“GOOD MORNING, SUNSHINE,” my mother said, a tall glass of iced coffee in front of her on the kitchen counter. She was still weary-eyed from sleep, like me, neither one of us looking at all like sunshine.
“You look tired,” I said, going into the fridge, retrieving the pitcher of coffee we brewed each day and left there to cool so when we added the ice it wouldn’t get watered down. I poured myself a glass and dropped five big cubes into it from the freezer, along with some half-and-half that turned it the color of caramel.
“I was up most of the night finishing Missy’s bridesmaid dresses.” She swirled the glass in circles with her hand, the ice clinking against the sides. “Why didn’t you come see me when you got home? My light was on.”
“I was tired, I guess.”
My mother gestured at the stool on the other side of the counter. “Sit.”
So I did, and now we were face-to-face, elbows resting on the table, iced coffees in front of us. “What?”
“I want to discuss the fact that you ran out of here yesterday.”
“I know. I’m sorry.”
She blinked once. Twice. “We need to be able to talk about what happened. We need to talk about your father.”
At this, I turned away. Stared at the hanging plant by the porch door, its leaves wilted from the heat, long green vines reaching toward the ground. Someone needed to water it. “It’s too hard to,” I said, my voice hoarse.
“Jane. Look at me.”
But I didn’t. Instead I turned my attention to the painting on the wall of an old fishing boat tied up on shore, stormy seas reaching up behind it, white caps dotting the tips of tiny waves farther out. My father had bought it at an art fair a long time ago, the kind that all beach towns seem to hold once a summer. I felt my mother’s hands close around mine, her arms stretched across the table, trying to reach me.
“Look at me, Jane,” she said again.
It took some effort, but I did. The subject—of that night, of my father—always snatched the breath right out of my lungs, threatening to choke me.
“What happened isn’t your fault.”
“But it is,” I whispered. “It is.”
“Jane, no—”
“If I hadn’t stayed late, if I hadn’t fallen asleep, if I hadn’t called you back—”
“You might be dead,” my mother finished before I could.
“But Dad,” I croaked, unable to say anything else.
My father. My father, who taught me how to ride a bike. My father who took me swimming even when the water was freezing. My father who loved to order pizza after his shift was over and take it down to the beach with me, still in his uniform, socks and shoes off, dinner on the sand, extra pepperoni, just the two of us. My father who was big and strong and fearless and invincible—until one day he wasn’t.
My father who was gone.
My mother squeezed my hands in hers. “Your father would be heartbroken to know that you’re blaming yourself. You have to stop.”
I blinked away tears. “I can’t.”
“It might help if you and I went to visit him.”
A single tear escaped. It rolled down my cheek. “I’m not ready. Not yet.”
“Just think about it. We don’t have to go today or tomorrow, but soon.”
I dabbed my face with a napkin. “Okay.”
“I mean it.”
“I know you do,” I said.
My mother’s hands slid away, returning to their place on the other side of the counter. Back around the cold glass of her iced coffee. “You have to face this. It’s been long enough.”
I didn’t say anything. My throat was too tight.
“You’re not alone, Jane,” she said. “We will get through this together. We will. I am your mother and I love you and I’m not going anywhere.”
Instead of running to my room, this time I slipped from my perch and softly padded my way to the other side of the counter. I leaned into my mother, and she took me in her arms and held me tight, as tight as that night after the police brought me home and everything was over. She didn’t let go for a long, long while.
• • •
“I saw that guy again by the way,” I said to the girls. It was mid-day, the sun straight above and glaring. Bridget had dragged an umbrella all the way down to the beach from her family’s house and spent an hour anchoring it into the sand. We’d laughed at her, but now the four of us were huddled underneath it, desperate for shade.
Tammy peeked a foot into the sun, then quickly pulled it back. “If by that guy you mean Handel, that information has already been discussed.”
“No,” I said. “I mean that rich guy with the dog.”
Bridget perked up. “The cute one with the friends? The lacrosse player?”
Michaela rolled her eyes. “How many other rich guys with dogs have shown up to talk to us recently?”
“I was just verifying,” she said, offended. Her eyes flickered up to the green polka-dot umbrella above us. “Be nice or I’ll kick you out from under my shade.”
“I’m sorry, B,” Michaela said quickly. “I don’t mean to be impatient.”
“It’s fine. You can stay, then. For now.”
I turned to Bridget. She always meant well. “Yes, it was the one with the friends, and I suppose he was cute. Though jocks aren’t really my type.”
Tammy nudged me. “Because your type is more”—she tapped her finger to her chin, made a mock-thinking stare—“young Irish mafia?”
My only response was to glare.
“Their names were pretty ridiculous,” Bridget admitted, choosing to ignore Tammy’s comment, or too distracted thinking about the boys to notice it. “What were they again?”
“I think one of them was actually Logan,” Michaela said with a laugh. “Or was it Juniper? Or Jodper?”
“Miles was the name of their leader—you know, the dog one,” Tammy said, finally dropping the Handel bit.
“He was their leader, wasn’t he?” I agreed. “It’s funny how that stuff is obvious. You see a group of guys and you automatically know which one is in charge.”
“So, anyway, you saw him and . . . what?” Bridget wanted to know.
“I was walking along Ocean Ave,” I said. “You know, over by the strip with the restaurants like the Ocean Club?”
“What were you doing there?” Michaela asked.
