“You did a beautiful thing here, Jonah.” She finally makes eye contact, locking in.
“Thanks. I still have some food left. Do you want cheesecake or something?”
“No, thanks. I’m coming from breakfast with Officer Hayashi.” She smiles a little at my confusion. “Breakfast for dinner.”
I take a step closer to her because that’s my impulse—to be near her. I’m not sure why she’s hanging back. “Are you feeling okay? Are you in a lot of pain?”
“I’m okay. The pain meds help.” She gestures toward the wall nearest her. “You should do something with this blank wall. I bet Mr. Thomas would let you.”
“He suggested it himself, actually. Just haven’t gotten around to it yet.”
“Yeah. You’ve had a lot going on.” She raises her chin to eye level again. “Do you want to take a walk with me? Can you leave?”
The cleanup detail can wait till tomorrow. Everything can wait when it comes to Vivi. “Of course.”
I open the gate so that I’m standing in the alleyway with her. Normally, I’d take her hand. But this is not normally. I’m not sure if I should act the same way. I’m not sure if she’ll still like me the way she did before. I’m not sure of anything. We fall into step down Main Street, and she stays quiet.
“So . . .” I try to begin. I’ve got nothing. The awkwardness trips me, and my brain takes a painful spill onto the cobblestone streets. “What’s . . . new . . . ?”
She stops dead. I wish I could contort my body to kick myself in the face. What’s new? What the hell kind of question is that?
But then Vivi starts to laugh. It’s that wind chime sound at first, and then she’s doubled over on the sidewalk, ha-ha-ha-ing. It makes me laugh, too. Hesitantly, at first. And then more and more. We stand across from each other, unable to stop. Vivi looks up, covering her mouth. Our eyes stay on each other as we shake with laughter.
Once we calm down, Vivi wraps her arm around my waist, still giggling to herself. Just like that, we’re us again. A different us because I know more now. But that’s good.
There are no cars out so we walk in the center of the street. The streetlights guide our path.
“Oh, Jonah. What a week.” I want to put my arm around her shoulder, but I can’t because of her cast and sling. I repress a cringe, thinking of the bone sticking out after her crash. “Was the party tonight everything you wanted it to be?”
“Yeah. It was. It felt like the right thing. If that makes sense.”
“It does.”
“So, um. How are you really?” I glance down at her, and she looks up in return.
Her eyes crinkle a bit at the sides when she smiles. “Pretty good, actually. I mostly just watched TV and slept and let nurses change my bandages. But I also went to some therapy appointments—even a family session with my mom. It felt . . . I don’t know. Like a relief.”
We’re talking about really serious stuff. But—I can’t explain it—the pulse of our conversation is steady. This almost feels casual. Or, at least, like us.
“Counseling with your mom—was that good?” I ask. “Just curious because, uh, my mom went to a grief support group twice this week. Officer Hayashi told her about it, actually. I guess he goes.”
“Yeah.” She smiles, clearly already aware of this. “Family therapy was really good. My mom and I are usually pretty good about talking, but it helped to talk in a different setting, I think.”
“My mom’s already trying to talk the rest of us into going. I’m glad she can go, but . . .” I glance over. “I don’t know.”
There’s a pause, and I start searching for something else to say. Vivi bails me out. “My dad’s wife sent me a letter. My mom gave it to me today.”
Holy shit. “Oh yeah? Wow. That’s big.”
“Yeah. I haven’t opened it yet.” She reads my expression and smiles. “I know—it surprises me, too. I mean, if I had been around when Pandora got her hands on that box, I would have been on the sidelines, like, just open it, already, girl. But this letter is . . . a lot for me.”
“Do you think you’ll open it eventually?”
“Oh yeah. I have a lot of things to work through, and I want to give myself some time. With all of it. But I just keep thinking I didn’t lose anything, with him. And I still have my mom, always have. And someday, maybe I’ll even get to meet my half siblings.”
We’re out past the edge of town. I’ve known where we were headed this whole little walk. It’s the edge of the coastline that Vivi likes the most. She keeps her arm around my waist as we step through the high grass. I can hear the water sloshing below as we dodge the stalks of yellow flowers.
The moon glows overhead, the way it did the night we ran into the ocean. It feels like a lifetime ago. A lifetime but not enough. She stops about five yards away from the drop-off.
“Let’s sit down,” she says. “This is the perfect spot.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN