The Truth About Letting Go (2 page)

She drops onto the soft grass a few feet from where I’m sitting. Neither of us speaks as she attempts to recover. I’m frustrated my few seconds of peace are gone, but I’m also curious about what she wants. Why she worked so hard to reach me. Finally she has breath enough to speak.

“I’m sorry about your dad,” she says.

Her voice is high-pitched and sweet. I figure she has to live in our neighborhood, but I don’t remember seeing her outside of school.

“I liked to read his fitness tips in the paper.” She’s still breathing hard.

I nod. In addition to his column in
Healthy Man
, Dad also provided a weekly fitness feature for the local Sunday edition.

“It’s hard to believe someone so healthy could die,” she says.

I look back at the creek. The swirling currents continue their rippling sound, but now they’re punctuated by her breathing.

“Will you be back at school Monday?” She’s watching me, so I decide it’s time to surrender to the conversation.

“Yes.” I say.

“I don’t know if I’d be strong enough for that.”

I can't believe this girl. She’s sitting here, saying everything I really feel, everything that to date no one’s been brave enough to acknowledge, and yet for whatever reason, it doesn’t upset me.

“I don’t know what else to do,” I say. “I can’t just sit around the house anymore.”

It’s not really true. I’d be glad to stay in my bed, under my covers forever, but other than the funeral, my house has been complete silence for the last week, spring break week. Mom has continued working nonstop—she practically moved into her law office following Dad’s diagnosis—and Will has returned to his apartment in Glennville. The rest of the house feels too big and quiet outside my cave. And I don’t even want to go near what was Dad’s final room.

“I understand that.” Her small voice makes me feel safe to lower my guard.

“What’s your name?”

“Charlotte. We go to the same school. You didn’t know?”

“Yes, but,” I’m not sure how to say it nicely. “I didn’t know your name. Somehow.”

“It’s OK. I try to blend in. Not like I’d expect someone like you to notice someone like me.” She laughs slightly as she says it, and I don’t take offence.

She’s right, after all. I hadn’t tried to know her, even with Creekside being the only high school in Shadow Falls. My parents said we moved here from Glennville so I could have a “more traditional childhood experience.” I’m not sure what they meant, but once I started at Creekside, I fell into step with the other kids who live in Shadow Creek—the ones just like me. Like we always do.

My first friend was Stephanie Miller, even though she was a senior and I was a freshman. She was head cheerleader, she introduced me to Harley Andrews, and after she graduated, I joined the squad the next year. Every year after that, I simply followed the rules of high school. I was at the top of the food chain and so were my friends, and we were expected to act the part.

But as a transplant, I’ve never felt connected to this place, and now that Dad’s gone, it’s become hard to care about traditional anything or doing what I’m supposed to do. It’s no guarantee your life still won’t fall apart, that everything still won’t crumble around you as you stand there watching—or as you try to catch it. It only slips faster through your hands the more you try and hold on.

“Have you always gone to Creekside?” I ask, trying to shake my dark thoughts.

“This is my first year, but I started in August.”

I remember August—one month before my nightmare began. Back then I’d been anticipating senior year. It was supposed to be the best year of high school with prom and football games and being head cheerleader. Four weeks later, Dad got sick, and as the months passed, I dropped out of almost everything without even a word.

“Sorry. I don’t remember a lot after September.”

“It’s okay. I was just doing my daily walk when I saw you over here. Wanted to let you know I’ll miss your dad. He was an inspiration to me.”

My eyebrows pull together. “Why?” What in the world could she have in common with my handsome, athletic, popular dad?

“The way he wrote was always so positive and… up. He made me feel like I could do it too.”

“Do what?”

“Oh, I don’t know,” she laughs under her breath. “Be like you?”

With all the black that’s been swirling in my brain for so many months, her words seem like a cruel joke.

“You want to be like me,” I repeat, suppressing a bitter laugh. “Careful what you wish for. You might not like it so much.”

“That’s what people like you always say. I’d like the chance to decide for myself.”

