I leave the motel at three a.m., when I’m sober and Dom is asleep, making sure that by the time he wakes up I’ll be long gone. I’m back in Pennsylvania before the sun rises, and that’s the least amount of distance I need from him after last night.
I manage to pack up my things, drive my rental to the airport, and board a plane to Washington without further fucking up my life, and I think that’s something to be proud of.
Back in Seattle, I vow not to think about Dominic Perry until our next ash-spreading excursion. Unfortunately, there’s a picture of us on my phone that my fingers insist upon opening multiple times a day.
Maybe Josh is haunting my hands, and he’s bored, and he’s decided to torture me. Like right now, two days after the funeral and beach disaster, I could be on an animal shelter website contemplating how many abandoned cats I need to adopt to fill the hole my brother left in my heart. Instead, I’m lying on the floor of my apartment, staring at the awkward photo of Dom and me in Delaware.
My smile is terrible. All toothy and strained and fake. More of a grimace than anything.
Dom isn’t even trying to fake it. He’s not even looking at the camera. No, the man is staring at me, probably wondering why I’m going through the trouble of getting a picture taken.
I should delete it. I don’t need it.
When we’re done, I tell myself. When all the trips are over, I’ll scroll through the pictures, then I’ll get rid of them. Another way to say goodbye.
A pounding on my condo’s front door interrupts my melancholy musings.
I ignore the familiar knocking pattern and swipe my phone off. Then I stare at the ceiling of my condo and try to remember how old Florence is.
My grandmother and mother are both terrified of aging and regularly lie about the years they were born. Still, I know Cecilia was twenty-two when she had me, and I think Florence once mentioned being pregnant when she was twenty while she was lamenting my inability to find a boyfriend in high school.
Florence is forty-two years older than me.
If I live as long as she does, that means I’ll have to live forty-two years without Josh.
Probably more.
I know these aren’t healthy thoughts to be having. They certainly aren’t comforting. But my brain continues to cycle through different ways to define the time stretching out in front of me without my brother.
Forty-two years.
Unless my life ends early. Like his did.
The knock repeats itself, this time followed by a demanding shout.
“Maddie, let me in!”
I roll over onto my stomach, smashing my face into the plush carpet, wondering if I just need gravity to force the tears out of my ducts. There’s a part of me that wonders if my grief is worse because I can’t physically expel it from my body with heart-wrenching sobs and flooded eyes.
Even after the Motel Mistake, as I’ve dubbed it in my brain, I still haven’t cried.
Sure, I curled up in a miserable ball on the bottom of the slightly sandy bathtub and begged Josh to reach a hand through the veil and drag me into the afterlife with him.
But I didn’t cry.
I did come up with creative new ways to curse my brother for insisting I spend more time around his best friend when drinking was involved. Turns out drunk Maddie easily forgives and forgets how Dom dropped me like a hot potato.
“Maddie!” The muffled voice holds a scolding note. “Don’t even try to pretend you’re not home. I can smell your cinnamon candle through the door!”
With a groan, I push myself up to my knees and contemplate crossing the distance to the entrance of my condo. I wouldn’t need to travel far. My place is small, and normally I consider the compact condo cozy. I’ve filled my living space with a cushy green couch, a massive coffee table, and lots of meditation pillows. Not that I meditate. Spending too much time in my own mind seems like a bad idea, especially lately. The pillows are for extra comfort when sitting on the floor.
No, it isn’t the square footage that keeps my limbs from moving forward.
I’m just not sure I’m ready to face the other side of that door. Not sure I’m ready to let them in.
There’s an audible huff and another hard tap of knuckles. “I’m not above using my spare key! You better not make me go all the way back to my place to get it just because you’re in reclusive sloth mode.”
He won’t go away.
With a grunt, I heave myself to my feet and maneuver around the butcher block island that designates where both my kitchen and entryway start. There’s no point in glancing through the peephole. I know who’s on the other side.
When I swing the door wide, I come face-to-face with my ex-boyfriend—and current best friend—Jeremy Hassan.
Jeremy is the most handsome man I have ever encountered in my life. And I am including every single picture of every single celebrity in that designation. Jeremy is hotter. It’s an undeniable fact. He is tall, golden-skinned, with heavy-lidded dark eyes that gaze into your soul like you’re his salvation. It was unfathomable to me that this deity come to earth would want to go out with me.
And I’m not saying that I think I am a horrendous troll destined to live alone under a bridge. Most days—now that I live a country away from Cecilia and Florence’s nitpicking—I like my face. Sometimes my hair does what I want it to. And I look adorable in a sweater.
