“Time to go?” Eva asks, ticking her head toward the bonfire. Jay’s belt buckle now hangs undone, football-printed boxers on display.
“I’d say so. You going to head back to Emmy’s?”
She nods and lets out a sigh. “Home sweet home.” But she doesn’t move. She just watches the water roll over itself, her eyes hazy in thought. There’s no doubt in my mind that Emmy and Luca, even Macon and Janelle, are really trying to give Eva a good home. Make her feel loved. Watching Eva, there’s no doubt in my mind that it’s not working. Maybe nothing can work right now.
“You want to meet me at the lighthouse later?” I ask before I can think better of it.
She turns to me, her eyes brightening. “Yes.”
No hesitation. No doubt.
Yes.
Chapter Twelve
THE NEXT MORNING, I’M BRUSHING MY TEETH, HALF AWAKE, when I hear my mother unleash a string of curses loud enough to rattle the windows.
It’s the ass-crack of dawn—?I’m up early for my first shift at LuMac’s—?so I’m pretty surprised she’s even out of bed. She and Pete weren’t home when I got back from the bonfire last night, but I waded through a trail of fresh beer cans when I sneaked out to meet Eva after midnight.
As always, my heart rate gallops and my feet itch to hurtle me toward my mother before my brain can catch up, slow me down, prepare me for whatever tiny nothing or huge something I’m about to face. I spit out a mouthful of foamy toothpaste and follow the eff-bombs.
Mom’s in the kitchen, a soldering iron in her shaking hands. My stomach sinks to my feet when I see an open can of Bud Light close to her elbow. I’m already inching closer, wondering if I can slip the can into the trash without her noticing, when I spot three pieces of thin, triangular sea glass, all hued in various shades of aqua. Next to them lie skinny strands of copper, ready to be mixed with the solder. I feel an annoying flare of childlike joy.
Approaching the table, I pick up a familiar and ragged notebook open to a drawing of a necklace. In the picture, the pieces of sea glass fan out on a delicate, nearly translucent chain. The copper, a rusty red color, encases each piece. I’ve seen this necklace in its final form so many times, and the effect is magical.
I love this necklace. Mom designed it a few years ago, and it’s her most popular item in her Etsy shop. For a long time, she’s been promising to make me one, but most of the time, it takes every bit of initiative in her bones to get her to fulfill an order, so making a necklace for zero profit—?even for her own daughter—?isn’t likely. It even became a sort of running joke. Every time she’d get an order, she’d smile at me and say, “Another call for the Precious.”
“Gollum is so demanding,” I’d say.
“But we needs it, Precious,” she’d say in a freakishly accurate impersonation of Gollum, and we’d laugh and I’d help her get out all her materials, and the world was small and okay and ours.
“Goddammit to hell,” Mom says now, pulling my eyes from the sketch. She’s attempting to edge a sliver of gorgeous blue-green in the soldered copper but keeps smearing it onto the surface of the glass. That stuff is hot, too. Her fingers are red from little burns and flecks of copper.
“Can I help?” I ask, pushing the beer out of her reach.
She startles in her chair. “Oh, baby. I didn’t hear you come in.”
“Alas, I am here.” I look around for an order form to get some idea of how much time we have until it needs to ship, but there’s nothing but the notebook and materials. “Who ordered the Precious this time?”
Not even the hint of a smile. She doesn’t look up, just cleans the glass with some Goo Gone and starts edging again.
“Mom?”
“What?”
“The order? How long do you have to make it?”
“Um . . . there’s no time limit.” She finally gets the edging right and moves on to the next piece.
“Oh.” I fight a smile, finally understanding why she’s acting so weird. I start to back away from the table. “I’ll just pretend I didn’t see all this, then.”
She finally glances up at me. “Why would you do that?”
“Because. The necklace.” I sweep my hand over the table.
Mom frowns at me. “Yes. The necklace. I’m making it for Eva.”
My stomach plunges to my feet. “What?”
