NIGHT HAD FALLEN ON THE BEACH, AND IT WAS EVEN colder than before. Adam said we should go back to the car. I didn’t ask him anything as we climbed up the staircase. I didn’t speak at all. It was dark, and I concentrated on my steps.
When we got into the car, I tucked the blanket around my bare legs. Adam turned the key in the ignition and cranked up the heat. “There,” he said. “Better?”
“Yeah,” I said, though my teeth were chattering.
“I have a sibling,” he said. “I understand if you’re pissed.”
“I’m surprised, not pissed,” I said. “I know as well as anyone that there are reasons people need to keep secrets sometimes.”
Adam nodded.
“Did she die?” I asked. “Or, is it he?”
“She,” he said. “No, she didn’t. That’s not why . . . listen, this is hard for me. So let me get this out, okay?”
“Okay,” I said.
“And I just want to say for the record, when you asked me back at Grizzly Cove whether I had any siblings, I said it was just my parents and me at home, that wasn’t a lie—CJ hasn’t lived at home for years.”
“Her name is CJ?”
“Yeah,” he said. “We’re five years apart, like you and Talley. We didn’t get along as well as you guys when we were kids, but I thought we had a pretty normal family. Actually, when I was a little kid, I took it for granted, and didn’t think about whether we were normal or not, which just goes to show that we were normal. My parents worked too much, and CJ was a pain, but those were my only complaints. Everything changed the summer I was six and CJ turned eleven, because she got leukemia.”
“Oh no,” I said.
“It was the good kind,” Adam said. “Like, all leukemia is bad, but if you have to get it, this is the kind you want, because the cure rate is ninety percent. When CJ was diagnosed, my dad kept repeating that to my mom, ‘ninety percent, ninety percent.’ And my mom would say that means ten percent don’t survive. She’d run the numbers—one out of ten die, two out of twenty die, and on. I literally taught myself what percentages mean because of all the conversations they had about CJ’s chances. They had these whisper-fights, trying to be quiet so CJ and I wouldn’t overhear. But sometimes they got loud, and the air vent in my bedroom goes down to the kitchen, where their late-night talks tended to take place. My mom was mad at my dad because when CJ had first gotten sick, he said she just needed more iron in her diet. Since he’s a doctor, my mom trusted him, and it was a few weeks before she finally brought CJ to the doctor and the real diagnosis was made. So there was our formerly normal family—now CJ was fighting a potentially deadly illness, and my mom was so mad at my dad for the delay. He said CJ getting diagnosed a few weeks earlier wouldn’t have made a difference, but that just further enraged my mom. My dad had been wrong about CJ being sick; what if he was wrong about the delay not being a big deal? My mom kicked him out of the house. It felt like all the worst things that could happen had happened to us.”
“But . . . she was in the ninety percent, right?”
“Yeah, she was,” he said. “And my parents got back together, too—though not till after CJ was done with the intense part of the treatment, which lasted almost a year. She was basically absent for all of sixth grade. I was a total jerk about it, acting like CJ had gotten sick on purpose. As if she wanted that kind of attention.”
“You were a little kid.”
“Yeah, and a dense one at that.”
“Not so dense. You figured out percentages.”
“My one shining moment, but the rest of the time, I was just pissed. My dad bought the boat with CJ’s name on it. That really pissed me off.”
“CJ stands for Cara Joy?”
“Yeah,” he said. “Sorry I wasn’t honest with you about it—but it did come with the name, like I said. CJ was sick, and my dad saw an ad for the boat, and he thought it was a sign that she’d get well, as long as he bought it. We weren’t a boating family, but that hardly mattered to him when it came to his daughter’s life. I wouldn’t categorize my dad as a superstitious person, but I guess despite what he told my mom, the ninety-percent statistic wasn’t making him entirely secure, either. He brought us all out to see it, and I threw a fit because he said he wouldn’t add my name to the boat. He said it was bad luck to change a boat’s name, and the whole point of buying the boat was to bring good luck to our family, and to CJ especially. I’d never gotten a present that was anything close to that big, and I was pissed at CJ for getting everything, and pissed at my dad for giving it to her, and pissed at my mom for kicking my dad out. And I was pissed at everyone for missing every single baseball practice I had for two years straight. Not that my parents ever came to my practices. They didn’t even always make it to my games because they were usually working. They used to be fairly hands-off parents, if you can believe it. When CJ got sick, they changed their style—my mom especially. But back then it was only directed at CJ, and I was insanely jealous. My mom said she couldn’t come to baseball because it conflicted with when she had to take CJ to her support group at the hospital for kids who had cancer.” He paused. “It was called Sunshine Crew,” he added. “And I’m—”
“Wait,” I said. “Stop talking. You told me you didn’t know anything else on the list.”
“I know. I should’ve told you. I’m sorry.”
“You lied to me.”
“I tried not to.”
“Oh, just because you didn’t technically tell me you didn’t have a sibling, and the boat really did come with that name, you think you’re off the hook? You knew what you were doing. You knew you were hiding something about Talley from me. And why—because the Sunshine Crew conflicted with your baseball games a dozen years ago?”
“No, of course not,” he said. “And it may not have anything to do with Talley. This all happened a long time ago—for all I know, the Sunshine Crew doesn’t even exist anymore, and even if it does, Talley could’ve been writing about something else with the same name.”
