“Let go,” I told myself, pulling that tiny piece of paper out of my pocket. “No more crush on Peter McCarthy!”
I jumped and opened my hand, so the paper fluttered down much slower than I did.
The fall felt endless, even though it was probably less than fifteen feet to the water. My stomach floated up into my throat. The air tore past me. Then the water hit like a slap, cold and shocking and hard. I went under, deeper than I meant to, the world turning dark and green and silent.
For one perfect second, there was nothing in my chest—no longing. No ache. No hope.
No Peter.
When I burst back to the surface, coughing and laughing, hair slicked to my face, I actually believed it worked. I floated on my back, staring up at the stars, thinking: It’s gone. I let it go.
Later, we came back to the house wrapped in towels, still soaked. Our parents were out on the back deck playing a raucous round of Hearts that sounded more like a drinking game than cards.
So we ran up and over the dunes and…there was Peter.
He and Eli and some other guy were down on the sand, laughing too loud, pretending they weren’t sneaking beer.
“We did it!” Tessa called, running toward them and letting her towel fall, which of course got Eli’s attention. “We jumped off Let Go Bridge!”
Peter turned and looked right at me. Not Tessa in her wet T-tank top, not Kate (who couldn’t have seen him anyway), but me. Me.
All at once, they demanded to know our “let go” promise.
“It’s a secret,” Kate said softly, trying not to steal a glance at Eli. She probably should have hung on to her nerdiness and let go of HER summer crush.
Peter lifted a beer bottle to his lips, suddenly looking older and unattainable and absolutely drop-dead BEAUTIFUL.
“Your secret’s safe with me, kid,” he whispered. “What did you let go of?”
I looked up at him and realized that maybe letting go isn’t something you do once. Maybe it’s something you have to choose, over and over, like stepping off a bridge every day.
I don’t know how to do that yet.
I just know that when he looks at me, I still feel like I’m falling.
“Nothing,” I told him.
And it was the God’s truth. I hadn’t let go of a thing. I still love Peter McCarthy and might for the rest of my life.
Love,
Viv
Vivien closed the pages of the decades-old notebook with a weary sigh. Usually, she let these journals open where they might and randomly cruised memory lane. But with the Let Go Bridge on her brain, she’d searched for this entry, remembering she’d memorialized her jump in her Destin diary.
Her crush on Peter had reached pinnacle intensity when she was sixteen. That summer, Peter became a “man” in her eyes. He’d been in college for a year, he drank, and he had more swagger. She should have known back then he’d be a cop—already so alpha and cool and protective it hurt.
Literally hurt. Still hurt, if she was being honest with herself.
Enough days had passed since the hospital that she decided she had to check on Connor. And Peter. And, she supposed, Holly the Talkative Ex-Wife.
She had a few client meetings in the morning first, so she dressed in a pale blue tank sheath with a linen jacket—to impress the clients, not Peter.
Okay, maybe a little Peter.
They’d exchanged a couple of texts over the past few days, which were little more than a note that Connor was home and resting, and one that said, “Thanks again for the coffee.”
Nothing like,Gee, come over and keep me company and we can finish the conversation we almost started on the Fourth of July.
