Chapter1
I was really excited to start my freshman year.
Again.
I was leavingWimmers Hall after my last orientation session of the week, when I saw the three girls who personified, to me, What Might Have Been.
Sydney O’Brien, Jane Winters, and Lily Spaulding were huddled together, looking at something Jane was showing the other two on her phone. Jane had a “you’re not going to believe this shit” look on her face and the other two were avidly looking at her screen.
Simultaneously, Lily and Syd lifted their heads, smiles on their faces, and all three of them burst into laughter.
I felt a pang of loss that was different than those I’d felt over the past year. Since losing my mother to a car accident.
That loss was bone-deep, almost searing pain. A black hole that I’d only recently started to crawl out of. (Only to find myself falling back into it mere days later.)
This pang was different. Watching the three girls who had been my suitemates, albeit for only a few weeks last year, it felt more of an opportunity missed. A road not taken.
Jane saw me then, put her phone away, and came my way. “There she is. “Megan Gaffney, long lost roommate. How’d it go?” She pointed to the building behind me. “Get all oriented?”
“Were you waiting for me?” I asked, surprised. When we reached each other, there was a moment of awkwardness, and then Syd reached out and went in for the hug.
I’d been hugged a lot in the past year. A lot. In fact, one of the first hugs I received after finding out about Mom was from Syd, in our dorm room. She’d come in as I was already packing to head back to Nebraska, leaving Maryland behind. Though at the time I hadn’t known it would be for a whole year.
Then Lily rushed in, alerted by text from Syd, and wrapped me in her arms, rocking me back and forth. Then Jane came into my side of the suite. She didn’t hug me, just said, “That’s a really shitty break, Megan.”
And just like that afternoon a year ago, Syd hugged me first, Lily second (again with the rocking), and Jane (still not one for hugs, apparently) just hit me with some truthful words. “Sucks you missed last year. But it’s good you’re back.”
It did suck. And it was good I was back.
I’d texted a bit with Syd after I left school. She’d send some pics of her and Jane and Lily, and updates here and there. But when it was decided I wouldn’t be coming back to Bribury and instead staying in Lincoln, and Syd had arranged to have the rest of my stuff shipped back to me, we’d pretty much gone on with our respective years with little contact besides socials.
“It’s really great to see you all,” I said, hating that my voice caught at the end. I’d thought I was through with all that.
“You too,” Syd said. “I’m really happy you decided to come back east to Bribury. I thought maybe the closeness to University of Nebraska would win out for this year.”
“It almost did,” I said. “My dad wanted me to stay and do my freshman year there. Live at home. My aunt did too. And it would have been good to be around my brother and sister, but…”
Syd and Lily were nodding, sympathetic looks on their faces. I’d received more sympathetic looks in the past year than hugs, and that was saying a lot.
“Fuck that,” Jane said. Lily rolled her eyes and Syd sighed.
“Jane,” Lily warned.
“No, really. Fuck that. You need to live your life. Not your dad’s or your younger siblings’.”
“That’s easy for you to say,” Lily said. “Every family is different.”
That was definitely the case with the four of us. One of our first nights living together, we’d done the rundown of homelife, and it could not have been more different. I’d gone to sleep that night grateful (mostly) and just a little envious of their colorful backgrounds when compared to my boring, upper-middle-class, Midwestern, parents-still-together-and-in-love family unit.
“Look, I’m sure it was great to be near family last year. But, well, it sounds like youwantedto come back here. Am I right?”
“Yes,” I said. “No question.”
Jane looked at Lily with a “see?” expression. “Then it’s good you’re back. This is your do-over for freshman year. A mulligan.”
“A what?” Syd asked.
Jane waved a hand. “I don’t know. Golf term, I think. Basically means a do-over.” She had on a funky peasant-type blouse that fluttered when she moved her arms. That and a denim skirt and chunky wedge sandals. Syd and Lily were dressed more alike, more like me, in capri-length yoga pants, tight tee, and tennis shoes. The typical college student uniform of early fall. At least at Bribury.
