It was a perfect day for a wedding, Owen thought as he drove past Winthrop Farm on his way to work. White chairs were set up on the lawn. An arbor covered in flowers, positioned so that the endless stripes of the fields would feature in the background of every picture. Late afternoon sunshine all over the grass. The guests were starting to arrive, cars lining both sides of the road. He couldn’t see her, but he knew that Lucie was there somewhere, rushing around to ensure everything went according to plan.
There was an ache in his chest that he couldn’t get rid of. It had been three weeks since that Friday night of rain and stars and kissing Angela. He hadn’t spoken to Lucie since then. She’d been long gone by the time he got back home, a thousand different thoughts tangled in his mind. He’d gone upstairs to his room and texted Angela all night, wide awake, and somewhere in all those messages, they were together now.
And then, later that weekend, she’d asked him to keep it a secret. She kept saying it was better that way but Owen didn’t know if that was true. He hadn’t told anyone anyway. He barely saw his friends anymore, even at school. At lunch, the only time all four of them were together, he slipped outside with Angela, to the fragments of reservoir down the street. In between classes, Max and Declan tried to put his friendship with Lucie back together. She didn’t seem to want to. She wouldn’t answer his texts. Moved to the other side of the room in the two classes they had together. Owen tried to fight the feeling that everything was fraying.
He’d decided on Enfield just before the deadline and every time he saw someone running through town in a Walcott T-shirt or heard his classmates talking about it in the halls, it hurt a little less. He’d signed up for Orientation this morning and scrolled through their website, through their social media, finding things to look forward to.
He thought about Angela as he hung up dresses left behind in the fitting room. The way she smiled at him in golden hour and let her laughter carry across sea air, harbor lights and lighthouse beams far in the distance. He wanted to feel like this forever, like he was floating in the ocean she loved so much, nothing but soft–gold sky above and eternal blue collected from daydreams. But the expression on Lucie’s face that day kept coming back to him. He thought about how she averted her eyes every time they passed each other in the hallway. His heart sank, heavy, all the way to the ocean floor.
Customers asked for flowy sundresses in colors he knew they didn’t have, shoes they’d sold out of last month. Owen escaped to the back room. Pretended to look for them and texted Angela instead. On his break, he tuned out a conversation about the premiere of a reality TV show and smiled to himself as he made plans with her for the rest of the weekend.
When he left the store, he was surprised to see a message from Lucie. A picture of her and Max, smiling with wedding flowers blurred in the background.
Actually having a lot of fun tonight. I miss you. Can we talk soon?
The wedding was almost over by the time Owen got back to Westview. From the road, it looked like they were all in a snow globe of gold, a little capsule of lights with nothing but velvet sky around them.
There were a few couples still slow dancing, shoes off, music drifting up to the spring stars. The antiques Lucie had spent months collecting were the centerpieces of every table.
She was wearing a pale pink bridesmaid dress and sitting with Max. They both waved when they saw Owen approaching.
“We saved you some cake,” said Lucie, handing him a plate of cake with tiny flowers trailing across the icing. “I’m glad you came. Let’s talk.”
He crossed the grass with Lucie to a cluster of haybales that overlooked the apple orchard, surrounded by lanterns made of blown glass.
“Vanessa told me that she asked me to make her earrings for today because of you,” Lucie said. “I just wanted to say I’m sorry. For everything.”
“It’s okay.”
“It’s not. I feel terrible for making you feel like you couldn’t tell me.” Lucie sighed, looking out at the shadowy apple trees. “I wasted so much time judging Vanessa for her choices. When she decided she wanted to go to Walcott and became friends with all those people from legacy families, it felt like we weren’t good enough for her anymore. Like she was trying to be someone she wasn’t. That was all I could see. I thought she was going to spend the rest of her life trying to keep up with everyone in this town and I hated that.”
Lucie was quiet for a moment, watching moths flutter around the lanterns, wings painted copper in the firelight.
“We finally talked about everything a few days ago. She told me she did get a little wrapped up in it all and didn’t realize she’d made me feel like she was pushing me out of her life,” she continued. “But I never realized how hard she worked to get into Walcott and to accomplish everything she has since then. She has an amazing career and she’s happy. And I really like Dominic now that I’ve gotten to know him better.”
“I’m glad,” Owen said. “And I’m sorry, too. I shouldn’t have lied to you. I just didn’t want you to feel like I was doing the same thing and I didn’t know how to tell you.”
“You should be proud of yourself for getting in. I’m really sorry it didn’t work out.” She put her arm around him, rested her head on his shoulder and Owen breathed a sigh of relief that they were finally okay again. “They don’t deserve you.”
“It’s okay. At least we’ll be at Enfield together.”
“Max told me.” She sat back, smiling. “Is it selfish of me to be happy about that? We’re going to have fun.”
“I know, I’m excited,” Owen said. He took a bite of the cake he was still holding. “This is really good. It might actually be the best cake I’ve ever had.”
Lucie laughed. “Did you expect anything less than the best bakery in Cherwell?”
“Of course not.”
“No more secrets, okay?”
“Promise.” Broken as soon as he said it. He watched the long, slow flicker of the flames inside speckled glass because he knew he couldn’t look at her.