Which is good because the majority of the items in my closet are sweaters.
Still, I am not on Jeremy’s level.
But we did it. Two years ago we went out. Then we kept going out. For months. I took pictures as proof, just to make sure.
But the most mind-blowing part of the situation? The moment I realized I wasn’t into him that way.
How does that work?
Jeremy is so hot, I used to apply sunscreen before hanging out with him. If I could get sunburn from a person, it would be him. And worse than that? He has a great personality. Funny, smart, and kind.
Truly, it’s not fair a man like him exists in the world.
But we were sitting on my couch one day, and I looked over at his face of perfection, and I thought, All I wanna do with this man is continue watching our marathon of Charmed and never sleep with him again.
We had slept together, multiple times, and it was…fine.
It had to be my fault that it was only fine. Jeremy is too gorgeous and giving for sex to only be fine. There are people who are so good-looking that they don’t try in bed. But Jeremy made sure I orgasmed before he did. Every time.
But those orgasms were simply…fine. A pleasant clenching rather than a full body wave of pleasure.
Still, I didn’t end things. Because I loved Jeremy even if I wasn’t in love with him, and I was terrified a breakup meant he’d walk out of my life. He mentioned being in a relationship before me, but other than saying his ex was a guy, he never spoke about him. Jeremy had cut the man out of his life entirely, and I was sure he would do the same to me if I admitted my feelings were platonic rather than romantic.
The idea of being honest with him started to give me asthma attacks when I thought about it too deeply.
Then one day Jeremy showed up at my door with my favorite lavender latte and a croissant.
“We haven’t had sex in a month,” he said.
I’d gaped at him.
“And I have a crush on the guy who moved into Unit 2F.” His smile was apologetic while his eyes were wide and hopeful. “Will you hate me if I ask to be your best friend instead of your boyfriend? And by ask, I mean insist, because I don’t want to give you up, Maddie Sanderson.”
It was the sweetest friend proposal I’d ever received. And for the first time in months, I felt like I could breathe.
“I can’t believe you broke up with me before I broke up with you.” I’d worn an exaggerated pout while pretending I would’ve had the courage to end things. Then I assembled a charcuterie board of my favorite snacks for us while he told me about 2F—and I tried not to be nervous about a new person in his life potentially pushing me out of it. But Jeremy claimed he knew we were soulmates the day we met, when he strolled into our building lobby and heard me shout “Not my cheeses!” when the strap on one of my grocery bags snapped. My utter devotion to dairy products thoroughly charmed him and gained his immediate respect.
Sometimes, it turns out, soulmates are meant to be friends.
Now I can’t escape him. Which is a problem because Jeremy is too kind to handle the rage that simmers under the suffocating weight of my grief.
Jeremy Hassan befriended a quiet, playful introvert.
Not this toxic, defensive version of myself seeping from a wound in my soul that refuses to heal.
But maybe I can manage banter. Something like what I threw at Dom, but without all the sharp edges. Then I can convince Jeremy I’m fine, and he’ll go back downstairs, and I can lie on the floor and contemplate mortality for a few more weeks.
Jeremy’s eyes soften when they find mine. “Maddie,” he sighs.
“You’re here for Brie, right?” I hear the panic in my voice. This reaction is not his normal show-up-to-my-place-and-scrounge-for-food smirk.
“No.” Jeremy spreads a long pair of arms. “I’m wearing my baggiest sweatshirt and Carlisle’s cologne. I’m here to hug you, Maddie Sanderson.”
I’m not a hugger. Can’t remember a time that I was. I prefer the unemotional touch of a doctor during my yearly check-up to a spur-of-the-moment embrace from a friend. I know it’s strange. It’s not that I’m repulsed by the touch of someone else. I hugged Mrs. Perry because I knew that she liked hugs and uses them to say hello. I hugged Adam to shield him from his brother’s wrath.
But they don’t comfort me. I have no instinctual urge to press my body against another’s. And when I’m prompted to, the act feels like…an act.
The exception: sweatshirts.
There’s something about the soft material that I love having pressed against my cheek as I’m enfolded in sweatshirt-covered arms.
But again, it’s not about the person in the sweatshirt. It’s the piece of clothing itself that I find comforting.
I’m a sweatshirt slut.
A hoodie whore.
And Jeremy knows it. Knows that this isn’t him giving me a hug. It’s his deliciously smelling piece of loungewear. Maybe I can only truly be comforted by the idea of an animated blanket.
“Come on. I smell really good.” He coaxes, arms wide as he steps into my home and kicks the door shut behind him.
