“Oh! Thank you. Thanks for saying that,” she said. It felt like she’d been strapped to a rocket, firing up. “That’s a really sweet thing to say to someone. I don’t know how else to respond.”
“Don’t need to. It fits, because I think you’re really sweet,” he said, sitting and leaning back, looking up at the sky as “Cowboy Take Me Away” by The Chicks came on the radio.
“I think you’re really sweet too,” Kasey said, sitting next to him with a mouth full of words she kept in.
The romance of the water. The swelling symphony of chorus frogs. It wasn’t long until Silas asked if he could kiss her. He asked if she would go to prom with him and finally be his girl. He told her he’d been wanting to ask for so long but was working up the nerve. Kasey hadn’t ever thought of herself as someone a person would have to work up the nerve to ask out, and she never thought of Silas as the type of person who had to work up the nerve to do anything either. Him saying that made her feel upside down—heavy and light at the same time, like a wet petal. Wonderful. Enchanted.
Kasey smiled and said yes as he leaned in to kiss her, her ears roaring so loud she thought they’d up and burst.
Three! Two! One! Blast off!
2019
3
Caroline Foxberry
Caro, half-dizzy and buzzed on Foxberry Bourbon, stared at her swimmy reflection in the mirror. She and Kasey were alone in an upstairs bathroom of the Plum house; Kasey was peeing. Caro had missed Kasey so much she even missed going to the bathroom with her.
“Should I get bangs?” Caro asked. She hadn’t had bangs since freshman year of high school. She pulled some of her hair over her forehead to make fake ones—A longish fringe would look good, she thought.
“Okay, what’s wrong? Spill it. Whenever you talk about getting bangs, it’s because you’re going through some sort of crisis,” Kasey said, reaching for the toilet paper.
“Zooey Deschanel had those bangs in New Girl and everyone loved her,” Caro said.
Kasey wiped and got up from the toilet, stood at the sink to wash her hands. Caro scootched over a bit.
“Seriously, what’s up?” Kasey asked.
“Why’d you come back for Taylor’s wedding but not mine?” Caro asked her for the first time. She’d wanted to ask before but couldn’t find the right moment. Although Kasey had said she was coming for Taylor’s wedding, she was a bit vague about it and Caro had half hoped it wasn’t true. “When Trey and I got married, you said you couldn’t do it. Only six months ago, you said you couldn’t set foot in Goldie, that you had too many bad memories and that’s why you never came home. I know we promised we wouldn’t bring it up anymore if you didn’t want to talk about it. We were too scared of pushing you away—but lo and behold, here you are, Kasey. Your ass is here in Goldie, just like that! And for Taylor? I mean, we all love Taylor, of course we do, but she’s not one of us. You never came back for us, and that hurts, Kasey. It really fucking hurts!”
They were both crying now. Caro had held it in for so long that when she finally let loose, it was like a natural disaster she had to let happen. Simply brace herself for the aftermath. Her breath got short. Kasey stood close.
“Caro, I’m sorry. I’m sorry I missed your wedding. It wasn’t easy for me to come back now. Trust me, it took a while to talk myself into it. I’m sorry I can’t come here more, I…” Kasey said.
Caro knew how hard things were for Kasey growing up, knew how hard she took her mama’s death. She never knew her maternal grandparents, and her dad had been adopted by a single woman who didn’t have much family, who’d died of a broken heart not long after Kasey’s dad did. She had a few distant cousins of her mom’s scattered farther south but had never met them. Kasey’s mama was all she had, and everything in Goldie reminded her of it.
Caro was sensitive to what returning to Goldie could dredge up for Kasey, but she needed to be honest with her too. She’d accepted the fact that Kasey left and they had to go to New York or Seattle to see her, so Kasey was going to have to accept the fact that after fifteen years, Caro could get buzzed and stand in the bathroom and ask some tough questions. Finally. She and Kasey had always been able to be real with each other before Kasey left Goldie. Theirs was a special bond because of the shared disfunction when it came to their families and since they were the only ones in RACK without siblings. She wanted them to get back to the way they’d been before. Somehow.
“But why? Why did you finally come home? Why now?” Caro asked, after taking some deep breaths.
Kasey had sent four hundred dollars’ worth of lingerie to Caro for her bridal shower, in absentia. Kasey had sent wineglasses and dish towels and eight-hundred-count bedsheets to her and Trey for their wedding, in absentia. Caro had asked Kasey to be her bridesmaid and Kasey had declined. The wedding photos weren’t the same without her. RACK was RAC.
“I…” Kasey started. “It was just time to come back.”
“Was it Silas? Did you come back for him? He’s out there, y’know,” Caro said, flicking her hand toward the open window facing the backyard—the smell of fresh-cut grass, and chatter, laughter, birdsong. The air-conditioning was on full blast, but Caro had opened the window as soon as she walked in, convinced it would sober her up a bit. “Did you see him? He looks the same. He hasn’t changed. He’s everywhere all the time. I see him practically every day. He looks good. I mean, it’s Silas Cas-te-low, y’know?”
“No!” Kasey’s mouth twisted into a snarl. Caro couldn’t help but think she was ridiculously cute. Caro was pissed, but it was so good to be this close to Kasey again, to see her grouchy face right in front of her. “I didn’t come here for Si! I’m engaged. You know I’m engaged to Devon. What are you talking about?”
“I haven’t even seen your engagement ring in real life,” Caro said, taking Kasey’s left hand, separating her ring finger from the others. She touched the square diamond, gently pulling it closer to her eyes. “It’s gorgeous and it’s huge. Devon must be loaded?”
“Yours is bigger than mine. Please! The diamond as big as the Ritz.” Kasey smacked her lips and snatched Caro’s left hand up to her face. They both eyed the ice flashing in the sunlight. “Um, you’re married to Maxwell Mason Foxberry the Third.” Kasey held up three fingers with her free hand. “That long-ass name alone screams money. It’s, like, probably illegal for a poor person to have a name like that. Get real. His family owns more than half of Goldie…so yeah, now you own more than half of Goldie. Puhlease!”
No, Caroline didn’t exactly hate becoming town royalty by default when she’d married Trey. The girls had teased her about it for a bit, calling her Princess Caroline and Princess Caroppenheimer Foxberry the Third in their emails and texts. Ada was one to talk, with how much money she’d always had, and Rosemarie was content with nonprofits and working for Christian charities. Apparently, Kasey was now rolling in it too, which made Caro so happy. Kasey grew up with practically nothing and went off to an Ivy League and now had this amazing job and apparently an amazing, loaded fiancé, and all of that would have been lovely if Kasey had bothered to return to Goldie even once during the last fifteen years. Caro’s fresh round of tears was angry and it wasn’t stopping. She wanted to know why Kasey was back, but of course Kasey wouldn’t budge. She had been as stubborn as a Mississippi mule since the day she was born.