Page 11 of Every Beautiful Mile

Also, I have to know—apparently?

Ethan

I was so annoyed by my dad’s request I almost hoped my email was as far as this was going to go.

Clearly, he picked up on said annoyance.

I blow out a breath and hit reply.

Mr. Mills,

Thank you so much for this. I’m not exactly sure what to ask. My area of expertise is the bar, and my reaching out to you is regarding the restaurant portion of our business. We currently order from distributors for most of our food—do you do the same by finding ones that are Maine-based, or do you go smaller than that and find local-to-you farmers and go from there?

No rush to respond—we won’t be making changes until our slow season anyway, which is summer.

Thanks,

Penelope

I reread, making sure I’ve asked questions that will help whatever it is my dad is trying to do, then add,

P.S. If you don’t understand my use of the word apparently, then I’d say it’s pretty apparent you aren’t in business with your dad. That’s an experience that really expands your vocabulary.

Three

I yawn into my hand as the coffee drips slowly into the pot, my body humming with the foreign sensation of excitement.

Between the ugly words Finn said to me and the beautiful ones we shared in our stories, something shifted in me ever so slightly. Like a weight had lifted just enough to remind me how it feels to not constantly carry something so heavy.

After Marin and Finn went to bed, I forced myself to open Travis’ closet. The first time since he left. I did laundry the day of his crash, hung everything up where it belonged, then closed the doors and never looked in there again. As far as I was concerned, it was a sealed tomb not to be disturbed for all eternity.

It was, like everything else in my life, an echo of what used to be. His salty, citrusy smell didn’t linger, his voice didn’t whisper from the rustling of his shirts, and his familiar arms didn’t reach out to hug me. It was just a closet of stuff.

I easily bagged most of them up to donate, but when I got to his t-shirts, I couldn’t let them go. They were just so him.

“How else will I remember this place?” he would ask with a grin.

Whether we were on a big vacation or just down the street at a restaurant, if there was a t-shirt for sale, he was buying it. After almost two decades of the habit, he had nearly achieved hoarder status with his ridiculous collection.

I went through all of them and smiled as I remembered each story. One from a hotdog stand just a few miles outside of town. Dinghy’s Dongs, it said in big loopy letters, making me laugh out loud. Like a teenage boy, he bought it because he thought it was insanely funny. I closed my eyes when I held it, and I could see his face and hear his voice so intensely from the day we went there for lunch.

“Would you like a dong today, Nel?” he had asked with a wolfish smile as he leaned against the counter at the window.

Every shirt pushed a button to start a slideshow of memories in my brain, taking me back to the scene like it was unfolding in real-time. I spent hours last night lost in the faded cotton artifacts that made up our whole history. I spent as much time crying as I did laughing.

I take a sip of my coffee and cringe. For seventeen years, Travis made my coffee every day, and somehow, after over a year of having to make it myself, it’s still never a guarantee I’ll get it right.

Honestly—it’s mostly wrong.

I look around the living room. The house—far from modern—is a little bungalow built in the 80s we slowly remodeled. The walls are painted in jewel tone colors of blues and greens, dotted with paintings by local artists. The floor is tiled, but most of it’s covered with natural fibered rugs and oversized tropical houseplants shoved in every corner.

Even in my year of misery, I managed to keep them alive.

The lime green velvet sofa in the middle of the room is now covered with stacks of Travis’ t-shirts I laid out to look like a department store display. Somehow, despite the chaos of all the colors and ridiculous graphics, they look like they belong.

An alarm goes off from one of the bedrooms followed by the sounds of drawers sliding open and closed. In minutes, Finn and Marin will see what I’ve done. I go to the mirror in the hall to give myself one last look.

“God, you look awful,” I mutter to my reflection.

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