Cautiously, I shuffle into his hold and allow myself to be engulfed.
And damn, Carlisle knows how to pick a cologne. I bury my head against the soft material over Jeremy’s chest, suck in a deep breath, and imagine a heated comforter transformed itself into my personal hugging machine.
“We would’ve come. You know that, right?” Jeremy murmurs the words against my hair, breaking the illusion.
Guilt condenses in my gut as I sigh and step back. He doesn’t fight me, letting his arms drop to his sides.
“You didn’t need to.” I don’t know what I would’ve done if Jeremy and my other best friend, Tula, had shown up and tried to coddle me. Maybe I would have broken and finally shed some tears. Or maybe I would have watched their faces crease in concerned confusion as I hid and snarked and never cried.
At the time, I didn’t understand what Josh’s death was doing to me.
I still don’t.
And I’m not doing any of the things normal grieving sisters are supposed to do. In fact, the only times I’ve felt relief, brief as it was, were the moments I berated Dom.
Hell, it felt so good to tear into that immovable man. To spew my inappropriate humor all over him and only receive his stoic responses in return.
I could never treat Jeremy and Tula like punching bags. They’ve done zero to deserve that, and I’m terrified my messed-up grief will drive them away.
“I know I didn’t need to,” Jeremy says, reaching out to gently tug a strand of hair that’s fallen out of my messy bun. “But I would have come. For you. So you didn’t have to be alone. Especially at the funeral.”
“There were plenty of people there…Wait. How did you…” I trail off as my face flushes with mortification.
The day after Josh passed away, I texted Jeremy and Tula with the news and told them I’d be gone for a few days. But I didn’t tell them about the funeral. If I had, I knew they both would’ve come.
“I looked up your mom’s blog,” he says, grimace twisting his handsome face. “I wanted to make sure she wasn’t dragging you into her influencer bullshit.”
As I walk into my kitchen area, I can feel his frown like a press against my shoulder blades. “I kept my distance. And I didn’t stay at the funeral long. Just went to say hi to some old friends.” Adam and Carter pop into my mind, and I smile at thoughts of the twins. I found them on Instagram, DMed them both for their phone numbers, and now we have a group chat set up. Adam is the most active one on it, mainly sending GIFs and random videos updating us on his life.
“What did you do after the funeral?”
I fumble with a jar of jam, almost dropping the glass container, but manage to catch it at the last second. “Nothing much. Went to a bar. Toasted Josh. Spent the night in my hotel room.”
No need to mention who was at the bar with me and how I ended up at a random hotel after repeating past mistakes.
Jeremy settles on my couch. “You look gorgeous, by the way.”
I’m makeup-less with my hair in a messy bun, wearing my normal at-home uniform of leggings and an engulfing fisherman sweater that I pretend Chris Evans gave me from his personal closet. Not red-carpet ready or even done up for a night out on the town.
But Jeremy knows how much I love my sweaters. He would never disparage them. This is his attempt at making me feel better.
“I’m only baking the Brie. Not giving you all my cheese,” I warn him instead of responding to the compliment. What do I say anyway?
Grief combined with embarrassment does wonders for my pores, apparently.
“Baked Brie is all anyone needs in the world.” Jeremy leans over my coffee table, studying my latest puzzle in progress. He picks up a random piece and tries to notch it into place, failing.
“That should go there,” he mutters.
I pinch my lips together to keep my smile at bay. Jeremy is wonderful at running marathons, singing karaoke, and managing the media relations of the largest university in the city. But he’s horrible at puzzles.
And being in a romantic relationship with me. But I was bad at being in one with him, too, so fair is fair.
Having him as one of my best friends is better, especially since falling for the sexy dentist in 2F hasn’t stopped him from wandering up to my apartment to demand the elaborate charcuterie boards Carlisle refuses to make for him. I can always be counted on to have an array of cheese.
I set a baking sheet on the counter and line it with parchment paper.
“Full wheel or half?” I ask.
“Full. Tula should be here soon.”
My hand pauses on the fridge handle.
Tula comes by almost as often as Jeremy, despite living a few blocks away. But the fact that Jeremy knows she’s coming is a hint. A reason to be worried. They don’t plan visits. They just show up.
As if summoned by her name, there’s a quick knock on my door before it swings wide.
“I brought margaritas.” Tula strolls into my kitchen, plops down a massive travel thermos on my counter, then pulls out limes and salt from her bag. Her dark hair and tan skin are damp from the light rain I spy out the window. Even though she lives in a city with almost constant precipitation, Tula barely ever bothers with an umbrella, claiming they slow her down. I’ve only seen her use one on our bookstore outings, and that’s more about protecting the precious pages than staying dry herself.
