“You don’t get to decide what’s best for everyone,” Cleo says. “It doesn’t matter how good you think your intentions were. You manipulated us. You knew how stressed out I was about this week, and you knew why Wyn wasn’t coming, and you forced us all into it anyway.”
“I did what I had to,” Sabrina says. “Just like I always do, because no one makes even the tiniest bit of effort anymore. If I waited on all of you, this friendship would already be over, and you know it. I send the first text. I make the phone calls. I leave the voicemails. I schedule the trips, and when you cancel on them, I pitch other dates, and when you can’t give me an immediate yes or no, guess what? I’m the one to check back in a couple days later.”
“We have other things going on in our lives,” Cleo says. “We can’t always drop everything to relive the glory days with you.”
Instantly, I can tell from Sabrina’s expression that Cleo’s hit a nerve, a deep one.
All my virulent anger breaks, a fog clearing enough to reveal a steep drop-off ahead. The anger’s still there, but the fear is heavier, rooting through me, yelling, Stop, stop, stop this, before it gets any worse. Stop this before someone leaves. Before you lose them.
“Let’s all cool off for a second,” I choke out.
Cleo’s eyes lock on to me. “I’m not angry,” she says evenly.
She means it. There’s no fire behind her gaze, only exhaustion, only disappointment. “I’m just not pretending anymore.”
The sidewalk seems to crack underneath me, the world splitting. If I don’t do something, the gap will yawn wider and wider until I can’t reach them. Until I’m all alone.
“Not pretending what?” Sabrina asks.
“That these are the glory days,” Cleo says. “That we’re as close as we used to be, when the truth is, it’s different. We’re different.”
“Cleo,” I say, quiet, pleading.
“Our lives are total opposites,” she goes on, “and our schedules are totally different, and we don’t like spending our free time the same way anymore, and Wyn’s out in Montana, and Harriet’s all but cut us out of her life, and you and Parth still want everything to be one big party, but it’s not! There’s real shit going on in our lives, and we never talk about any of it.”
“I haven’t cut you out of my life,” I say. “We kept something from you that was so painful I haven’t been able to make myself tell anyone about it. I can still hardly think about it—about him—without feeling like . . . like the world’s coming apart at the seams.”
Cleo’s eyes are dark and glossy. “We’re exactly who you’re supposed to come to when you feel like that, and instead you stop talking to us, and then when things are . . . are hard for us, what are we supposed to do?”
“Oh, come on, Cleo,” Sabrina says. “Don’t act like you’re any better. You’ve been dodging plans with me for months. As far as I can tell, I’m the only one trying to hold all this together, while everyone else would be totally fine never seeing one another.”
“We’ve seen one another all week,” Cleo says, “and you’re just now telling us this was all some kind of Machiavellian scheme, and Harriet’s just confessing she and Wyn aren’t even together, and we’ve had days, and it hasn’t even mattered. Because you’d rather sit in a theater for five hours, just because we used to, than adjust to the fact that maybe we’d all rather do something different! We’re not in the same place anymore. We’re growing up.”
Her voice wavers. “And in different directions. And there are things we can’t talk to one another about anymore, and maybe we’ve all been fighting it, or pretending we don’t notice, when we should accept it. We’re not what we used to be for one another. And that’s fine.”
“It’s fine?” Sabrina repeats emptily.
“Things are changing. They already have. And I’ve never been this person who just goes along with things she doesn’t want to do, but you’ve made it so I have to. It all has to be on your terms.”
“No one’s forcing you to stay!” Sabrina says. “If you want to go, go!”
Cleo looks down at her feet, a tiny fern growing up between the cracks in the sidewalk there, right between her sandals. “Fine,” she says. “Kimmy and I will find a hotel for the night.”
Another cold laugh from Sabrina. “So, what, you’re going to consciously uncouple from our friendship?”
“I’m going to take some space,” Cleo says.
“This is ridiculous,” Sabrina replies. “You won’t find anywhere to stay on this entire coast.”
Cleo’s lips press tighter. “Then we’ll sleep in the guesthouse tonight.”
“And then what?” Sabrina says.
“I don’t know yet,” Cleo said. “Maybe leave.”
I have no idea how to argue with her, or if I even want to. My head throbs. Everything is all wrong.
Finally, Sabrina says, “I’ll get the car.” She turns and stalks down the street. I look back the way we came. Even in silhouette, Kimmy, Wyn, and Parth look rigid. They heard everything.
In a way, I tell myself, it’s a relief, to have everything out in the open.
But the truth is, if I could take it all back, I would. I’d do anything to go back to that happy place, outside of time, where nothing from real life can touch us.
32
REAL LIFE
Friday
ON THE DRIVE home, we’re silent. Now that the truth is out, Wyn and I can’t even look at each other. He won’t look at Parth either, keeps his eyes fixed out the car window.
As soon as we get inside the cottage, everyone retreats, and rather than endure any more awkward or painful run-ins, I tuck myself away in the first-floor powder room.
When I make my way up the stairs, though, Kimmy and Cleo are coming down, bags in hand, bound for the guesthouse.
Cleo doesn’t look at me.
Neither of them says anything, but Kimmy flashes a tense smile and squeezes my hand as we pass. A lump forms in my throat at the whine of the front door opening behind me.
I don’t go to Wyn’s and my room. The bubble has popped, this pocket universe collapsed. Instead, I take the kids’ room. It’s tidy, the twin beds returned to opposite walls and neatly made. Cleo and Kimmy left no trace of themselves here apart from the lingering scent of Kimmy’s peppermint oil.
I sit on the edge of the bed, feeling the loneliness swell, not knowing whether it’s pressing against me from the outside or growing from within.
Either way, it’s inescapable, my oldest companion.
I shuck off my clothes and crawl into bed. I don’t cry, but I don’t sleep either.
The argument replays in my mind on a feverish loop until it feels like the words melt together nonsensically.
I ask myself, again and again, why I didn’t tell them. All the same half-assed answers cycle through my mind until I’m as sick with myself as everyone else is.
I turn onto my back and glare up at a beam of moonlight on the ceiling.
I wasn’t afraid they’d be mad at me, exactly, for how things ended with Wyn. I was afraid of their sadness. I was afraid of ruining this trip that meant so much to them. I was afraid of ruining this place where they’ve always been happy. I was afraid they would resent me and never say it, afraid they wouldn’t like me as much without Wyn, because I didn’t like me as much without him.