The Mighty Heart of Sunny St. James

by Ashley Herring Blake

  And now that I’m all fixed, she’s back, looking all cool with tattoos, tugging at all the questions I’d knotted up in my secret heart of hearts for years and years.

  I press my other hand to my chest and take a few quiet breaths. But before I can think on it all too much, Quinn yanks her fingers out of mine and grabs my arm.

  “Ow, what—”

  “Hey,” Sam says as he joins us at the rail.

  Ah, that’s what.

  “Hey,” I say.

  “Hey,” Quinn says.

  The boat’s motor rumbles to a stop and we slow until we’re bobbing up and down, up and down. There’s so much blue, everywhere, all the shades. I can almost taste it, clean and bright and a little tangy.

  “We’re stopping,” Sam says.

  “Oh, are we?” Quinn asks, even though it’s pretty obvious we are. Her voice is like a thousand-watt bulb. She glances at me and grimaces and I have to swallow a laugh.

  Sam and I follow her to the back of the boat—the stern for the seafaring folk—and over to where her mom is fitting a mask over her face. Nathan checks all these tubes that sprout from the big tank strapped to Marisol’s back and then lowers the dive platform. Quinn helps her mom pick up a camera that, honestly, looks like a giant insect. There’s a big lens in the middle, along with two handholds on either side. Two lights stick out from the sides like antennae. It looks like it weighs a thousand pounds.

  Marisol sticks a big rubber mouthpiece between her teeth and gives Quinn a thumbs-up. Then she just falls off the boat, back first. It’s pretty much the coolest thing I’ve ever seen.

  “Keep an eye out, kids,” Nathan says as he checks some official-looking gauge on some official-looking instrument in the wheelhouse. “Dolphins love to play in this area and show off.”

  “Did you know that the killer whale is actually a type of dolphin?” Sam asks as we head back to the bow and sit on the padded benches that border the boat. Quinn stuffs me between her and Sam, and the wind keeps snapping pieces of her blue hair in my face.

  “No, I didn’t know that,” I say.

  “They can live up to twenty-nine years.”

  “Wow. Killer.”

  He blinks at me.

  “You know… killer… like cool, but killer because it’s a killer whale.”

  “Oh.” He frowns at me. “Yeah.”

  I clear my throat. Maybe I shouldn’t get my adjectives from a retired rock star. “I bet Quinn knew that, though, right, Quinn?”

  “Huh?” she says, trying to corral her hair. She let her bun down for optimum hair flipping, but the wind pulls at it like fingers. The ocean is really choppy, taking my stomach on a roller coaster.

  “Um, yeah, I totally knew that,” she says. “And striped dolphins can live up to sixty years.”

  “Whoa, really?” Sam asks.

  Quinn nods and Sam grins at her. Quinn smiles back, but it looks weird on her face, and the second he looks away she nods her head toward him and mouths something I don’t understand. Does she just want me to lay one on him right here?

  “Hey, Quinn,” I say, searching my brain for a question that might interest Sam. Then I’ve got it. “Could you die if you got stung by an immortal jellyfish?”

  “Immortal jellyfish?” Sam asks. “That’s a thing?”

  “Yeah,” Quinn says. “But I’d rather talk about… um… Sunny, what are you really good at?”

  “What am I what?”

  “Good at. Like, you know, art or music or running. You have long legs. I bet you’d be a good runner. Don’t you think, Sam?”

  “Well, um, I can’t run,” I say. “At least, not for longer than about thirty seconds before Kate would call an ambulance.”

  Her eyes go as big as planets. “Oh, god, Sunny, I’m sorry. I totally forgot.”

  “It’s okay.”

  “No, I just… I was…”

  I nudge her arm and give her a chill the heck out kind of look.

  “Um… what’s an immortal jellyfish?” Sam asks, scratching the back of his head.

  “Oh,” Quinn says. “It’s a really tiny jellyfish. So, Sunny—”

  “Wait, why is it immortal?” Sam asks.

  “It can start its whole life cycle over again,” Quinn says, huffing a breath. “After they reproduce, they turn themselves back into their polyp state.”