Tula moves around my condo with the ease of familiarity, unearthing the margarita glasses she gifted me on my birthday—mainly so they’d be on hand when she comes over for an impromptu happy hour, where she pays me with citrusy alcohol to listen to her rant about the men at her company that think they’re better engineers than her while they screw shit up that she has to fix. I enjoy gossip and drama that has nothing to do with me, so I happily sip my drink and share in her outrage.
When all the fixings are on the table, my friend halts and stares at me, claiming my eyes with hers as they soften with love and sadness. “How are you doing?”
This is the moment. The one where I should break down in sobs, crumpling inward on the gaping pit in my chest. My two best friends are here, ready to support me.
Instead, I feel something like anger.
Not at them. I’m grateful for them. They’re here for me, and that means more than I could ever express.
But the slow, low simmer of fury still heats my skin until the soft cotton of my sweater itches like cheap wool. Reining in my unexplained temper, I turn away from her probing stare.
“I’m baking Brie, and you brought drinks, so I’m better than ten minutes ago.” Searching the plethora of dairy options in my refrigerator is a good excuse to not meet her eyes.
“How was the funeral?” Tula ventures.
“Look,” I snap, then breathe and calm my voice. “I didn’t want you all coming because it wasn’t his funeral. Not really.” Instead of slamming the cheese on the counter, I take special care to place the Brie down gently. “It was a room full of my mom’s followers and people I didn’t know.”
Except for the Perrys.
Except for Dom.
Don’t think about him.
Don’t think about his judgmental eyes.
Don’t think about the taut skin of his hips disappearing under the waistband of pineapple underwear.
Don’t think about how he growled out a pirate impression that was so serious you had to taste the sour candy on his stern mouth.
Don’t think about how he pushed you away. Again.
Maybe I should’ve invited Jeremy and Tula. They never would have let me make such a fool of myself.
“That’s exactly why we should’ve been there.” Tula takes the jar of fig jam from me after listening to me mutter a string of curses while trying to open it. She pops the lid with one turn. “You would’ve known us. And we could have held your hand, and gotten you drinks, and mocked strangers with you.”
And guarded the janitor’s closet so Dom never found me floundering in toilet paper.
Maybe it would’ve been nice to have them there.
“It was on the other side of the country.” I shrug and focus on situating the Brie in the exact center of the baking sheet.
“We would’ve gone to the other side of the world for you,” Jeremy says.
See? This is a perfect time to cry.
But my tear ducts are dry.
They deserve a better friend than me. Someone who fully appreciates the level of love they have to offer.
“Fine,” I mutter. “I’ll let you know about the next funeral.”
Tula huffs. “Just don’t shut us out. We’re here for you.”
“And not just because of your snacks,” Jeremy adds. “Though that is why I first fell in love with you.”
“What’s that?” Tula points to the coffee table, and the only corner where puzzle pieces don’t lay claim.
“My laptop?”
“Yes, obviously it’s your laptop. But what’s that open on it? And it better not be what I think it is.”
“I don’t know what you think it is.” The heat of the oven brushes my cheeks as I open the door and slide the tray in.
“Maddie.” Tula tries to catch my eye. “Please don’t tell me you have your work email open during your bereavement leave.”
I can’t tell her that. Because I do.
“I’m not actively working.” My voice sounds surly with defensiveness as I straighten. “Just running some reports. And making myself available in case any fires pop up. It’s not like I’m doing anything else with my time off.”
“You are grieving.” Tula grasps my shoulders, all but forcing me to meet her gaze. “That is something. A huge thing. You need to close your email and really take some time off for yourself. Redford can survive without you.”
That might be true at most jobs, but mine, not so much. Over the years, I’ve become an integral part of the makeup of The Redford Team, an accounting firm that serves clients nationwide and needs their only logistics associate on call most working days. My boss has a general idea of what I do and how I achieve it, but she’s distanced herself from the particulars. Without me, systems would start crumbling within a week. Maybe sooner.
If I tell Tula that, she’ll start badgering me about work-life balance.
The thing is, I like how imperative I am to the company. How they rely on me and how all my coworkers know I can be trusted to keep the ship floating.
“Yeah, well, maybe if grieving came with clearly laid out tasks that definitively took up time, I’d take work off. But I’m just reading and putting puzzles together and falling in love with Nam Do San. Plenty of time to get some work done.”