“Um.” I hesitated. I thought about the conversation I’d had with my mother beforehand, the one that sent me running off, and the one from this morning about how I needed to deal with the stuff about my father. I decided I didn’t need to start dealing yet. “You know, I just felt like being somewhere different. Other than the wharf.”
“Well, that place is definitely different than the wharf,” Bridget said with a laugh.
“I was walking by Christie’s, and it turns out that this guy—the one named Miles—valets there, and he pulled up in one of the cars and said hello. He remembered me from the beach.”
“I bet he did,” Tammy said.
“I’m sure he remembers all of us, Tam,” I said.
“Right.”
Michaela looked at me. “Did he ask you out?”
“Yeah,” I said with a smile, remembering. “First he offered to come pick me up in his car some night, and then he invited me to come watch him play lacrosse.”
“You’re not serious,” Tammy said.
“Sadly, I am. I said no of course, and then didn’t let him get much further than that.”
Michaela looked at me. “You could give him a chance, Jane. See what he’s like and all. He might not be that bad.”
“Are you kidding?” Tammy and I both asked her at once.
“I’d go out with him,” Bridget said.
“Well, we all know that,” Tammy said.
“That’s it. Out of my shade,” Bridget protested, reaching around me to give Tammy a shove.
Tammy tipped a little into the sun and quickly scrambled to get her bearings again under the umbrella. “Sorry, sorry.”
Bridget just sighed and let it go.
“Maybe it would be good for you to go out with someone else,” Michaela suggested. “You know, someone other than Handel.”
This time it was my turn to shove someone, and I gave Michaela a push. She didn’t budge. Tammy might be bossy, but Michaela was tougher than all of us. “Can you, just this once, not judge Handel so negatively?”
“So we’re pro-Handel again?” Tammy asked. “Just because you ran into him once down on the wharf?”
“I like him. I can’t help it.”
“It’s okay, Jane,” Bridget said. “You like who you like. And I don’t blame you for liking Handel Davies. He is gor-or-geous.”
“But of dubious character,” Michaela said.
“So is the guy with the dog!” I shot back.
“He is not,” she said. “He’s a prep school athlete.”
“Exactly. He’s got ‘entitled’ written all over him.”
Michaela pursed her lips and gave me a look that said come on. “And Handel Davies has ‘bad idea’ written all over him.”
“I’m going out with him,” I said. “Handel, I mean. Tonight.”
Michaela took a deep breath. I could hear the disapproval in the way she inhaled. But she held her tongue.
Tammy sighed. “Oh, Jane.” She sounded resigned.
“Exactly,” Michaela said, finally letting out her breath. She sounded equally defeated.
Bridget looked at me, blinking those big eyes of hers. “If you see Miles again, and he asks you out again,” she said, the only one not to judge. “Tell him you have this friend.”
I leaned into Bridget. Rested my head on her shoulder. “I will, B. Don’t worry. I definitely will.”
• • •
A spark of excitement flickered in me the rest of the afternoon, an urgent buzz underneath my skin as I lay in the sun, like something was about to happen. I had to keep reminding myself that this eager pulse was beating out its rhythm because I was going to see Handel, because we had another date. I wondered if this time we would kiss—I kept picturing it, what kissing Handel would be like, daydreaming about how it might happen. Then I moved on to fantasizing about where those kisses might go next, imagining his hands on my skin, sliding up underneath my shirt, and all kinds of other things I’d never allowed myself to do with a boy. I could feel the blood rising into my cheeks and coloring the surface of my skin. I used to be so in control, so focused, so disciplined, but there was something about Handel that undid me, or maybe it was just that lately I was easily undone. No—I was looking to be. I was still thinking about our imaginary kissing and the places it might lead when I heard my name being repeated.
“Jane? Hellooo,” Bridget was saying.
I lifted my head from the towel and realized that she, Tammy, and Michaela were watching me. I hoped they didn’t notice my blush. The umbrella was gone, and their blankets and towels were all packed up, bags slung across their shoulders and resting against their hips. “What’s up?”
“We’re taking off.”
I sat up. “Oh?”
Bridget glanced over at Tammy. “Tammy has a date with Seamus.”
This startled me. “Really?”
“It’s not a date,” Tammy said. “We’re just going for a run.”
I took off my sunglasses and rubbed my eyes. “How did I miss that part of the conversation?”
Michaela crossed her arms and looked at me. “You’ve been in your own world for, like, hours now.”
Tammy smirked. “What were you thinking about?”
I shrugged. “I must have fallen asleep.”
“Right,” Tammy said. She cocked her head. “You might want to head, too. Don’t you have somewhere to be this evening?”
I smiled. Started to get up from my towel. “Yes. But you ladies go. I’m going for a quick swim before I leave. It’s hot.”
Bridget was grinning. “I bet. Have fun tonight,” she said. “And don’t do anything I wouldn’t do!”
Michaela rolled her eyes. “And by that, she means do everything.”
“Exactly,” Bridget said.
Tammy put her hand on my arm but spoke to the rest of the group. “Jane has always known her mind about this stuff, so I’m sure she knows her limits with someone like Handel.” She looked at me. “Right, Jane?”
“Right,” I said. “Tell Seamus hello.”
Tammy nodded.
But as I watched my friends walk away up the beach, I realized how much I’d been keeping from them about what was really going on inside me, how different I’d become right before their eyes. The Jane to which Tammy referred was the girl who’d existed before February, the one who’d been living in a cocoon, tucked up and hidden and safe from the outside world. Now that this new Jane had emerged, it was as something unexpected. A butterfly, but one who awoke to find that her wings were black.