  Sam’s mouth drops open. “For real?”

  Quinn barrels onward, a total rock star. You can tell she likes talking about this stuff. “Their tentacles retract, their bodies shrink up, and they sink to the bottom of the ocean and pretty much become a baby jellyfish again.”

  “That’s the coolest thing I’ve ever heard,” Sam says. “What else do you know?”

  “Um… a shrimp’s heart is in its head.”

  Sam laughs. “Gross.”

  “Totally. Good thing we don’t eat that part,” Quinn says.

  “I don’t eat them anyway. They’re like water roaches,” Sam says.

  “Ugh. I’ve never thought of them like that before.” Quinn makes a face and shudders. “Thanks a lot.”

  Sam smirks. “No problem.”

  I watch the conversation like a tennis match. Sam’s definitely flirting with her. He’s grinning like a doofus and watching Quinn from under his lashes.

  Quinn flicks her eyes to me and I shoot her a quick thumbs-up. She frowns and shrugs and I waggle my eyebrows at her while Sam takes a few more gulps from his water bottle.

  “Sam!” Nathan calls from the wheelhouse. “Come help me check this equipment for Marisol’s next dive.”

  Sam groans but stands up. He tosses Quinn a tiny smile before he leaves, then heads into the wheelhouse.

  “Wow,” I say when he’s gone. “That was a thing of beauty. You’re an expert flirter.”

  Her eyes go big and round. “I am? I was just… talking.”

  “If by talking you mean sweeping Sam off his feet, okay.”

  “No, no, no. Sam is kissing you, remember?” she says.

  “But he likes you,” I say, turning so I’m facing her.

  “He totally doesn’t.”

  “He does.”

  “Well, I don’t like him,” she says.

  “Well, I don’t like him either.”

  “So what are we doing?”

  “You’re going to kiss Sam,” I say.

  “Sunny, I don’t want to.”

  I stare at her for a second, because she kind of yelled it. Not loud, just… snappy. “Okay. You don’t have to. I just thought—”

  “And you don’t have to either, you know. This whole thing is stupid.”

  I sit back against the bench, my heart a weak little putter in my chest.

  “I’m sorry,” she says. “I didn’t mean that. I just—”

  “Hey,” Sam says, “check out the dolph—”

  But he doesn’t finish whatever he was going to say, because he lays a hand on my shoulder and it scares me half to death. I’m already all tense, so I jerk to my feet and whirl around, arm flailing, and my elbow catches Sam right in the nose.

  Hard.

  Blood squirts everywhere. And I mean, everywhere. Sam cries out and his hands fly to his face, bright red pouring between his fingers.

  “Oh my god, I’m so sorry!” I say.

  Sam shakes his head, his eyes wide and shocked. I can’t even see his face for all the blood. It drips onto the boat’s white floor and drenches Sam’s shirt.

  Quinn blinks at him, frozen. I think she’s in shock. I run around the back of the boat, looking for a towel or rag or something, but can’t find a single thing made of cloth.

  “Where are the towels, Sam?” I ask. He tries to answer, but his words are clogged and total gobbledygook. I’m about to scream at the sky because this whole adventure went from amazing and exciting to a horror show in three seconds flat. Finally, I spot my bag on a seat. Surely there’s something in there that will mop up the mess that is Sam’s face.

  I shove my hand in, feel some
thing soft and cottony, and pull it out.

  “Here!” I press it to Sam’s nose and he grabs on to it, tears and snot mixing with the blood and making a total mess of the—

  Oh. God.

  “Is that a…” Quinn starts to ask, but she can’t even say it. Because yes, Quinn, yes it is. That is Kate’s black, lacy bra smooshed up against Sam Blanchard’s broken nose.

  CHAPTER

  13

  By the time we get back to Juniper Island, the afternoon sun is a blurry lemon drop in the blue sky and Sam’s entire face is purple and green.

  I guess it’s safe to say that the first Kissing Quest attempt didn’t go well. At all. On the ride back to the island, I can’t even look at Quinn. I can’t look at anyone, I’m so mortified. She keeps telling me it’s okay, that, hey, everyone probably gives the first guy they try to kiss two black eyes and a broken nose and then a lacy bra to mop up the mess. I nod and smile, but really, I’m dying inside. Theoretically speaking, of course.

