Was it? Or had we thought that merely because it was the story we were used to hearing, the one we’d heard so many times we forgot others existed? It would have been even harder, I imagined, to choose to live a story you’d never heard before, but Sarah had. She’d known what she wanted to do, and she had done it. She’d done something hard and stressful and dangerous. She’d done it for years.
What if we all did that? Burst through the confines of other people’s expectations and grabbed what we wanted. Maybe it hadn’t made her happy forever—maybe she’d been forced to give up sailing too early, or she’d given it up because she hated whaling—but I found it both invigorating and bittersweet that she’d created a treasure trove not about a man but about her own life. What would I put in such a box? Skates and sheets of music? But what if I didn’t have to lock them away forever? We didn’t have such hard lines around my passions as Sarah had around what she wanted to do.
I didn’t know if Sarah Barbanel had been happy. But I knew she’d been brave.
I wanted to be brave.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
I arrived at the Phans’ an hour and a half before the party started to run through the song with Olivia and her sister before the guests arrived. My family and Tyler’s would both be arriving later in the main crush.
Olivia and Kaitlyn both wore white Romantic tutus, the long, gauzy white skirts giving them a dreamy appearance. “You look gorgeous,” I told them.
“So do you,” Olivia said. She nodded at my dress, red with black detailing. “I love this.”
The Phans had a particularly impressive foyer, sporting a two-story ceiling, perfect for displaying their elegant Christmas tree. The piano had its own private alcove to the side, and I warmed up as Olivia and Kaitlyn put on their pointe shoes. As expected, they nailed the dance; both girls had been in ballet for over adecade. Afterward, the three of us—along with Jackson—helped their parents with last-minute preparations.
The Phans had takenThe Nutcrackertheme seriously: their house, usually cool colors and simple elegance, had been transformed into a Victorian mansion. Golden cords held back red-velvet drapes framing the windows, plush red carpets lined the floor. Multiple small conifers had been added to their collection of houseplants, and their impeccably decorated Christmas tree stood at the bottom of the stairs, where the sisters would dance.
“The tree grows,” Olivia told me.
“I’m sorry, what?”
“It’s a key part ofThe Nutcracker. Clara shrinks down to toy-sized, and the tree grows.”
“Trees don’t actually grow, though.”
Olivia grinned. “Hate to break it to you...”
“You know what I mean! Christmas trees don’t grow. They’re dead.”
She pushed out her lower lip. “Now I’m sad.”
“How does it grow?”
“You’ll just have to wait and find out.”
The Phans had made a feast for the evening: spring rolls and banh mi and sticky rice, salads and tiny cannoli and French 75s. We straightened things up right until the clock ticked eight, and guests started arriving.
I’d always loved New Year’s—I always spent it with my family,after all—but I’d never been the kind of person who made resolutions, or, god forbid, stuck to them. Sometimes, as midnight struck and people counted down, I flung some half-baked hope into the universe with the same amount of thought and foresight I put into making a wish as I blew out my birthday candles (none).
But tonight, as Olivia, Kaitlyn, and I got ready for the performance, I realized I did have a resolution. I wanted to be more confident. I wanted to define myself, be whoIwanted to be as opposed to letting how other people perceived me be a factor. I wanted to let people in more. I wanted to take risks. Perhaps not ones as drastic as disguising myself as a man and going on a multiyear voyage, but whatever my version of that might be.
By nine, everyone had arrived: my family, in one massive influx of dark-eyed, curly-haired brunettes; friends of the Phans who had been convinced to come to the island for the holiday; and islanders I had known my whole life—year-rounders who had slowly warmed up to some of the summer people.
I saw Tyler and his moms arrive. He’d changed outfits since the attic, trading his sweatshirt and jeans for a gray sweater and darker gray slacks. Every time I saw him, my heart rate picked up. He scanned the crowd, and when he found me, a smile bloomed on his face, and I could feel a matching one on mine.
The crowd shifted, and I lost sight of him; too many people in fancy outfits blocking my view. And I didn’t have time to think about Tyler, anyway: with almost all the guests here, I could seeOlivia’s mom looking round, getting ready to officially welcome everyone to the party and for the ballet sequence to start.
I stood by Olivia at the piano, both of us trying to wrangle our nerves. I swallowed, hard. Here was another thing I could do—something else I’d always felt too embarrassed to say out loud. “Can I tell you something kind of silly? Or—sentimental?”
“Please.” Olivia ran her hand over her hair, which had been pulled back in a tight, high bun. “Especially if it’s going to distract me from performing in front of fifty people. God, how can your cousins do a play forfun?”
“Because it’s only for family.” My throat felt tight and I felt ridiculous and stupid, and I pushed through it anyway. “You’re my best friend.”
She stared at me, her face unchanging. My stomach sank.Oh.
God, why was I such an idiot? Of course this was a stupid thing to do. Who just told someone they were your best friend out of nowhere?
