I got my wish. The day is slow and quiet aside from a constant monologue from Reed. I pretend to sunbathe or draw while stealing glimpses of Miles, who swims or lies in the sun as far away from me as possible without appearing obvious. When the car is packed and my parents exchange their goodbyes with the Morgans and Shepard, Reed is the first one to pull me in for a hug.
“Have a great sophomore year, Teddy. Don’t go breaking any hearts with that gorgeous smile of yours.”
“Considering you and Miles are the only two guys I’ve ever been able to talk to, I think everyone is safe from me,” I snort.
He winks at me, gripping me with both arms around my waist. “Glad we were your first.”
In any normal circumstance, a comment like that from Reed would have me ten shades of red, but Miles is waiting behind him, shifting from foot to foot, his gaze boring into mine.
“You too,” I say, but I’m looking at Miles when I say it. I’m trying to convey with that one single look all that my heart longs to say about how much our kiss meant to me.
All I want to do is touch him one last time. But instead, I’m watching him walk away from me. He’s already turned for his trailer without saying goodbye, taking my heart along with him. A prick of emotion stings just beneath my lash line. Reed notices and looks behind him.
“He’s never been good at goodbyes,” he justifies.
I want to shout “You don’t think I know that?” as if I am right back in that place, convincing myself that the friendship I shared with Miles when we were kids was more than anyone else’s. Even Reed’s. I want to tell him“I was the one who watched Miles run and hide the day his mom left him,”and it’s taking all that I have not to run to him now. But I can’t do that. I’m leaving. Again. For a year. Just like last time, I can’t make any promises I can’t keep.
I rip my eyes from his quiet trailer and reach for Reed’s hand to squeeze one final time. “Bye, Reed.”
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
NOW
Afierce cramping seizes my right hand, and I drop the piece of charcoal onto my vanity before I register just how much time has slipped by.
Hours.
Hours I’ve spent brushing and shading and blending and losing myself to a piece of art that bloomed straight from me. This intense need took over, and I couldn’t stop until it was done.
Now, as I stare at the page, the soft lines of sloping fingers lie in the center. Long lifelines stroke across an open palm. I’m not sure whose hand it is or what it means, but this immense longing drove the idea from my mind and floated it across the page.
Had it not felt so all-consuming, I think my fear would have stopped me from finishing it. It’s the first thing from my past that I haven’t run from. Instead, I’m finding myself falling into it like the coziest down comforter. I’m afraid if I analyze it with a magnifying glass or dwell on how it defines who I am, that I’ll do what I’ve been doing with everything else about my past. I’ll push it away.
When a soft drum rattles my door, I panic. I don’t even have time to close the cover before I’m ditching my new drawing in the drawer and launching myself onto my bed.
“Teddy, it’s me. Can I come in?”
My mom peeks her head in the room, scanning her surroundings like she might find a boy stashed in the corner.
“I’m not disturbing you, am I?”
“No, just resting,” I lie. I’m the opposite of that. After drawing for the last three hours, I feel keyed up.
She pushes herself the rest of the way into the room. “I just… feel like you’ve been avoiding me, and I wanted to say I’m sorry. I know I’ve said it a lot lately, so it probably doesn’t mean all that much anymore. But I still am sor—” She freezes, her attention on the drawer of my vanity ajar. She takes slow, calculated steps toward it. My insides churn. It feels like an invasion of privacy, but it’s too late to hide the drawing now that her fingers have closed around the edges and she’s pulled the whole thing out. Her big round eyes dance.
“You’re drawing again,” she gusts out.
“It’s nothing,” I say, reaching for the notebook and slipping it from her grasp.
“It’s notnothing, Teddy, it’s incredible. The way you captured the feeling of touch,” she says, all breathy. “Does this mean?—”
I cut her off. “It doesn’t mean anything.”
It doesn’t. It doesn’t mean I’m remembering some part of myself or resurrecting an old talent. It means I’m acting on instinct. Figuring out what makes me happy again. Doing something fun.
“Not everything I do needs to mean something,” I say, my hackles starting to raise.
“No, I know,” she says, shaking herself from the fog of her daydream but leaving the wispiness to her voice. “But how did itfeel?”
