WHEN I GET back to the Fuel Dock, things have slowed down and Sam and a couple of guys are cleaning up the aftermath of the lunch rush.
“Wow, nice of you to come back,” he says, as he wipes the counter. “I was starting to think you decided to take the rest of the day off.”
“What? No, Jackson said you said I could have lunch with them, so I did.”
Sam stops what he’s doing. “Seriously?”
“Yeah. Seriously.”
Sam laughs, and then shakes his head. “That kid. He’s funny.”
“You didn’t tell him I could have lunch with them?”
“Why would I do that? You’re on the clock.”
I shrug. “I don’t know, to be nice to your sister.”
“Ha. No.” He laughs again, harder this time, so that I have to wait for him to catch his breath. “What I told him was that I’d throw in an extra burger in case he had a cute girl he wanted to offer lunch to.” He looks at me. “I guess you were it, though he could probably do better.”
“Stop.”
“What? It’s true. You’re way too old for him. But that was kinda smooth for a twelve-year-old, though.” He looks over his shoulder. “Anyway, you can go home now. We’re slowing down, and these guys need the hours, so they wanna stay. You feelin’ okay? I’m not off for another hour, but I can walk if you wanna take my car home.”
“I don’t know how to drive.”
“Balls. I forgot. We gotta fix that.”
“I can walk. If you’re sure it’s all right for me to go.”
He doesn’t hesitate. “Yep, you’re good. Get outta here, sport.”
I laugh. “Okay. I’m gonna go.”
Sam nods. “Good job today. See you at home.”
“All right, champ.”
I stop at his car to grab my purse and check my phone. There are multiple texts from both Paige and Matt, but I don’t feel like answering them right now. I don’t want to go home either, not yet. I don’t know what I want. I feel aimless. Lost.
I pull the Saint Anthony from my pocket and run my thumb over the tiny medallion. I remember when Jules got home from her trip, she’d been so excited to give it to me. At first it didn’t make sense, because she was never particularly religious, and neither was I. But then she told me how she’d wanted to buy something from a cute Italian boy who was selling them on the beach, and so that was my souvenir. That, and the story of how they’d gone for a walk after that, and he’d kissed her on the sand at sunset. And then it made perfect sense. Because I’d yet to have my first kiss, and was forever living vicariously through her.
When I’d asked her what the necklace meant, she didn’t know, but said she’d seen a lot of surfers wearing them. When we’d looked it up, it turned out she’d bought the wrong saint. Surfers wore Saint Christopher medals. This was Saint Anthony of Padua, the patron saint of lost things, just like Walker had said. At first she’d been disappointed, because she’d been thinking it’d be cool to get me an Italian surfer necklace, but I’d told her I loved it anyway, and that I would always wear it in case I needed to find something I lost. And I guess I had.
Out of nowhere, a wave of sadness hits me, and I feel like I might cry at the irony of holding this thing in my hand. So much is lost to me, and I’m beginning to think it’s actually gone for good. But Jules shouldn’t be. I take a deep breath and tuck the Saint Anthony into my pocket, and in my mind I say the little prayer we found when we looked it up: Anthony, Anthony, please come around. Something’s lost that must be found.
And then I make my way down Ruby Street, to In Focus, hoping to start there.
When I reach the shop, I can see Jules through the window, sitting behind the counter, reading a book. I take a deep breath and then push through the door.
She looks up, and her eyes widen in surprise for a moment, then she puts a slip of paper in her book and closes it. “Hi,” she says, standing.
“Hi,” I answer back.
It’s quiet, except for the low sound of the machine printing photos behind Jules. She tilts her head. “You have some more film to drop off?”
I shake my head. “No, I . . .” I don’t know where to start with this. “I just wanted to talk to you about something.”
“Okaay . . .”
“It’s—this is really strange for me, but it’s also important, so I’m just gonna say it.”
Her brows furrow. “Okay. What?”
“I lost my memory in the accident,” I blurt. “Not all of it, but four or five years, and when I woke up and Paige was there, and you weren’t, she said we weren’t friends anymore, and I didn’t believe her, but then the other night when I came in with Matt, it felt like we were strangers, so I knew it was true, and I don’t understand, Jules—why aren’t we friends anymore?” I take a breath, fight the tears I can feel rising behind my eyes. “What happened? With us?”
Jules doesn’t say anything for a moment, just blinks in shock, or confusion, or both. The silence stretches out, and with every second, I’m sure it must’ve been something terrible. That I must’ve done something terrible.
Then slowly, she comes out from behind the counter to me, so we’re standing face-to-face. “God, Liv,” she says, and she puts her arms around me in a silent hug. “It doesn’t matter, not with this happening to you. That was a long time ago.”
I cry into her shoulder. “What? What was a long time ago?”
She pulls me back by my shoulders. “Nothing. Don’t even worry about it. Are you okay? How are you doing life right now like this?”
I laugh and wipe at my eyes. “I don’t know. I’m just lost . . . all the time—not literally—I still know my way around town, I just . . . don’t really know my way around my life.” It’s a relief to say it out loud to someone who’s not so closely tied up in it. I catch my breath. “So maybe you could just tell me the part about what happened to us,” I say. “Please? I just . . . I feel like I need to know.”
Jules runs her eyes over my face like she’s checking to be sure I’m okay. Then she shrugs. “It wasn’t anything big or dramatic,” she says, “so it’s hard to even know how it started, but I remember feeling like we were growing apart.” She pauses. “I hate to say it, because I don’t want to blame Matt—he’s a great guy—but you two got together and started hanging out with Paige and her boyfriend at the time, and I just kinda became the fifth wheel.”
“I’m sorry,” I say softly.
Jules waves a dismissive hand. “You don’t need to be sorry.” She smiles. “Not now, at least. My feelings were hurt at first, but then I started hanging out with other people too. That’s what happens in high school. Groups break up, friends drift. People change. It’s just how it goes sometimes. We didn’t hate each other or anything, we just didn’t really know each other anymore.”
I sit there quiet, relieved that I didn’t do anything terrible to her, but still sad at the thought of us just drifting apart like that. My phone buzzes in my pocket.
I check it. My mom.
Everything okay? Sam just got home and said you left work before him. Where are you?
“Sorry,” I say to Jules. “I need to answer my mom real quick or she’ll get worried.”
“No problem,” she says.