“Zoe,” says Kit, “the camp does not have to be your—”
“Hewas the adventure,” I say. “A stupid, reckless adventure that I should’ve known better than to go on. And now—the way it’s all turned out—it’s another sin to add to the pile.”
“Don’t say that,” says Greer, and Kit and I both slide our eyes toward her. “Yeah, everything unraveled in the end, and he—he could’ve handled things better, once his mom showed up. But whatever happened—you were different, these last few weeks.”
“Different how?” I say, because I guess I’m a glutton for punishment. I guess I didn’t get enough in that lodge, Aiden’s mother looking at me likeI was nothing.
Greer shifts on the couch, worried, maybe, that she’s gone down this path. “After we won, you were definitely different. You weren’t wound so tight, I guess, once you left your job. But it still seemed like you were…I don’t know. It seemed like you weretryingso hard.” I suppress a wince at this, knowing just what she means. Ihadbeen trying so hard. Laughing too loud, making a joke of everything, my books about around-the-world trips, my fucking guilt jar. Trying to find something todowith myself. “But the past couple of weeks?” she says. “I’ve never seen you like that. I thought I knew your laugh, your smile. But I don’t think I really did, not until lately. So it wasn’t stupid. No matter how it turned out, it gaveyou something.”
There’s a long pause, while Kit and I take in what Greer’s said. It’s how it always is with Greer. It’s almost like you have to get used to her for the first time when she really commits to saying something. “What she said,” says Kit.
“You thought it was a terrible idea, from the start,” I say to Kit. “You never liked this whole thing.”
Kit takes a deep breath, adjusts her glasses. “I think I was a little jealous.”
“What?”
“You’ve always known the right things to say to us. The things that would get us out of our own heads, or that would get us to take risks. You’re our bullshit detector, our conscience. I knew you were struggling with your work, and I knew you were struggling after you quit, too. But I—I couldn’t seem to find the right thing to say or do, to get you out of it. I think maybe it bothered me that would be him, or his camp, or whatever, that managed it.”
“Oh,” I say, because I can’t say anything else, because here come the waterworks again. Not as fast or furious this time, but enough that I feel the tears trackdown my cheeks.
From her spot on the couch, Greer grabs my hand and tugs, hard, until I’m forced to stand and stumble over toward where she and Kit are sitting. Soon enough, I’m between them, right in the join of the couch cushions, their bodies pressed against mine, keeping me from sinking. “I’m sorry for that,” says Kit. “I’m sorry I didn’t know how to help.”
“Me too,” says Greer.
“Hey, don’t,” I tell them, reaching my hands out, setting one on Greer’s arm, one on Kit’s knee, pretzeling us all up in a way that reminds me of what I still have, what I’ll always have with these two. What I almost messed up. “I’m sorry I didn’t ask. I’m sorry I wasn’t more honest. I’m sorry I didn’t talk to you more about—I don’t know. Everything, I guess. My job, and how I felt about it. The way I felt after we won. I think I—I like being the tough one for you guys. I got used to playing that role. Maybe too much.”
“Idea,” says Kit, raising a finger in the air. “No more apologizing between us? We’re okay. And you’re going to be okay.”
I sigh out a breath of relief.No more apologizing.What a concept. “Good idea,” I say.
We’re quiet then, aside from my sniffling, a sound that I would normally find humiliating coming out of my own self, but I can’t muster any shame. I still feel so unbelievably, hugely sad. I’m still thinking, in spite of myself, about what Aiden’s doing now, about whether Sheree has given him the ring back, about how it’ll go with his mother, about what more he’s said to Paul and Lorraine. When I’d left Willis-Hanawalt all those months ago, what had surprised me most was how little I’d thought of it after, in terms of the day to day. How few things aboutit I’d missed.
It won’t be like that, not with this. I can feel it waiting for me like a physical presence, themissingI’m going to do. The campground, the people I met there, and Aiden.
Aiden, most of all.
But I have this,I tell myself, steeling my body for the long weeks to come, feeling the warmth and kindness of my friends next to me.
“Greatidea,” says Greer. And then after a pause, she pats my hand where it rests on her arm. “And anyways, let’s be honest. It’s me that’sthe tough one.”
I laugh, for the first time in what feels like forever, lift my hands to wipe the tears from my face. For once, I’m okay being weak, at least fora little while.
Chapter 18
Aiden
Having my parents back in the house is strange, disconcerting. When I’d first come back here, I’d thought it’d surely been a mistake to move in, to live in the place where we’d all been as a family. It’s a small place, all one floor, but it’d felt huge and soundless to me, and I’d find myself repeating these routines of my parents’ that I didn’t even know I’d internalized—before bed, checking all the locks in a certain order, like Pop always did. In the morning, opening the back door to let extra light into the kitchen, like Mom did.
Now that they’re both here—my dad flying up just two days after Mom and I returned from Stanton Valley, a special request, I’m guessing, in the aftermath of my fuckup—I find that they’ve remembered all those routines, taking them over for me while I move through the house, quiet and devastated, angry and defeated.
I’m not going to getthe campground.
That much was clear, of course, after the presentation itself, the way Paul and Lorraine had looked back and forth between me, Zoe, and my mother. For Zoe and my mom they’d at least seemed to have sympathy. But for me? Disappointment, through and through, and I’d thought nothing could be worse until Paul had called me yesterday evening, one week since the most disastrous, humiliating revelation of my life.
“We both want you to know that it isn’t about your plan for the camp,” he’d said, his voice so much more gentle than I deserved. “And it isn’t about your not...you know. About your not having a family. We both want you to know that we’re sorry if we gave you that impression—”
I’d cut him off, barely able to stand him offering any sort of apology to me. “You didn’t,” I’d said. “This wasall my doing.”
