Page 65 of The Goode Girls of Maple Lane
She sighs with all due despondence for my potential fate while I reach for my umpteenth tissue from the box I’ve been decimating since we started talking. I have my moments of rational thought, but then I say a word likebreakupand my composure crumples.
“Think you can maybe stay friends?” she asks.
I give her a look. She gets it instantly. She knows me too well not to.
“You already looked at apartment listings, didn’t you?” she asks.
“On the opposite side of town,” I confirm, unleashing another stream of tears. “I don’t want to move. I don’t want a breakup with Everett to mean a breakup with everyone else I’ve come to care about in the building and the neighborhood. But I also don’t want to risk running into him every time I leave my apartment. And Ireallydon’t want to get home late one night to find him smuggling an oversized plant in with his new girlfriend. Even the thought guts me.”
Hannah plucks a fluffy wad of dog hair off her hoodie and lets it float to the floor, the inevitable result of petting Aggie’s head, an activity she promptly resumes.
“At least you’d still have this exquisite cuddle monster,” she says.
“I don’t know. If Everett and I break up, she might never forgive me.” I pet the back end she so unceremoniously bequeathed me, as if she’s already holding a grudge.
“Aggie willalwaysforgive you,” Hannah counters.
Maybe, I think.And maybe that’ll be her greatest lesson yet. How to be happy, how to trust, and now, how to forgive. Though it’s the trust that got me into this mess to begin with.
“The real consolation is that my mom doesn’t know anything about Everett,” I say.
Hannah cringes. “She’s still sending you updates on your exes?”
“Yep.” I sink lower on the futon while petting Aggie’s back end. “I don’t know why she has to know what everyone she ever met is doing at all times.”
“Curiosity, probably, and not the totally healthy kind, though I also get the feeling she’s lonely.” Hannah’s tone is matter-of-fact, but I reel as if she slapped me.
“My mom’s the ultimate social butterfly,” I say. “She has more friends than anyone I know. Every conversation is a newsletter about the people in the neighborhood, her book club, wine club, craft club, walking group, and coworkers. She’s stayed friends with other parents she met through myday care. She knows everyone in Roseburg. And you’ve seen her social media. If it isn’t alive, laugh, lovesunset, it’s a dinner with friends or a perfect date with my—”
I stop myself, feeling like the idiot to end all idiots. I know my mom isn’t always as happy as she claims. That’s been obvious since I was little. But when did I last see my parents showing genuine affection toward each other? Not on social media, but in real life? And if those posts tell a false narrative, why assume nothing else is curated? Is Hannah right? Is my mom lonely? Has my greatest challenge in life also been hers? And if so, what do Idoabout that?
“Sorry,” Hannah says, snapping me from my thoughts. “Was that all right to say?”
“Yeah. I think I needed to hear it, though I’m not sure I can fully grasp it right now. Especially not with—” I wave a hand in the general direction of Everett’s apartment.
“God. Sorry. Of course.” Hannah takes my hand as I rest it on Aggie’s back. “First things first. See if Everett’s willing to talk when he gets home tonight. I’ll lace up my running shoes and get somemiles in while you sort things out. If your conversation goes well, Aggie and I will take the bed tonight while you have insanely hot makeup sex at Everett’s. If your conversation doesn’t go well, I’ll be here to ply you with tissues and comfort food all day tomorrow before I have to head home.”
“Okay,” I say through a reluctant, teary nod. “Okay. Okay. Okay.”
“That’s a lot of okays,” Hannah teases.
“Because it doesn’t sound convincing yet.”
“Then say it as many times as you need.” She gives my hand a reassuring squeeze.
I squeeze back, overcome with gratitude that she’s here, and that even during my darkest and loneliest times, I wasn’t truly alone, a thought that nudges me past my shakyokays.
I find my phone and open my screen to my long-running text thread with Everett, but I can’t make my fingers move. Once we do this, once he confirms what he tacitly acknowledged on Monday, all the things we haven’t done will become things we’ll never do. We’ll never go to another market on the Commons. We’ll never picnic with Aggie under blossoming spring trees. We’ll never walk past the waterfalls on a hot summer day, letting the mist cool our cheeks. We’ll never sing along to “Sweet Caroline” on a road trip to visit his family with Aggie’s head out the back window, her smile wide and tongue flapping. He’ll never loan me another sweater that smells and feels like him. I’ll never buy him the take-out dinner I still owe him from the day he drove to Syracuse. We’ll never wake up naked and tangled together, desperate to collide. He’ll never tease me about my textbooks full of parasite photos. I’ll never tease him about his plants.
I’ll never tell him I love him. He’ll never say it back.
I don’t want never. I don’t even want sometimes. I want always.
Hannah holds out her hand. “Need help?”
I swallow back the sob that wants to emerge as I hand her my phone. She types for me.
CAMERON:Can we talk when you get home tonight?