“Oh! You’re watching Start-Up?” Jeremy shares my K-Drama obsession. “I’m with you. Do San is dreamy. I would do very bad things to him if I could.”
“Good. Yes. Binge emotional TV. Do puzzles. Schedule an appointment with a therapist,” Tula says. “But don’t pretend like nothing in your life has changed. If you stuff everything down, you’ll explode. You can’t ignore this.”
“I’m not ignoring it. Josh made that impossible.” When I press the buttons on my oven timer, I shove them a touch too hard, and the display beeps a warning at me.
Don’t get mad at your friends, I scold myself. They care about you.
I didn’t expect to have to fight my temper so much. A few times this past year I contemplated a world post-Josh and figured it would involve a lot of public crying.
But I’m not even doing that privately.
“What do you mean?” Tula gives me space by leaning back on the island, but she continues to study me. “What did Josh make impossible?”
“Did he leave you something?” Jeremy abandons the puzzle and gives me his entire focus. “Like the letter he left your mom?”
Guess she did share that with her followers. I wonder if they saw the real correspondence or if Cecilia made up whatever her son supposedly wrote to her.
I suck in a deep breath, let it out slow. “Josh wants me to spread his ashes. In eight different states. The ones he never visited.”
And that’s where I stop. With half of the truth. Because I’m a bad friend.
I’ve shared almost every part of myself with these two. They know about my shitty parents and neglectful grandmother. They know Josh was the one who showed me how families should love each other. They know one time a boy broke my heart, so I decided to start somewhere new. Tula was the internet friend I met freshman year of college in an online fandom group for a fantasy romance series. She’s the one who waxed poetic about her university in Washington. She’s the reason I ran here when I ran away.
But I’ve never spoken Dominic Perry’s name to either of them.
And I don’t plan to start now.
I can’t do it. Can’t pick apart the weird, unending relationship that leaves me vulnerable time and time again. Can’t admit to them that I’m still gutted by a boy who hurt me when I was nineteen. I don’t need them to tell me he shouldn’t still affect me this way. I already know that. And I refuse to give Dom any more power over me. As far as I’m concerned, I’m the one making these trips, and he’s only tagging along.
And as far as Jeremy and Tula are concerned, I’d rather let them think I’m spreading the ashes on my own.
“Shit,” Jeremy mutters. “That’s a lot of places. How do you feel about it?”
I shrug. “Not sure. Having something to do, something for him, I think I like that part. But it’s a lot. A bunch of goodbyes. And that first one was hard enough.”
Tula frowns in concern. “People can make requests in their will, but you’re not legally bound to follow through.”
“I know that. But…it’s Josh.”
It’s my brother. It’s the last thing he asked me to do.
The last piece I have of him.
Well, pieces. I’ve got the seven remaining Rubbermaid containers tucked in the high cabinet I don’t normally use because I need a step stool to reach it. I was briefly terrified that TSA would confiscate him, but they let me through no problem.
“If you want company, I can come. We can come.” Jeremy tilts his head toward Tula, and she nods without hesitation.
They are better friends than I deserve. I should tell them about Dom, but I can’t find the words in me. I don’t trust myself to talk about him.
And I don’t trust myself not to drive away these two people I love more than anyone in the world now that Josh is gone.
“Thank you,” I say. “Really. Thank you. But I think I have to do this on my own.” Looking for a way to hide my lie with a change of subject, I point to the fourth glass Tula set out. “Is Carlisle coming?”
“No,” she says, unscrewing her thermos to pour our drinks. She hands each of us a glass, then clinks hers against the rim of the remaining one. “A drink for Josh. He will be missed.”
I remember the last time my brother came to visit me. Josh and Jeremy teamed up, convincing us to go barhopping and end the night at a karaoke spot. We sang and laughed, tipsy on life and friendship.
The next morning, when it was just the two of us, Josh told me about his diagnosis.
I think that night was the last time I was happy.
“To Josh.” Jeremy holds up his margarita. “The best drunken duet partner a man could ask for.” He tries to keep his voice light, but I can hear the tightening of his vocal cords.
They knew my brother. Cared about him. They probably even cried for him when they got my text.
And I didn’t invite them to his funeral because I couldn’t handle my current life colliding with my past one. I press the guilt away, vowing to never let the toxic mess in my chest spill out onto either of them.
“To Josh.” I hold up my drink and try not to think about the last toast I gave for him and who I was toasting with. “And to a few more trips with him.” He’s not gone yet. Trying to lighten the somber mood, I attempt a smirk at my friends. “I’ll bring you back some souvenirs.”