The Starfish Sisters: A Novel(8)

I lift my chin. “I was remembering.”

“Me too,” he says. “You had a little blue halter top, with sparkly things on it.”

It pops into my mind, a beautiful thing made of green and blue fabric with sequins laced on it in little patterns. Suze, with her clever fingers, made it for me, and I loved how I felt in it. “It wasn’t that little.”

He grins. “I wanted it to be littler.”

“Tsk, tsk.” A silence falls and I’m thinking about being fifteen and kissing and that top. “That was a hard summer.” Especially for Suze, who was sent away to an unwed mothers’ home, her head shaved, her life in tatters. I glance toward the window, up the hill. “I guess I should go see her.”

Ben’s eyes are calm. “You should.”





THEN

YOU’VE GOT A FRIEND





Phoebe

I spent summers in Blue Cove with my grandmother because my parents both had full-time jobs. My mom was a lawyer, hence our very nice house with a pool. My dad was a professor at a private university and often did research in the summer. He invited me to tag along, but I only wanted to go back to Amma’s house.

At the end of every summer, I had to go home to Portland. I always hated leaving Amma, going back to the city, but the summer I met Suze, I was bereft. The world would be so lonely without her.

We spent the day before I left playing on the beach, having a picnic my grandmother packed for us. Sitting on a gingham tablecloth, wearing bathing suits—hers a one-piece my grandmother bought her because she didn’t have one of her own, mine a blue bikini with little gold dolphins that was one of my favorite things in the world—we ate peanut butter and honey sandwiches and single boxes of raisins and tangerines. Between us were the hours and hours we’d spent together collecting shells, drawing in Amma’s studio, eating, telling each other stories.

“This is the best summer I’ve ever had,” Suze said, her knees up so she could rest her face on them. “I hate that you have to live in Portland.”

I leaned into her shoulder, and our heads nested. “I never had a best friend before.”

“Me either.”

Waves crashed playfully on the row of low rocks. The day was warm and sunny, and the beach was full of people cramming one more weekend of happiness in before summer was over and the rains came. “Let’s write letters every day.”

She lifted her head. “That’s a great idea! Except I don’t know if I can get stamps.”

“My grandma will help us.” I warmed to the idea. “Let’s go to Rexall and get stationery on the way home.”

Two hours later, we wandered the old drugstore with its wooden floors, looking at boxes of stationery. “These are pretty,” I said, pulling a box off the shelf. “Smell. Lilacs.”

She frowned. “Too fancy.” She liked some with piano keys on the bottom of each page. “We don’t have to get the same ones.”

“I only have five dollars.” It was always me who paid for things—Suze never had any money.

“Oh yeah. Good point.”

Right next to the stationery boxes was a row of diaries. I spied one with a blue plastic cover with a tiny key. “Hey!” I said, picking it up. “What if we share the diary? I’ll write in it for a few days and then send it to you, and you can write in it and send it back.”

Her face lit up. “I love this idea!”

So it began.

August 29, 19—

Dear Suze,

My mom told me I have to turn off the light in twenty minutes, so I’ll write fast. She took me to the library today and I checked out ten books. It’s been so rainy I will have time to read all of them even with homework.

I already started GO ASK ALICE, and it is really really good.

I hate being home! It’s so noisy and I can’t hear the ocean, only cars, and I miss you so so so so so so so so so so so so so much! My parents are fighting and they think I can’t hear them, but I can. It makes me scared. I think they might get a divorce. If that happens, I will only live with my dad or my grandma. Maybe I could live with my grandma all the time and then we can go to school together in Blue Cove instead of me at Pine Hill, where nobody likes me and they all think I’m weird.

Anyway, I’m sad. I’m going to read a book.

Love,

Phoebe

August 31, 19—

Dear Suze,

I have to tell you about this book. GO ASK ALICE. It’s so sad! About this girl who gets addicted to drugs and all the things she goes through. I read it in one day, and I cried and cried and cried. I wish you could read it, too. Maybe they have it at the Blue Cove library.

My mom left on a business trip for a week, so it’s just me and my dad. I like it this way. We have TV dinners or sometimes we go out to eat. This morning, he took me to eat breakfast at this little café where they have jukeboxes on the table. I had elderberry pancakes and bacon, and my dad had blueberry pancakes, which are his favorite and my mom doesn’t like him to eat them because she says he’s getting fat. He was happy and talked to the waitress and made her laugh and told me about this time when he was a little boy and tried to catch a seagull and it pooped on his head.

I hope this isn’t too boring, but I promised to write, so I am.