I study her a moment. “What do you want to know? I’ll be completely, painfully honest, and then you can decide.”

She’s quiet a little while. Then she takes a short inhale and rotates onto one hip. From there, she makes her way onto her hands and knees, holding the ground as she pulls a foot under her, then the other one, and gradually rises. I’m amazed at the process involved in getting her back to standing.

“Where are you going?”

“To finish my walk,” she huffs, winded from her all her efforts to stand.

“Not interested?”

She presses her lips into a smile and shakes her head. “Yes, I am. But I want to think about it first. Decide my questions.”

I shrug and turn back to the water. “Whatever.”

“Don’t worry. I’ll be back.”

She starts down the small hill faster than she came up it, and I think about what’s coming as that tightness starts to pull in my chest again. It’s crazy, but I wish she would come back and talk to me some more. Charlotte’s questions seem like they would be a welcome distraction, like being honest with her would be some sort of therapy.

What I have to dread comes in a few days. When I go back to school.

Chapter 2

I’m alone again.

Mom’s been going to her office before dawn every single morning for months, and she doesn’t come home until well after dark. I’ve stopped asking if she’s working on a case. We’ve practically stopped talking altogether.

At first it was okay, because I didn’t want to talk to anyone or be around people, but now our giant, empty house makes the pressure in my chest the only thing I can think about. It's a complete contradiction, I know, because I still don’t want to talk to anyone or be around people. It’s just this Saturday I can’t spend another day in what feels like a mausoleum.

Monday’s right around the corner, and the thought of facing hundreds of curious classmates makes my stomach lurch, but at least with school I can bury myself in homework, tests, and whatever else is going on. I’ll find enough to keep my mind off this pain. My mom. What’s left. Until the end of the year, when I guess I’ll leave for college. Maybe.

My college applications are also in the neglected pile. At some point, I’ll have to figure out what I’m doing next year, but for now, it’s about one foot in front of the other, one day at a time. Will’s in Glennville working out summer school and ways to minimize the impact of losing a semester. Maybe he can help me with my nonexistent future plans.

My phone vibrates, and I grab the sparkling case. It’s my best friend, Mandy Frazier.

Sophomore year, after Stephanie graduated, Mandy called and said we should be BFFs. It was funny in a sort of elementary school way, but she had a point—why wouldn’t we be friends? We both live in Shadow Creek, we’re both cheerleaders, and we look almost identical, except her eyes are brown and her hair’s a darker shade of blonde.

She’s way more opinionated about things like wearing the right clothes and dating the right guys, but it’s not a problem. I’ve done my best to avoid the whole Creekside dating scene. For one, we have practically zero options, and for two, the school’s so small, we basically have no choice but to recycle, which can be weird. And gross if you think about it too much. Mandy would say it’s because I still haven’t “broken the seal,” but I suppose I always felt like if I needed to talk to a guy, I had Dad.

Now I don’t have anything.

I slide my finger across my phone’s face.

Mandy’s voice is cautious. “Almost two weeks. Seeing a light at the end of the tunnel yet?”

“I think it’s a train.”

“School will help,” she says—just like everyone does. “And the end’s the best part of senior year with prom and all. Even though you’ve missed a lot. You’re not going to believe…”

She keeps talking, but I’m not listening. It’s hard to care, and I wonder if she really thinks two weeks is all I need to feel better. The week before spring break I stayed home, so technically I’ve only missed one week of school, but add a week of me hiding out, and that’s a lifetime in Mandy’s book. Not that I’ve really been “there” at school all the rest of the time.

I suppose Will would say she’s right. It’s time to start picking up with our lives again. He might be Mr. Resilient, but that’s not how I feel. Even if we’ve had months to prepare, even if Dad’s suffering has ended, even if he was “ready”—whatever the hell that means—I can’t pretend I’m over it.

“It’s
so
frustrating,” Mandy says. “He’s not giving me any signs, and I don’t want to spoil my reputation first thing.”

As it stands, Mandy’s only reputation is for being untouchable, which I guess would be mine, too. Which also feels stupid to me now.

