Almost three weeks later, the doorbell rang at the Lucas house.
Alma was still grounded. She’d had two panic attacks since the night at the top of the Fifth Point, but Vera had not been worried by this and Alma wasn’t either.
“Panic attacks are very treatable,” Vera had told her, “but nothing happens overnight.”
“Will they be gone forever though?” Alma had asked. “How can we be sure?”
“You can never be sure of anything,” Vera had said. “All you can do is tell your truth, ask for help, give help, and do the things that make you feel like yourself.”
So that was what Alma had been doing. She ate lunch with her friends every day. She did her homework, most of the time. She left her classes when the bell rang, moving through the halls with the rest of the students.
In spite of being grounded, she had seen more of Four Points than ever before—by day, at least. She had hiked up Second Point Peak with her mother one Saturday morning, and they had lain at the top and watched the clouds go by. On Monday afternoons, she and her father started going to Bean There Donut That for coffee and hot chocolate and conversation that didn’t include brow-furrowing or finger-lacing. She had explored the backyard, picking and drying the wildflowers that were beginning to blossom as April progressed and the warmth that had eluded the town for so long finally settled in.
And now she was opening the door.
“Oh my goodness!” cried Shirin, throwing herself at Alma. “It’s been forever!”
“I saw you at lunch today.” Alma laughed.
“Yeah, but I used to see you like every single night,” Shirin said without releasing Alma. “Thirty minutes while I shove pizza in my face is not nearly enough.”
Shirin stopped hugging Alma then because her sister gave one of her braids a little tug. “Are you going to formally introduce me to the famous Alma or what, Shir?” Farah asked. “And then you have to show me this quintescope you’ve been talking nonstop about.”
Shirin’s whole family had come over. Hugo, his mother, Marcus, and the twins were right behind them, and a little later Dustin, his mother, and his three younger brothers arrived. It was the get-together that Alma had once tried to put off and had now been looking forward to all week.
They had a cookout in the backyard, where the crater was now covered in a layer of new, green grass. Hugo, Farah, and a somewhat awkward-looking James were involved in a very intense science-y conversation that Alma had been unable to decipher. Marcus, Alma’s mother, Shirin’s mother, and Shirin were laughing uproariously about something, about everything, at the picnic table. Alma’s father was cleaning up and explaining real estate law to a serious-faced Dustin, who was following him and nodding along, while Shirin’s father, Hugo’s mother, and Dustin’s mother talked quietly and watched the younger kids climb trees and pick flowers and run in and out of the crater.
Alma moved from group to group, mostly listening, mostly just feeling content and at home, until the sun set.
“It’s getting dark out,” Alma’s mother said, coming up and putting her arm around her. “Are you ready to go?”
“Ready,” Alma replied. “Let’s go to the Fifth Point.”