She grabbed his hand and stood up. “Come on, let’s dance with Max.”
They danced until the only music left was the sound of crickets. Fireflies sparked in the distance. This was supposed to be one of those nights he wanted to slow down and keep forever, the blur of the lights as he laughed with his best friends and drew shapes in the sky with sparklers, the taste of springtime breathing all over tulip and lavender fields. The freedom of school starting to wind down, summer on its way.
He hated having a secret that was only half his to tell.
Later, he drove through New England backwoods with Angela. Into sleeping small towns like theirs, houses with American flags fluttering from their porches and empty rocking chairs pendulating gently in the breeze. They stopped for ice cream at a roadside stand that was just about to close and afterward, they stayed in the car until their breath fogged up all the glass. Her lips tasted like caramel. Hands soft. Skin warm and heartbeats fast, and Owen felt like he was lying to her, too.
***
Owen and Angela spent all the latest and earliest hours together now, at Gracie’s or driving around aimlessly, lighting up the reservoir with their headlights while the rest of the town slept. They’d go home as the sky paled to steal a little bit of sleep, shuffle into class with tired eyes, but all those moments were worth it, he thought. Something to keep for each time she looked away from him at school, pretending he didn’t exist until they could sneak off campus during lunch and then this town was only them again, if only for a few minutes.
Owen always waited until his family was asleep to leave, but tonight, he realized too late that the kitchen light was still on and Haley was sitting at the table, studying for a test. She looked up, startled when she heard his footsteps on the stairs.
“Where are you going?” she asked, eyes flitting to the car keys in his hand. She sounded nervous, almost suspicious, and he realized what this probably looked like. All those nights he’d snuck out of the house and couldn’t remember how he’d gotten back here when he woke up.
“I have to finish a project with Declan,” he lied, feeling guilty. But he couldn’t tell her about Angela. As much as he still hated lying about this, the tiniest part of him liked having something that was only theirs. Something no one else could ruin with whispers and questions and lies.
Haley studied his face and Owen hated himself for everything she must have heard back then when she should have been sleeping. She was barely old enough to remember their father, being forced out of dreamland by the sound of shouting or drunken stumbling, the sounds that made Owen afraid of the dark as a child. But she’d known what was happening every time Owen came home the same way and made everything around him seem fragile.
He wished he could take that all back.
“Good luck,” she said after a moment and Owen wondered if she really believed him or if it was just easier to pretend, the way he always had.
He met Angela at Gracie’s and she drove them away from Westview, narrow roads and wide skies blending into empty darkness. Followed welcome signs into neighboring towns that all blurred together.
She was happy tonight, talking about a new photography gallery she wanted to visit in Cherwell and the dresses she’d found at a thrift shop earlier that she was going to redesign. Owen tried to pay attention but he couldn’t stop thinking about that nervous expression on Haley’s face, the guilt gnawing inside of him. All this time, she’d seemed so happy. He’d never stopped to consider that maybe she wasn’t always okay either, that she could be pretending, too.
“You seem distracted,” Angela observed as Owen stared out the window. If he hadn’t known Westview by heart, he would have thought they were still there because all the roads and houses looked exactly the same. The only thing missing was the reservoir, which was supposed to belong to one of these towns instead of theirs. He sometimes imagined all the different stories that could have unfolded if Westview was whole.
Owen tested all the words in his head before he said them out loud. Tasted them. Their weight, the way they’d sound in this quiet car with nowhere to escape. He felt like he was running out of air, running out of ways to hide. Hands shaking.
“I need to tell you something,” he said.
He’d almost told her so many times, the truth burning at his lips. It always took him a long time to trust people, to show them all the worst parts of himself and believe that they’d never use it to hurt him. Once he’d been a glass storm, until he taught himself to hold all those pieces close, guarded. It seemed like that was less dangerous, but it turned out it just hurt in different ways.
She’d never asked, though. Never pushed him into talking about it when the conversation veered too close, like she was waiting for him to feel safe. She must have known, too, that there were some things you couldn’t say in daylight, easier confessed on late-night roads beneath violet midnights and small–town starscapes. That when you gave someone those fragments, the secrets and fears that ached all the way to your bones, there was no going back.
“Okay,” said Angela.
They were stopped at a red light now, just past the center of town. Her gaze flickered over to him and she put her turn signal on without saying anything else. When the light changed, she pulled into the empty parking lot of a store that looked like it had been closed for years. Turned off the car. There was a diner across the street and for a moment, Owen watched the sleepy movements of its little universe. A woman out front on her phone, cigarette smoke hazy under neon light. Inside, a group of teenagers just like them.
Owen took a deep breath. His mouth was dry.
“My dad died when I was eight,” he said. “I’m sure you’ve heard all the rumors about what happened.”
He remembered the pictures in the newspaper, a stranger’s narration of his family’s nightmare folded on the kitchen table. On TVs all over town but over time the story got distorted because people loved to speculate, rewrite the facts with their own theories and details. And so parts of it got less true, while others got closer to filling in the blanks than they’d ever know.
