“No way.”
“But they know you’re going somewhere with me.”
“They do now.”
I give her a side-eyed you’re making no sense expression, but I’m brought up short when I get a good look at her. She looks different than usual—no makeup, hair pulled up in a floppy loop on the top of her head, hoodie, sneakers. She looks more like Meg than she ever has.
“What’s wrong with you?” she asks.
Oh. I was staring. And I guess I took my foot off the gas pedal, because the car is creeping to a stop. I pull my eyes back to the road and shake my head. “There’s not enough time in the world to even begin answering that question.”
Mabel doesn’t say anything.
“Anyway,” I say, clearing my throat, “your parents. What do they think you and I are doing together at seven a.m. on a Monday?”
Mabel shrugs. “I don’t know and I don’t care.”
I squint at the road. “Explain, please.”
She sighs. “They’ve barely blinked at me this entire summer. I could’ve dyed my hair neon green and I honestly don’t think they would have noticed. But then Mom saw your car in the driveway and suddenly started demanding answers. I told her it was too little too late. She doesn’t get to know things.”
“They probably think I’m gonna get you pregnant too.”
Mabel actually laughs really hard at that. “Ryden Brooks’s master plan to inseminate all the Reynolds women. Look out, Mom, you’re next!”
I laugh a little too. But really, it’s not that funny.
We get to the storage center, and I pull up in front of number 1017. We stare at the garage door, neither of us moving.
“Okay, well,” Mabel says, unbuckling her seat belt and getting out. “Let’s get started.”
The storage unit is completely full. I start to feel sick. Meg’s bed frame. Her dresser. Her bookshelves. All of it was part of her, part of her life. And now it’s junk, thrown haphazardly into a cold metal garage off the highway, left to be forgotten.
There are boxes everywhere—and they’re all unlabeled.
I put Hope’s car seat on Meg’s desk and pull my keys out of my pocket. “Where should we start?” I ask, but Mabel’s not really paying attention to me. She’s standing near the door, absentmindedly flicking the knobs on Meg’s floor lamp back and forth, staring at the room full of stuff. Her eyes look like filled-up fishbowls, and when she blinks, the tears pour down her face.
Don’t do it, I tell myself. Do not cry.
In one swift move, not giving myself time to think, I pull the nearest box over to me and slice the tape on the top open with my key.
Clothes. Tshirts, actually. The ones she used to wear before her belly swelled to the size of a soccer ball. I push the shirts back into the box and move on to the next. More clothes. Same for the next three boxes.
What the…
Is that mine?
I move the pile of Meg’s sweats aside—the big, baggy ones she wore in the later stages of her pregnancy—and pull out the thick navy-blue thing. It’s my varsity soccer pullover hoodie, complete with the Downey soccer logo, Brooks, and my number: 1. I didn’t even realize it was missing.
“Hey, Mabel?”
Her face is dry now, and she’s sitting on the concrete floor a little ways away, quietly going through a box of books. “Hmm?”
“Did Meg wear this?” I hold up the sweatshirt.
She smiles. “All the time. She slept in it most nights.”
“How long did she have it?”
“I don’t know. A few months, I guess.” She looks confused. “Why, didn’t you give it to her?”
I shake my head. “She must have swiped it from my room. Or maybe I left it at your house and didn’t realize it.” For some reason, she didn’t want me to know she had this sweatshirt, just like I didn’t want her to know I had her notebook. Maybe it was the same story. She loved it, it made her feel close to me, and she didn’t want it taken away. The thought makes me smile. I’m not crazy—about this, at least. She really did love me too.
I slip the sweatshirt over my head, even though it’s getting kinda warm in the storage unit. It still smells like her.
Tears prick the backs of my eyes, but I sniffle and press the sweatshirt-covered heels of my hands into my eyes to push them back. When I open my eyes again and the blurry spots fade, I notice Mabel watching me. She doesn’t say anything though.
Hope wakes up then and starts to whine. I put on Joni’s Washington Square Park audio file and tuck my phone into the car seat with her. She quiets down immediately.
“What’s that?” Mabel asks.
I shrug. “Just some New York sounds. She likes it.”