“Mom. But other than that, just me and Lewis. And he never cared about this place one way or another. I can’t exactly see him sneaking off out here.”
She takes in a deep breath, thinking. “Well, when does the lock get here?”
“Two days. We’ll be fine until then.”
“Of course you will. But I’ll stay until it’s changed, just to be safe.”
Most days I have no idea how I got so lucky to have her. “You don’t have to do that.”
“I know, but I’m the best, so…” She takes her bowl, shoveling a handful of popcorn into her mouth as she calls out to Taylor, “What are we watching?”
CHAPTER SIX
CORINNE WILDE - PRESENT DAY
Like when we were kids, Greta and I lay my mattress on the living room floor to sleep for the night.
“Now, don’t think I’m going to let you hog all the covers just because you got divorced or something,” she teases as we slip under the blanket.
“Ah, cool. I was worried that would make you start being nice to me.”
“Please, my friend. It would take a lobotomy.”
I pretend to jot something down. “Lobotomy. Noted. Not ruling it out.”
She laughs, staring up at the ceiling, arms resting across her chest. “Man, I miss visiting this place when we were kids. How many times did we sleep right here? Your grandma would be asleep. It would be storming.” She wiggles her fingers toward me playfully. “It was like we had our own little island.”
“Too many times to count.”
“I remember we used to look for patterns in the grain of the wood like we were looking for shapes in the clouds.” She turns her head to look at me. “Do you remember that?”
The memories come back to me at once. “I remember…making up things I could see to keep up with you. Same as when we were older andactuallylooking at the clouds.”
She hums a laugh. “Well, I might’ve been making some up along the way, too.”
“So, you didn’t really see Jake Jagielski’s eyes up there?”
She snorts and swats my arm. “Honey, I see those eyes everywhere.”
After a few moments, she rolls over, propping her head up in her palm. “So, real talk for a minute, how are you doing? This week has been a lot.”
I start to answer, but pause, forcing myself to take stock of how I’m feeling underneath all my attempts to bury my emotions. “I’m…sad,” I admit, my voice cracking. “I never thought it would get to this point, you know? It sounds stupid, but I guess I always thought that right before we signed, he’d realize this was all a mistake, and we’d make up and go home and pretend it hadn’t happened. I kept waiting for something to change, but it didn’t.”
“Did you ever tell him that?”
I give her a look that says she knows the answer.
“Obviously he sucks, and we hate him, and you’re so much better off, and yada yada, but also…none of that. People hit rough patches, you know? People change. I always liked you two together. If there’s no hope for you guys, I’m not sure there’s hope for any of us.”
“I don’t hate him,” I say, agreeing with her. I could never hate Lewis, the man I’ve loved since I was seventeen. The man who gave me our daughter. Who was by my side through so many life changes. Loss, sickness, grief, love. “We just aren’t the people we were.”
She gives me a small, sad smile. “Because, obviously, you got much cooler than he ever was. He couldn’t keep up.”
“Obviously.” I smile, though I’m drying my eyes.
“When is he going to see Taylor?”
“I asked him for some time with her. I worry if she goes home, she’ll never come back to me.” At that, my voice cracks, and tears well in my eyes. I brush them away as quickly as they fall.