“I’ve heard stories,” Angela admitted. She reached over and held his hand. He looked down at the delicate silver rings she always wore.
“He hit a tree on our street on his way home after he’d been out drinking one night,” Owen continued. His voice sounded so matter-of-fact but that night was still seared into his dreams. The whole world blazing with blue and red when it was supposed to be dark out. Sirens and screaming. That place he never let himself look every time he drove past.
“I’m sorry,” Angela said quietly and he looked at her now. Shadows soaking her face, eyes full of sadness.
“A few years ago, everything caught up to me and it felt like too much. I’d go out drinking with people from work all the time, make bad decisions. I didn’t bother trying to do well in school. I didn’t think about what I was doing. I just wanted to escape.”
He stared ahead again, into the diner. All those people inside probably knew versions of each other’s secrets, the stories of whatever little town they were sitting in right now. Unaware of the strangers outside in a car who knew absolutely nothing about any of them, trying to be more than the things their own place and pasts had written for them.
“My mom tried to get me to stop,” he said.
She’d always give him coffee in the morning when he stumbled downstairs with his head and stomach aching, tried to reason with him until it turned into shouting and slammed doors followed by hours of silence that echoed just as loudly.
“One day when we were arguing, she just looked at me and said she was afraid of me turning into him.”
The words he’d known everyone in town was saying about him, what they thought every time they looked at him. He’d never forget the way her voice sounded when she said it. Like she’d given up.
Her words hurt but they’d scared him, too. It was enough to make him realize how badly he’d messed up. How much worse everything could have gotten. That day, he’d made a promise to himself that he’d be as close to perfect as possible for her.
“That was the only time we’ve really talked about it in years. We don’t talk about him anymore. We don’t talk about anything that happened but I can’t stop thinking about it and I feel like I have to act like everything’s okay all the time now so that she doesn’t worry about me,” Owen said.
He couldn’t look at Angela now. “I don’t remember a lot of good things about him. I don’t know what Haley remembers. But she definitely remembers me being that way. She caught me leaving tonight and she had this look on her face like she was afraid it was going to start happening again.”
He felt like he was clawing for the next words, the thoughts he’d had over and over, so many nights screaming in his head, feeling so sick and alone his body couldn’t remember how to move or see anything but tides of jade black. Making him beg to forces and gods he didn’t believe in until he was almost praying to himself, pleading to the air for help.
“Every time things in my life feel like they’re getting better, I get so scared that part of me is going to come back somehow,” he said quietly. He felt Angela’s hand grip his fingers more tightly.
“It’s not.”
The way she said it was like a promise. Like something she could make true. He wished she could.
“I don’t want other people to be afraid of that, too.”
“Do you think you should try talking to them?”
He shook his head. Didn’t say anything. He didn’t want to think about it, everything he felt right now loud and amplified among all the bad memories in their house.
“That’s not the only part of you,” Angela added. There was something protective in her voice he’d never heard before. “You’re so much more than the bad things that happened to you or mistakes you’ve made.”
Owen willed himself to believe that. For right now to be all that mattered, almost alone in the middle of nowhere, faith in nothing but the sound of her voice and the warmth of her hand on his. Almost all of his secrets sheltered inside this car as they drove away later with the darkness and woods and stars tucked safely outside the windows, reservoir water calling them home.
The inside of his body felt scraped up, like they’d been removing tiny shards of glass. Angela kept their hands together while she drove. He was starting to feel like he could breathe again. A little lighter now that he’d said those things out loud.
But there were still the parts he couldn’t tell her. Couldn’t tell anyone. That day he was six and it was hot outside and he was building a city in his sandbox, thirsty.
He remembered walking into the kitchen to find water. The way the sunlight flowed in through the open window, framed by old curtains, painting angles of glowing gold across his mother’s face.
His father, standing by the sink, wrapped in the stale scent of beer. Shattered at his feet, a plate, white with red flowers painted precisely around the edges. Stressed syllables leaving his lips with strings of spit.
And then, a movement that seemed to occur in slow motion, suspended seconds. His father’s fingers curled into a fist, arching through stripes of light and graceful dust to collide with his mother’s skin. The mark it left, red.
She stumbled back toward the counter, knocking over a bottle of wine. It covered the floor with pools and frantic lines of scarlet, sharp edges of glass glinting in the sunlight.
He wanted to run to her but he was frozen, skin still against the doorframe. And when his body finally remembered how to move, he ran away instead. Outside through the heat to collapse in the sandbox, crushing his carefully constructed city with shaking limbs. Shards of sand stung his eyes. He could taste its grit at his lips. The shouting was outside now, too, bleeding through the windows. Loud in the blazing sunlight like the sound could touch the sky.
And after that day, so many times until that winter night where siren light painted the snow like stained glass in a cathedral, he’d hidden away while it happened again. He couldn’t ever move, tired eyes scared wide open in the dark. No one to ask for help when he saw her at her mirror in the mornings, blotting on makeup in stale sunlight to cover all the bruises. And now, he still didn’t know how to live with himself for doing nothing, staying scared and silent, letting her get hurt. So he just kept running and running, all of it always so close behind, always chasing him in his dreams, down streetlight-less Westview roads drenched in black.