“You were drunk—we all were—and we were up on the roof, polishing off a very expensive bottle of booze courtesy of Mr. and Mrs. London. I pulled you aside before we went back down to the party, told you I was worried about Daniel. That he’d been a bit too ‘friendly’ with the pretty brunette bartender earlier. A bit too handsy for someone about to get married to someone else. But you said Daniel would never do anything like that. Accused me of being jealous and suggested I should worry about my own ‘nonexistent’ love life. I think you even called me pathetic.” Alex laughed, and I cringed. Strange how I remembered the night of our engagement party, and being up on the roof, but had conveniently blanked out on this particular detail.
“Sorry. I’m sure I didn’t mean it. Iwasdrunk, right?”
“Oh, you meant it, little sister. But it was fine, didn’t bother me.” I envied Alex’s confidence, her ability to trust herself so completely. She had always been self-assured and cool, and I wished I could be more like her, especially these days.
“But why wait until now to tell me?”
“You weren’t ready to hear it before.”
I let out an exasperated groan. Her revelation didn’t fully explain things but certainly planted some doubt in between my memories and feelings about Daniel. I wasn’t in the mood to play games.
She held my gaze, repeated it again, slower this time. “You weren’t ready to hear it.”
“And what makes me ready now?” I threw my hands up in the air.
“You asked.” I wanted to throttle her.
“I asked you before, Alex.”
“No, you didn’t. You asked if I knewwhyyou broke up, specifically. And I don’t. As far as I know you didn’t talk about it, with anyone. Besides, it was a couple of months after the engagement party, so it probably had nothing to do with the bartender.”
It seemed Iwasthe only person who knew exactly what happened (aside from Daniel, of course), and there was a good chance I would never remember it.
“Hey, don’t go dark on me now,” Alex said, taking in my expression. “Silver linings, okay? If things hadn’t gone south with Daniel, you never would have met Matt. And Matt is a good one, Lucy.”
But I wasn’t interested—yet—in seeing the positives here. Plus, it cut deep, thinking about Matt. What did any of it matter if I couldn’t remember our relationship? “Well, silver linings are overrated,” I grumbled. “Nancy McPherson taught me that valuable lesson.”
“I think she taught you to never take bad advice,” Alex said, a smirk on her face. “She was a piece of work. I never liked her.”
“It’s always a risk to fully trust another person.” I spoke quietly, mostly to myself.
“That’s depressing,” Alex said in response. Then she screwed the lid back on the peanut butter. “Also, not true.”
“Yes, it is! Think about it. Nancy. Daniel. Mom and Dad. Even Jenny and Matt.” I enumerated them on my fingers. I tried not to get defensive and wondered when silver-lining-Lucy had disappeared. Maybe it was when Nancy McPherson stabbed me in the back and went to the dance with the boy I liked. Maybe I could blame Daniel, and whatever happened to end our engagement. I wished I knew, because maybe then I could figure out how to get that Lucy we all used to know back. “Seems everyone has let me down, especially recently.”
“Oh, really?” Her sarcastic tone was hard to miss. “How so, Princess Lucy?” I hated it when she called me that—it had been a common nickname when we were kids, Alex often suggesting my parents treated me like the “baby” I was. In fairness to her, it had been true my parents focused more on my good behavior and more on Alex’s rebellions, so I supposed things had been somewhat unbalanced. But even if I was seven years younger than her, we were adults now, and her pulling out this particular childhood jab incensed me.
“By keeping me in the dark about everything I can’t remember!” I knew it was safe for me to lash out at Alex, and so I was going to let it come. “Can I trust Mom and Dad to tell me the truth? Do I believe Jenny when she says she has no idea why I broke up with Daniel? I mean, she’s my best friend. I didn’t tell heranything? And what about Matt? He’s been holding stuff back right along with everyone else. Do you all have my best interests in mind? Because being lied to sucks, Alex. All I can count on is the truth, and you guys seem determined to keep even the smallest scraps from me.”
“Hang on a second, killer,” Alex said. “Now you’re creating aworseversion of reality.” I glowered but didn’t respond. She got up and put the peanut butter back in the cupboard, grabbing an apple from the fridge. “Want one?” I shook my head, and she came back to sit with me, polishing the apple against her thigh.
“Look, sweets. This blows, okay? No one would argue you got a crap deal here. But you know what I’ve been seeing? People going out of their way to accommodate you, and trying to make this better somehowfor you. Mom and Dad keeping up this ridiculous ‘we’re still together and in love’ ruse so you don’t have to deal with the shittiness of going through their breakup.Again.Jenny has literally been sick with guilt about not giving you the exact lay of the land. And Matt, well, Lucy, Matt has been a mess.”
“A mess?” I asked, feeling an uncomfortable heaviness spreading across my chest.
“Did you know he’s been going to therapy, too? Or that he’s lost, like, fifteen pounds because he’s been so stressed about what’s happened? Or that he’s probably been pushed off partner track for the next year or two because of all the time off? Or that he’s spent hours over at Mom and Dad’s trying to figure out ways to jog your memory? All those photo albums? Matt put those together. In his ‘spare’ time, which with work and worrying about you has meant he’s barely slept and, if you ask me, is holding his own life together by a thread.”
She set the apple down beside her and took my hands in hers. “I’m not telling you this to make you feel guilty, so stop it. Stop feeling sorry for yourself.” I was close to tears but nodded. “What I’m saying, Lucy, is this has never beenjustabout you. Yeah, you’re the one who slipped and hit her head and ended up with a memory like those moth-chewed dress-up clothes from Grammy’s attic, but you aren’t the only one suffering because of it. You’re wrong if you think you can’t trust us. Dead wrong.”
I was quiet for a moment and Alex, satisfied to have said her piece, let go of my hands and bit into the apple. She chewed, watching me thoughtfully as she did. What Alex had said hit me hard. I had taken for granted how much they all loved me, how much my accident had changed them, too.You are only as strong as your weakest link.And I was the weak link, but not because of what I could or couldn’t remember—because I had been pushing everyone away, unwilling to accept the help I desperately needed and insisting the problem was mine (and mine alone) to solve.
“IwishI didn’t have to question everything,” I finally said, my voice thick and shaky. I sniffled, wiped my nose with my sleeve. “I also wish I’d been wearing my winter boots and had ordered Matt’s tie online. And that I hadn’t hit my head in the first place.”
“Me, too, Luce,” Alex replied, then she laughed.
“What’s so funny?”
“All your wishing reminded me of when you were little, and every time you made a wish—whether it was on the first star you saw at night or from blowing away dandelion fluff or a birthday candle—you used to screw your eyes shut and say, ‘I wish for chocolate cake!’”
