The Truth About Letting Go Read online

  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 desig
ned 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.”

  We’re quiet a few minutes. The water’s trickling past, and I study her pulling blades of grass. She’s so curious about me, but I wonder what it’s like to be in her shoes. I wonder what it’s like to have trouble walking up a small hill.

  “You used to come out here with your dad.” Charlotte interrupts my thoughts. “I’d watch you two from my window riding bikes around the neighborhood. I always wondered what that was like.”

  “What?” Can she not ride a bike or something?

  “Having a parent who liked you and wanted to be with you, spend time with you.”

  “Oh.” I pull my own blade of grass not sure how to respond. Is she saying her parents don't like her? “I don’t know. It’s just how it was. Mom’s always working herself to death, but with his job, Dad was home most of the time. With me.”

  “You must’ve loved it.”

  “Actually, it kind of got on my nerves sometimes. A lot of the time, really.”

  “Really?” Charlotte smiles, her eyes full of amazement.

  I can’t believe I feel safe admitting this to her, like I don’t have to feel guilty saying the truth. I wonder if it’s because no matter what, I’m still the one in control, the one with more power. It’s a cynical thought I don’t like. I push it away, and instead I think about how amazing it is, my dad’s number one fan lives right here in our neighborhood.

  I wish I could tell him. He’d probably make a funny observation about life, and I could laugh again.

  “Well, yeah,” I say, feeling better. “I mean, wouldn’t you get sick of your dad always wanting to know what you were doing or what happened at school or if you didn’t want to talk about it, insisting you go for a bike ride or a run to clear your head?”

  “I probably wouldn’t look like this,” she chuckles.

  I’m not sure the safe reply, so I look back at the creek.

  “You always looked happy to me,” she says softly.

  “I was,” I whisper, and for a second, I feel dangerously close to crying.

  The pressure’s back, and I don’t want to be here now. I stand quickly—far too quickly for Charlotte to keep up.

  “I’m taking off,” I say, without giving her a chance to speak. But I see the look in her eye, and I know she knows what almost happened.

  And I know I’ll be back.

  * * *

  The next day is Sunday. I lie in bed listening as my mom softly taps on my door. She calls to me, something about church, but I don’t answer. Finally, she goes away. I roll back over and close my eyes for another hour. When I open them again, the house is quiet.

  I jump up, throw on my track shorts and a long-sleeved tee, and jog out to the creek. After a few minutes of sitting, I hear the sound of respiratory distress and Charlotte appears. She takes her place below me on the bluff.

  I break the silence first. “Did your family move here so you could go to Creekside, too?”

  “Sort-of,” she says. “I think they wanted to get me out of my old high school to see if I was stress-eating.”

  “Your old school was stressful?”

  “Some of the kids there… well, there were a few mean girls.” She seems embarrassed, so I don’t pursue it.

  “And you moved here over the summer?”

  “Yeah, but I was at camp when they moved in,” she says. “I didn’t get back until the week before school started.”

  “Camp? Where’d you go to camp?”

  “Camp Be Well.”

  I frown. “Is that like an Indian name or something?”

  “It’s a fat camp.” She says flatly.

  A laugh jumps into my throat, but I swallow it back down.

  “Oh,” I say. “So. What’s that like?”

  “It’s supposed to be esteem-building. But it’s hard to feel good about yourself when you’ve been shipped off for being an embarrassment.”

  “I don’t think that’s—”

  “How would you know?”

  I’m surprised by the sharpness in her high-pitched tone. It’s an unsettling mixture—bitterness delivered in a princess voice. I close my mouth and look back at the creek. She’s right. I don’t know anything about why her parents would send her to a fat camp. Dad always said you had to want to change for change to happen. And weight isn’t something I struggle with.

  We’re quiet a few moments and then she speaks again. “I’m sorry,” she mumbles.

  I don’t answer. I don’t really know what to say.

  “My parents own those Posh Princess stores,” she says, pulling at another blade of grass and still seeming angry.

  “Oh, I love those stores!”

  She smiles bitterly and nods. “I’m the reject in the back room.”

  My lips press together, and I take a deep breath. I can’t help Charlotte with these things, and the comfort I came to find isn’t coming. I dust my hands and stand, pulling my shorts down. Charlotte’s woes piling on top of my own are making the pressure in my chest unbearable.

  “I guess I’ll see you at school,” I say, not sure what that will mean.

  “Yeah,” she says. “Back to school.”

  I nod and do a little wave before turning to go. My emotions are so shredded, I can’t feel any worse. Besides, she and I aren’t on the same team. We probably never will be. I don’t like it, but it’s just the way it is.

  Unless…

  As I walk slowly to my house, I think about my bike ride, about my vow, and about stepping off that ladder. What happens if I fall? Will the pain release? Am I strong enough to find out?

  Chapter 3

  Mandy takes one glance at me when I get in her car and frowns. Then she does a quick exhale and reaches over to smooth the back of my hair several times. I let her.

  “Heroin chic is so Y2K. But I guess that’s what’s next, right? Kate Moss?”

  I look away, out the window at what's coming. “I’m not going for a trend.”

  All of my colorful spring outfits felt as wrong as everything in my life this morning, so I opted for jeans and a black tank. My hair was a spontaneous decision. However I slept last night, I woke up with it falling in messy waves, so instead of brushing it into smooth submission, I left it. My first break with the rules. One foot off the ladder.

  “Well, anyway, I’ve apparently made the geek patrol’s hit list,” she complains. “It’s all over school what a bitch I am, and it’s infuriating and ridiculous at the same time.”

  I study my nail. “What happened.”

  “Perry Rensselaer asked me to the spring luau. Can you bel
ieve that?”

  I shrug. Perry’s a total nerd, but he’s not the worst guy at school. That would be Trevor Martin, resident delinquent.

  “A shrug? That’s all I get from you?”

  “I take it you told him no.”

  “You take it. Of course I told him no!” Her face is an offended frown. “As if it’s not an established fact I only date hot guys. You don’t qualify? Don’t ask.”

  I glance over as she slides a lock of smooth, perfectly highlighted blonde hair behind her shoulder. I think about how different we are despite our usually similar appearance. Mandy’s more the in-your-face type, while I tend to float above. Sure, I get noticed, I’ve just always done my best to dodge the drama. She’s probably more engaged because she grew up here, with the same kids year after year.

  “The critics are just jealous because I don’t have to settle,” she says. “It doesn’t make me shallow, it makes me selective.”

  “Right.” I look away, wondering how Charlotte gets to school. There’s no way she’s walking.

  Our brief conversation has been on my mind since yesterday, and I wonder if whatever we were doing is over now. If we’ll pick up where we left off, with me not even knowing her name. It couldn’t feel more alien to me.

  “What they don’t get is it also means I’m alone. A lot,” Mandy continues. “There are not as many hot guys in high school as you’re led to believe in the books.”

  “Perry’s a nice guy. He worked up the nerve to ask you out, and you shut him down. You had to expect some blowback.”

  She turns wide, horrified eyes on me. “Are you truly on drugs? I can not be pressing my lips against some chicken-chested acne victim’s. It’s gross. I’ll open my eyes and throw up.”

  “Drama queen.”

  “Besides, I’ve gone to school with half these geeks since kindergarten. They should know better.”

  And we’re here.

  For two years, it’s been our thing to wheel into a front parking spot in Mandy’s silver Beemer, flip our hair as we step out, and walk to class. But today I’m tense. Everything in my life has changed, and I don’t feel like that old Ashley anymore.