“That’s beside the point.”
“It’s actually not,” Adam said. “The Sunshine Crew was a support group for kids with cancer. If Talley wasn’t a kid with cancer, why would she know about it? When you think about it, it’s much more likely that it’s two different things with coincidentally the same name, and then it’d be a waste of time for you to pursue it.”
“Did you even bother to ask CJ if she knew Talley?”
“No.”
“Call her,” I said. “Right now.”
“I don’t think we have service yet.”
“Fine. As soon as we’re in range, call her.”
“I will,” Adam said. “But she’s not going to answer. This is why I really didn’t tell you about CJ—she’s been MIA for months now. She’s checked in a few times so we know she’s alive, but she won’t answer if we call or text her. She said she’s tired of my mom trying to micromanage her life, and she needs to be free from all the attachments for a while. Who does that?”
He paused, waiting for me to say something. But I was too mad to take his side about anything.
“Yeah, so, my mom’s a control freak,” he went on. “She’s obsessed with things like what we’re eating, and whether we’re drinking or smoking, or doing anything that can cause cancer. It makes me nuts, too. But I think that’s a really shitty excuse to just up and disappear. My parents are a wreck about it, and fighting all the time. I’ve left messages for CJ to clue her in—you think she wouldn’t want to be the reason my parents split up for a second time. Maybe the cancer wasn’t her fault. But this sure is. She was so abrupt about it, too. It’s not like she had a big blowup with my mom—or my dad for that matter. She was talking to them all the time, and then all of a sudden she just decided she’d had enough. It didn’t make any sense. But now I’ve been wondering . . . maybe she met Talley, and Talley told her how she didn’t follow the life plan your dad had for her.”
“Oh my God. You did NOT just try to pin this on Talley.”
“I’m not trying to pin it on anyone. I’m just trying to understand what’s going on with my sister, the same as you’re trying to understand yours.”
“We’re not the same. I wouldn’t have kept this from you for so long.”
That was it for a while. We lapsed into silence. I had my cell phone in my hands, and I was checking the bars every minute or so to see if we were in range. It turned out I didn’t have to check, because the instant we were back on the grid, both my phone and Adam’s starting pinging with notifications of messages. Adam’s parents were looking for him, and both Aunt Elise and Juno were worried about me.
I made Adam call CJ first. As he’d predicted, she didn’t answer. He left a message: “Please call back, or send a text, or a carrier pigeon—whatever. It’s really important that you get in touch. It has nothing to do with Mom and Dad this time. You don’t have to worry about them—not that you ever do. But still, I need to tell you something, so get in touch, okay?”
He hung up and glanced over at me, like he was expecting a nod or a smile or a thumbs-up sign. I looked down at my own phone, typing “Sunshine Crew Stanford Hospital” into an internet search box. There was a brief explanation about the program—they offered support groups to kids aged three to eighteen who were going through treatment, and there was a phone number to call if you had a child in need. I didn’t have a child in need. I tried calling anyway, and after three rings, the call went to voice mail. It was after hours. I texted Aunt Elise to say I was sorry to have worried her, and that she didn’t need to wait up. I’d see her in the morning.
I also texted Juno. The messages from her had stacked up all day, first all Audrey-related. But then she got increasingly worried that I was mad at her for some reason, and that’s why I wasn’t responding, and then she was worried that something terrible had happened to me. The last few texts, in all caps, were all the same: I NEED TO KNOW THAT UR OK
I wasn’t okay, but I did want to assure her I wasn’t, like, in a ditch somewhere or anything like that.
I’m safe, I wrote.
She was probably sleeping anyway. But a few seconds later, my phone rang with a call from her. I pressed the button to reject the call, just like I’d done to Talley.
She texted again: Glad ur safe but are you ok??????
Me: Not really. More later.
Adam and I hardly talked the whole way home. When he pulled into a rest stop to charge up the car, we just sat in silence. I made myself look busy pretending to scroll through things on my phone. Adam did the same. Back home, Dad occasionally got worked up about how cell phones contributed to the breakdown of social etiquette. But sometimes you really don’t want to have to talk to someone, and in those cases, having a cell phone at your fingertips is a saving grace.
Finally, close to midnight, Adam pulled into Aunt Elise’s driveway. I had my hand on the door handle even before he’d fully slowed to a stop.
“Sloane,” he said. “Wait. I just want to tell you—look, things have been hard with CJ, but I still should’ve been honest with you, and I know that. I really am very sorry.”
“Is that all?” I asked.
“I don’t know what else to say.”
My hand was still on the door handle. “You know,” I said, “when I left Talley that last morning of her life, I didn’t know it’d be the last time I’d see her. I didn’t tell her all the things I should’ve, and now for the rest of my life, I have to live with all that was left unsaid. But in this case, I know it’s going to be the last time I see you.”
“I hope that’s not true. Even if we’ve only known each other a few days, you’re my friend. A really good friend.”
I shook my head. “I’m not your friend,” I said. “And you’re not mine. My friends would never do what you did. Goodbye, Adam. That’s all that’s left to say—goodbye.”
I opened the door and headed up the walkway to Aunt Elise’s front door. I would’ve heard if he backed up out of the driveway, but the car stayed idle. I knew Adam was watching me, but I didn’t turn around. I just let myself into the house.