Page 137 of Every Beautiful Mile

I google Bangor, Maine, shifting my phone to my other ear. “Yeah, that does sound fun. All right, well, email all those over to me, and I’ll text you anything else. Thanks, Nadine.”

I hang up, looking at the map on my screen. It’s just over a hundred miles from Bangor to Bethel. I could add a couple days onto the trip and go see Ethan and… What? Say hi? Dry hump his leg? Give an awkward speech declaring my love?

I rub my forehead.

Me: Hey, can you extend my trip to Bangor for the whole week?

Nadine: Sure thing, Boss. Anything else?

Me: That’s it. Thanks!

And just like that, once again, I’m going to Maine.

***

I’ll never understand why Miami sells winter clothes, but they do. This is why, the week before my trip to Maine in mid-January, I drag my mom and Marin with me to the city to go shopping.

“Penelope, show some skin. You look like a nun.”

Eyes narrowed, my mom pinches at the sweater I’m wearing like it’s a piece of rotten produce.

“It’s twenty-three degrees in Maine, Mom. Showing skin will kill me,” I argue.

She scoffs and turns up her nose. “Well, you won’t win him over looking like that, that’s all I’m going to say. I mean, a turtleneck?” she huffs. “It’s blasphemous to a woman’s body!”

With this declaration, her arms are in the air.

“Mom,” Marin interjects. “How about we get a nice coat, and then whatever you wear under it can be less… nun-ish.”

Ever the mediator, my Marin.

My mom eyes me over the lingerie she’s holding. I don’t even want to know if she’s looking at that for her or me.

“So, what’s the plan? Are you just going to go in there, guns blazing, with some cleavage and jump on the bar licking your lips or what?” she asks.

I roll my eyes. “What kind of plan is that, Mom? No, I’m just going to walk in and say hi. And then I’ll see what happens. There’s a very good chance he’s dating someone. Hell, I might walk in and find him making out with another woman at the bar.” My stomach twists at the visual.

“Why don’t you just call him and find out?” she asks.

Like I haven’t thought about that every single day since I flew from there.

“And say what? Hey Ethan, I can’t stop thinking about you even though I ran away from you, and you still live in Maine?” I shake my head. “No, I’ll chicken out. I just need to go see for myself and then figure it out. Maybe I’ll see him, and he won’t be as attractive as he was six months ago. Like maybe I was in such a different headspace that it will all be… uglier. Like desperation made me do it.”

Lie.

My mom and Marin exchange a look as they send me back into the dressing room, arms full of everything that isn’t a turtleneck.

***

I’m on my second day of freaking out, but there’s no backing out. I’m going to do this scary thing even if I piss my pants in the process. I cycle through a million different ways how walking into Ethan’s restaurant unannounced might backfire on me. Him being married is the absolute worst-case scenario, I decide, but him kissing a woman at a dark, quiet table rivals it.

What if he’s not even there? Do I drive to his house? God knows what I might find there.

No.

I’ll show up, he’s going to be casually working as he always is, and I’m simply going to say hello, and I shouldn’t have left the way I did.

I can do that.

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