“I’m sure your reputation will survive,” I say.

“So, you think I should just do it?”

“Yes. Do it. Do what you always do.”

“God! Really, Ashley? Were you even listening? I just said I’ve been doing that and it isn’t working! He’s not giving me any signs of interest.”

I inhale and force myself to respond. Fake it ’til it’s real, right? “Oh, please. You’re the one always saying they’re
all
interested.”

“True. And it is getting warmer, so I can use that. Less clothes and all.”

I can just see Mandy swishing down the school halls in her short cheerleader skirt, turning heads. In the past, I’ve been right there beside her.

“Just wait til you see him. He’ll snap you back to reality.”

“Reality,” I repeat, wondering what that word even means.

“So I’m picking you up Monday?”

“Sure,” I say.

We disconnect, and I stare at the TV. The faces are talking, but the sound is off. In two days, I’ll go back to my place at Mandy’s side, back to the top of the social ladder. The faces on the TV blur as I picture myself climbing up, up, up… to my old position. I’m losing my breath like Charlotte climbing the smallest hill.

I wonder what would happen if I quietly turned around and stepped off.

That weight is pressing down in the middle of my chest again, making it hard for me to breathe. Dad would say the best thing to do when you’re feeling bad is exercise. If he were here, he’d probably send me to get my tennis shoes and insist we go for a run. So after a few more seconds of muted talk shows, I hop up, throw on a white tank and denim shorts, and grab my bike.

I pedal as hard as I can, building up the heat in my middle and forcing the air to push through my lungs. In less than two minutes, I’m flying through Shadow Falls, the older homes that make up the front of our huge, circular neighborhood. I follow the curve around until I pass Dr. Andrew’s church, First Presbyterian, the only church in town. It forms the center of the wheel, and Dad made us join even though we’re Methodists. He said it would help us connect with the community, and he was right. This church is the community.

I hit the brakes and skid to a stop. For a moment I stand there and stare at the large, white building with its imposing steeple. All the anger blazes up inside me as I study it hard. I think about how much I believed in this place, how much I believed in church and in faith. In making the right decisions. In prayer.

I blink a few times, to clear the mist in my eyes, as I remember my dad’s wasted body. How thin he continued to grow the harder I prayed. For six months, all I did was pray, and it didn’t change a thing. In that moment, I make a promise. I’ll never step foot in this place again.

“It’s over," I whisper. "I don’t believe in you anymore.”

I turn and push on the pedals, making my way back around toward my end of the neighborhood. As I pass mini-mansion after mini-mansion, I think about Mandy’s dad. Shadow Creek is his crowning achievement. The thing he hopes will live on after him.

Not only did my best friend grow up here, but her dad was the first quarterback for what was then the Shadow Falls High School football team. After graduation, he went into construction, and now he owns the development company that dug the creek, renamed the school, and designed our section of the neighborhood.

The Frazier mini-mansion is the biggest on the street, which consists of about ten others, each situated on two-acre lots. The first one built is only five years old and belongs to Mr. Bender, a grouchy, old retired Marine. His wife is nice enough. I see her oversized rear in the air as she digs in her manicured beds. I wonder why old southern women think they need to do their own planting. She’s even wearing a funny hat.

She straightens up as I pass. I nod and continue on to the empty lot near my house that leads up to the creek and the bluff with the tree. I leave my bike at the street and run up the little hill. No sooner have I sat down and leaned back than I hear the familiar sound of huffing and puffing. Charlotte.

“Hey,” she gasps. “Saw you headed out of your driveway flying.”

“Yeah,” I say. “Still too quiet at my house.”

I’m not bothered by her appearance. To be honest, I’m glad she’s here. She won’t talk about stupid things that don’t matter, and the things she says about Dad comfort me. I guess because she talks about him when he was alive and doesn’t try to find soothing catch-phrases that never make me feel better anyway. She just remembers him with me.

“You ready with your questions?” I ask.

She settles into her former spot a few feet below me facing the creek. “What if we just talk instead and see what comes up?”

I shrug. “However you want to do it.”