. They depended on his paycheck and insurance benefits. My young cousins couldn’t be expected to pick up the slack of housework and errands. My aunt and uncle would be reliant on friends to help with the house and the girls…or I could step in to help.

I knew it would upset my father deeply if I put my Juneau plans on hold. And there was a time, not so long ago, when making my father happy was the most important thing in my life. I wouldn’t have risked upsetting or disappointing him. I’d sacrificed a great deal, in fact, in my need for his approval and in the pursuit of his love.

Not this time.

There was no way I could start my new life in Juneau when my uncle, aunt, and cousins needed my help in Skagway. I packed my bags, said goodbye to Clark, and flew north.

So, here I am in Skagway during the off-season. I don’t mind. I’m grateful to be useful to people who have been so kind to me, and I don’t intend to leave until Aunt Priscilla is in remission and strong enough to manage things on her own. In the meantime, I’ll do whatever I can to make things easier for her. I’ll get the girls ready for school, keep the laundry moving, buy the groceries, cook the meals, order the takeout, run the vacuum…

…and do my best to avoid any more run-ins with Sawyer Stewart.

I look down at my engagement ring, plop a load of whites into the washer, add the bleach and detergent, and press START.

Chapter 2

Sawyer

I watch Ivy with her cousins from the safe distance of the checkout counter. Jenny points to a flyer that Ivy leans forward to consider, while Vicky jumps up and down about something Ivy tells her.

“Paper or plastic, Sawyer?”

“Whatever’s easiest,” I tell Neena distractedly.

When I look up again, Ivy is alone in the vestibule. She pulls a tear-strip from a flyer far to the left, slips it into her bag, and follows her cousins out the door.

I wonder what captured her attention. I definitely intend to find out.

“That’ll be two hundred and sixty-eight.”

I tap my credit card, take the receipt, and tell her goodbye.

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