The Rest of the Story
Page 34
“You saved her life,” I said as he nibbled some toast.
“Oh, I don’t know about that,” he said. “That shed is pretty tough. That’s why your mom liked it.”
I looked at him. “Mom?”
He nodded, swallowing. “You know how she was into disappearing. She could hide anywhere. But she loved that shed. She told me she always went there when Mimi and Joe were fighting.”
I looked back at Gordon, kicking her feet as she read. “And you remembered?”
He looked surprised. “I remember everything about your mom, Emma.”
I turned the page of my paper, over to sports. “Me too. But I want to hear all your stories, remember? I mean, sometime.”
For a second, he was silent. Then he said, “Right. Yeah, I’ve been thinking. I’d like that too.”
I looked at him. “Really?”
“Really.” He smiled, then reached up, rubbing his hand under his glasses. “We can start with this table, right here. Do you know that was my seat?”
He was pointing at the one I was in, to the left of the head. “It was?”
“Yep. Right next to Joe, who did not like PDA of any sort. Your mom sat across from me, but kicked my leg under the table throughout every meal. I had a permanent shin bruise.”
I tried to picture him with his own seat in this place I thought I knew so well. “Really.”
“Oh, yeah.” He smiled, a little sadly, looking out at the lake. “It was like a whole new world, being in this crazy house after living with your grandmother. I loved it.”
Me too, I thought. Then I kicked him under the table, and he laughed.
The last few days we’d spent packing, getting ready to leave. I slipped my notebook with my family tree in the bottom of my bag, then threw my shoes in on top of it, all jumbled together. Then I took them all out again and put them in neatly. You couldn’t change everything all at once. It was good we had time.
The album was one of the last things I packed. Before I did, though, I’d gone up to the office, where I found Mimi standing behind the counter facing the window, her hands on her hips.
“What are you looking at?” I asked her as I came in, the cold air smacking me in the face.
“Oh, just the traffic going by,” she said, even though there were no cars at that moment. “Helps me think. What are you up to?”
“I wanted to show you something,” I said. “If you have a minute.”
“For you, honey?” She gave me a wink. “Always. What is it?”
I walked over, putting the album on the counter between us. As she leaned over it and I opened the cover, I said, “Roo gave me this. But there’s something in it I want you to have.”
“Oh, my,” she breathed softly as I turned the page to that first picture of my mom scowling at church camp. “That brings back some memories.”
She was studying the page so intently, her eyes moving across the pictures, that I stayed quiet for a moment. When I saw her eyes get wet, I said quickly, “I didn’t mean to upset you.”
“Oh, no.” She waved her hand in front of her face, turning another page. “I’m not upset. Just remembering.”
I looked down too, at all those pictures Roo had told me about, wondering if she recalled the same things. Because the story can change so much, depending on who’s telling it. I hoped, over time, I’d hear more of hers.
“This is the one I wanted to give you,” I said, flipping to the page I’d marked. There, at the bottom, was the picture of us together on my first visit, sitting in that lawn chair. I’d driven to Delaney to a drugstore to get a good copy of it, which I pulled out now from behind the original. “I thought maybe you could put it under the glass.”
She was still for a second. Then, slowly, she moved her hand forward, taking the picture from me. “Well, what do you know,” she said, then smiled. “If it isn’t George.”
We made room for it beside an old shot of Celeste and my mom, right by the register. If I couldn’t be there, I liked knowing it was.
Now, back in room seven, I looked around as Nana unpacked the meal she’d ordered from the Club, which was running a shoestring kitchen to try to accommodate all the displaced members. “Oyster salad,” she said, handing the container to Bailey, “and cucumber and cream cheese sandwiches. Not too fancy, but it’s something.”
“It’s perfect,” Bailey told her as I heard her phone buzz. She glanced down at it, balanced on her bag, then smiled, helping herself to oysters. I looked too: VINCENT, it said on the screen. Apparently, Roo and I weren’t the only ones who had found each other during the storm. At the Station, Bailey and Vincent had taken shelter in the snack bar, even as a piece of roof metal blew against the doors, trapping them there. By the time Silas and Jack got them out, something had changed. All I knew was I hadn’t heard a word about Colin or Campus since.
“Let’s have a toast,” Nana said, once we’d each helped ourselves from the carry-out containers and I’d filled our glasses with Pop Soda. She lifted her glass. “To family.”
“To family,” Bailey said, looking at me.
“To family,” I repeated, and I had that feeling again, of being complete, as we clinked our glasses and drank. The next day I’d go home, see Ryan and Bridget, move into a new house and new neighborhood. Even with my wild imagination I couldn’t picture it, not yet, but that was okay. The details would come, and then I’d capture and add them, image by image, onto the pages of the book Roo had given me.
What would they be? At that moment, I couldn’t say. Only later would I know they would include the In Memoriam I’d write for the Bly County News, sending it in so it ran on the Monday after Thanksgiving, the day my mom died. My dad would help me find a picture of her when she was sober and happy. Also to be in those pages, eventually: the day I left, when Trinity and Bailey presented me with my own spray bottle, EMMA SAYLOR—I’d decided to go by both names, not choosing between them anymore—which would be waiting for me the following summer when I returned.
But first, I had to go, and I would. But not as a passenger this time.
Even with all the progress I’d made, my dad wasn’t thrilled with the idea of me driving home alone. But Nana had a car coming, and plenty of room for him and Tracy and all their bags, and I had more goodbyes to say than he did. So finally, begrudgingly, he agreed, waving at me as they drove off from Calvander’s in a black town car, the blinker flashing as they turned left onto the main road. Which left just Roo and me, my packed bags, and one more thing. A lake thing.
“Hold it out,” he said as I gripped the sparkler in my hand. I did, and he put his against it, tip to tip, before striking the lighter. As he waited for them to catch, I took the opportunity to study him. Blond hair, sticking up a bit in the back. The gap in this teeth, trademark. And those numbers, where to find him, across one calf. There were no guarantees of what would happen to us in the coming year, but as my mind started to consider it, there was a spark, another, then a shower between us. I thought of my mom and his dad—both big lives, gone too soon. I was leaving, too. But I knew I’d be back.
About the Author
Photo by Seth Abel
SARAH DESSEN is the #1 New York Times bestselling author of over a dozen novels for teens, including Once and for All, Saint Anything, This Lullaby, The Truth About Forever, Just Listen, and Along for the Ride. Her books have been published in over thirty countries and have sold millions of copies worldwide. That Summer and Someone Like You were made into the movie How to Deal. She is the recipient of the Margaret A. Edwards Award from the American Library Association for outstanding contribution to young adult literature. A North Carolina native, Sarah currently lives in Chapel Hill with her family. Visit Sarah at www.sarahdessen.com.
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Balzer + Bray is an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers.
THE REST OF THE STORY. Copyright © 2019 by Sarah Dessen. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.
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Cover art © 2019 by Jenny Carrow
Digital Edition JUNE 2019 ISBN: 978-0-06-293364-5
Print ISBN: 978-0-06-293362-1
ISBN 978-0-06-293637-0 (special edition)
ISBN 978-0-06-293712-4 (special edition)
ISBN 978-0-06-293744-5 (special edition)
1920212223PC/LSCH10987654321
FIRST EDITION
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