  Marisol is pretty ticked, though. Not at me, she said. Sam’s nose was an accident, but I guess she got some good shots and was hoping to go down again after a break. But when Nathan came out of the wheelhouse and saw his son gushing blood, he called it quits.

  Now Sam’s on his way to the hospital, Quinn’s on her way back to Sandy Dunes with her fuming, blue-haired mom, and I’m walking home with a bloody bra in my bag.

  New Life, as it turns out, is a little more complicated than I thought it would be. I mean, obviously, I know that I need to want to kiss someone for this whole thing to work, but how do I know I want to? One thing’s for sure: I knew when I didn’t want to, and I didn’t want to kiss Sam Blanchard.

  I’m thinking up all sort of ways to convince Kate to let me go over to Sandy Dunes and see Quinn and make sure she doesn’t want to bail on the Quest—and on me—when I hear voices coming from my front porch.

  “…just needs some time,” Kate is saying.

  “She won’t even let me look at her right now.”

  I freeze. Hearing Lena’s voice is like sprinting into a brick wall. I squint through the bright sun and, sure enough, I see Kate and Lena sitting on the porch stairs. The same truck from last night is parked in the driveway. It’s mint green and looks super-old, like it’s from the middle of the last century or something. I duck behind the big oak in our front yard, its shadow tucking me away.

  “Like I said, it might take some time,” Kate says. “How long are you staying in Port Hope?”

  Lena picks at a loose thread on her jeans. “Indefinitely. I’ve lined up some voice lessons while I’m here.”

  “Wow. Okay,” Kate says.

  “Is that all right?” Lena asks.

  Kate sighs. “You can do what you want.”

  “But are you okay with it? I need to know.”

  Kate doesn’t answer at first. My heart is going wild in my chest, a hummingbird buzzing around a feeder. I can’t figure out what I want Kate to say.

  “I don’t know,” Kate finally says, so quiet I almost don’t hear her. It’s the perfect answer, because I don’t know either.

  “That’s fair,” Lena says.

  “You… you still go to meetings, right?” Kate asks.

  “We talked about this last night.”

  “Talk about it again.”

  “Yes,” Lena says. “Every week. Sometimes more.”

  “And you’ve found one in Port Hope?”

  “I have,” Lena says. “They meet in the Methodist church basement, right near the house I’m renting. Don’t worry about me, Katie.”

  “It’s hard not to. I’ve worried for eight years. Actually, even longer than that.”

  “I know. I’m sorry.”

  “Are you?”

  Lena sighs and rubs her forehead with both hands. “Yes. I told you, I’m good now. That’s why I’m here. I would never try to put myself back into her life if I wasn’t positive I was ready.”

  “And you haven’t been ready for the past eight years?”

  A beat. I hold my breath. “I know it sounds terrible, but no. I wasn’t. I’d be okay for a while, only to start drinking again. But I’m ready now, I promise.”

  “Well, maybe Sunny’s not,” Kate says.

  “I get that. I just want a chance.”

  “I’m trying, Lena, but Sunny has a mind of her own.”

  Lena smiles and I kind of want to run over there and slap it off. And I kind of want to watch her smile again. It’s confusing.

  “Of course she does,” she says. Then the smile fades. “I never dreamed she’d get sick.”

  “What parent does?” Kate asks.

  I tense up at that word—parent. It’s not like it applies to Lena. At all.

  Lena sighs and shakes her head. “I’m so sorry you went through everything alone. I’m sorry I didn’t call for so long. It felt easier, at the time. Not only for me, but for you and Sunny. I didn’t want to mess up your life and I was such a mess for so long. If I’d known—”

  “I wasn’t alone. I had Dave. And I had Sunny. She’s really strong.”

  “I can tell. She’s just like you.”

  Kate doesn’t say anything to that, but a little knot gets all tangled up in my throat. I swallow it down. Inside the house, our kettle screeches from the kitchen and Kate stands up.

