You, With a View(19)
I sigh, turning my gaze back to the sky. Thomas and Sadie drove up to Glenlake for dinner, and we decided to take a walk while my parents cooked and danced around the kitchen like moony teenagers. We stopped at the neighborhood park, where we’re now stretched out on the grass side by side. Thomas is on his stomach, head propped on his arms, while Sadie’s on her back next to me, her fingers loosely twined with mine.
I’m grateful for their company. It’s been two days since my visit with Paul, and even after updating them on everything I’ve learned, my mind is still spinning.
“I had to turn my notifications off,” I admit. “My phone kept overheating.”
“People want an update,” Thomas says, laying his cheek on his forearm, his gaze sharp on me. “You need to tell them you found the guy and you know his grandson. Someone said, ‘if you don’t give us an update I will literally die.’ They’re gonna die, Beans. Come on.”
“That’s not my fault!” I laugh as Sadie squeezes my hand, her shoulder shaking against mine.
He props up on his elbows. “You’re sitting on a gold mine. When people find out the grandson is your old nemesis, they’re going to lose their shit. Do you know how many fifteen-year-olds wish they had this clout? You can’t waste it.”
“TikTok was a onetime deal. I got what I needed out of it. There’s no reason to continue, even if someone’s threatening death by curiosity.” I pause. “Relatable, though.”
He’s quiet for all of three seconds. “Weren’t you using TikTok to show your photography?”
Immediately, I picture the videos I put together, little montages of shots I took on random weekends, set to some indie song. “Kind of, I guess. I mean, not in any serious way.”
Thomas snorts. “Yeah, that’s the theme there, huh?”
“Mas,” Sadie warns softly.
I whip my head toward him. “What does that mean?”
“It means you’re afraid to fail at something you really love to do, so you’ve barely put any effort into it.”
“I don’t know if you remember this, but I did, in fact, already fail at something I love to do.”
“No,” he insists. “Enzo was a dick who was wrong about you, and you believed his bullshit. I’m telling you, this is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. Maybe if you keep going, it’ll help you get more attention with your photography.”
I gnaw at my lip, my heart beating hopefully against my ribs. It doesn’t have the common sense my brain does, and pushing against it with my fingers isn’t slowing it down.
“If you’re going to keep seeing them, you should do it, Noelle,” Sadie says quietly. “It might be kind of cool to document this whole thing on video as you go. Since that’s how it started, you know?”
“Exactly,” Thomas says. “And listen, if it’ll give you confidence about your photography—which is great, by the way—then even better.”
“All your compliments are freaking me out, please stop.”
He grins, hearing the thank you buried there.
Would people be into it? Would they care about what’s happened since that first video, follow me on whatever path this takes me down?
“Besides, what else do you have going on? You’re unemployed. You have all the time in the world to do this.”
“Back on familiar ground,” I mutter.
He marches on. “Honestly, what you really should do is go on Gram’s honeymoon trip and document that. People would lose it; you’d get some free promotion. Ride that viral wave.”
I blink over at him. The voice that whispered to me when I saw the map won’t quiet down, and now I wonder if Thomas heard it, too.
More than anything else I learned at Paul’s—Gram going to UCLA, their planned elopement—that map has been digging under my skin. The route sketched itself out in my mind as I filled out online applications yesterday, and I ended up down a Google rabbit hole, researching each destination Gram circled and imagining what I’d see and do. I even dreamed about it last night. I was standing at the base of Zion’s rich red cliffs, and I couldn’t see Gram, but I felt her there. She was standing right beside me, her touch against my hand as soft as the wind, and as fleeting. There was a creek running behind us, sage-colored shrubs rustling around us, and it felt like peace.
I woke up wondering if I was dreaming about it because I’m desperate for an escape from my hamster-wheel life, or if it was a sign. Thomas bringing it up feels like the latter.
His phone trills before I can formulate a response.
“Dinner’s ready.” He leaps up and holds a hand out for Sadie and me.
Sadie wraps her arm around my waist, squeezing me against her. “You’ll figure it all out.”
I keep hearing that, but I’m no closer to figuring anything out than I was a year ago. Or the five before that.
* * *
Thomas zeroes in on Dad’s famous cheesy garlic bread as soon as we walk into the dining room. “Hell yes.”
“Don’t take it all this time,” I say as he slides into his seat, Sadie dropping into the chair beside him.
“I had four pieces last time.”
“You had eight.” I look at Dad as he walks into the dining room, a stack of dishes in one hand. He stoops his six-five frame down to engulf me in a one-armed hug. “Why did you make him this way? He has a hole in his stomach.”