Page 43 of Every Chance After

I leave, locking the door behind me.

After a Food Lion haul, I meet Mom at Seagrove Pharmacy, where she lets me in the darkened store with the bells chiming overhead.

“Just printing out the labels.” She waves me through the quiet aisles to the pharmacy in the back. She wears her white lab coat, though the store is closed.

“How’s Marnie?”

“Home and hurting.”

She flashes a concerned look. “Grady, it’s not your fault.”

“Stop saying that. Itismy fault.”

“It was an accident. The more times you hear it, the quicker you’ll believe it,” she says, her reading glasses perched on her nose. She taps her computer keys and moves around the small space. “I’m glad you’re helping her, but I’m surprised, too.”

“There’s no one else to do it. Cora’s too much to deal with and Ashe’s gone on their honeymoon without her.”

Mom’s the textbook definition of appalled. “No! Did they break up? Over a car accident?”

“No, not that it’s any of our business. Almost done? I want to get back.”

She folds the paperwork, checks the pill vials, and puts everything into a small paper bag. “I don’t know Marnie well, but she deserves better.”

“Anyone deserves better.”

“She used to come in here, haggling for her mom’s pills,” Mom muses.

“Haggling?”

“She’d try and get her mom extras to hold her over until her prescription was renewed. Her mom struggled to make her doctor’s appointments. She’d go off her meds. Then, get back on them. It was hard on Marnie.”

“Again, not our business.”

She hands the bag over. “Grady, take a heating pad from aisle three. I’ll put it on my account. Marnie might need it. Oh, and a box of chocolates. They’ll all go on clearance tomorrow anyway, and the antioxidants will give her a healing boost.”

I grab the electric heating pad and pass the long table up front with Valentine’s Day leftovers. It seems like a dumb idea, bringing her Valentine’s Day chocolates—another reminder of the day I ruined for her.

But she’d probably appreciate the gesture.

I tuck the biggest box under my arm.

“Atta boy!” Mom says.

“Thanks, Mom.”

“Anything to help, Grady. I mean that. All you have to do is ask.”

I nod, knowing that’s true and feeling grateful for once.

CHAPTERELEVEN

Marnie

Pain wakes me,sharp and unforgiving, like electric shocks ripping over my midsection. It’s a wonder I fell asleep at all. Sunkist meows near my feet, like she can sense my distress. It feels like I’ve been run over by a motorcycle, and the driver keeps spinning the wheels on top of me. I groan, trying to sit up.

After he left, I initiated all my comforts. I carefully changed out of my ridiculous sundress and flip-flops to warm pajamas and slippers. I managed the bathroom, washed my face, and brushed my teeth. A mug of chamomile tea sits mostly gone on the coffee table. At the time, it felt good to move around and be here, where I’m most comfortable.

Now, I regret leaving, the hurt so debilitating that my eyes water, and I fully expect to spend the night moaning and wincing. I’ve never known pain like this. Not even close. Not even onthatday, as if the trauma and shock subdued my nerve sensors.

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