  “Orange blossom tea still your favorite?” she asks, wiping under her eyes.

  Lena looks up at her and smiles. “You remembered.”

  “I remember a lot of things.” Then Kate disappears inside the house.

  “Thank you,” Lena whispers long after the screen door clicks shut. Her voice sounds super-sad, talking to no one.

  I stand there and watch her for a couple of seconds. I wonder how long I’m going to have to wait out here until she leaves. I want to get inside and lock myself in my room and hide under the covers and stare at my picture of Lena until my eyes blur.

  But I don’t need to look at a picture. The real Lena is right here. Still, a picture is safe. A picture doesn’t talk or give reasons or ask questions.

  Lena stares at her lap and runs her fingers over one of the tattoos on her wrist. My heart gets all fast and jumpy, because she looks lonely.

  Something tugs at me, like a knuckle knocking against my ribs. It nudges and nags until I’m walking toward the porch. Lena lifts her head, and her eyes widen when she sees me. My eyes probably widen too, because it’s just plain weird that she’s real. That she’s sitting on my porch. That she sees me too.

  I sit down next to her but scoot as far away as I can without falling off the step. I set my bag down and fiddle with the strap. I’m not sure what to do now. I kind of want to throw up. Or scream. Or ask a ton of questions. Or cry.

  “Hi, Sunny,” she says, her voice all whispery and soft.

  I nod and don’t look at her.

  “I came by to talk to Kate,” she says. “I didn’t mean to surprise you.”

  Shrug. I guess I’m going for the silent treatment. The nice thing is, she lets me. She doesn’t pile a whole bunch of questions in my lap. She gives me a second to get my breath back and figure out if I actually want to sit next to the lady who grew me in her body for nine months and then gave me away.

  After five long minutes, I still don’t have an answer. Maybe there isn’t one. I wrap my arms around my legs and pull my knees to my chest. I sneak a glance at her. Both of her arms are completely covered in tattoos, swirling up from her wrists to her shoulders. There are a lot of suns on there. All sizes and shapes, some with elegant, curling rays and some with knifelike points and some with just a formless glow surrounding the ball of light.

  “You didn’t have all those tattoos in your picture,” I say.

  She tilts her head at me. “My picture?”

  My face feels hot as I realize what I just admitted. I stay quiet. I don’t want to tell her that I have a photo of her tucked in my nightstand that I stare at every night.

  When I don’t answer, she hold
s out her arms, inspecting them herself. “I got all these in the past few years.”

  “All of them?”

  “Every single one.”

  “You like suns a lot.”

  She smiles, this time looking at me instead of her arms. “Why do you think your name is Sunshine?”

  “I don’t know. Because you’re weird?”

  She laughs. “Well, that’s probably true. But I also like suns. I mean, I hope I do. These aren’t coming off.” She rubs at a sun on her upper arm that’s half hidden behind a coil of thorns.

  “Why?” I ask.

  “Why the sun?”

  I nod. “And why…” I tap my chest, hoping my question comes across. My middle name is Kate’s name, but I’ve never asked where my first name came from. I’ve wondered about it, though. I know there are other people in the world with my name, but it’s usually just Sunny. Period. Not Sunshine, which is my legal first name. It’s on my birth certificate and everything.

  Sunshine Kathryn St. James.

  “Well,” Lena says, clearing her throat. “The sun is powerful. Life-giving.”

  “But it can hurt too,” I say. “Like, if you have too much of it. And it gets covered up by clouds and hides at night.”

  Lena nods and touches a little sun on her wrist that’s surrounded by a bunch of dark clouds, like a storm approaching. “All true. But I think that’s why I love these images of the sun even more, you know? Anything good in life isn’t all good, right? There are levels, layers. Everything that’s beautiful can turn ugly and everything that’s dark can be given some light. Nothing is only one thing. And the sun, it’s the same every day, shining on and on, but every day is different too.”

  “And it’s big,” I say. “It always makes me feel super-small when I see those diagrams of the solar system and how the sun is like this big old basketball next to a bunch of little golf balls and marbles.”