Page 9 of My Almost Ex

My mom is still fast asleep when I slip out of our room at the inn. This time I left her a note and told her I’d have my cell phone on me. For the past two months, I’ve tried to keep up running since it clears my head and allows all the pressure of remembering anything to disappear.

Thankfully, Mandi isn’t at the reservation desk. I’m pretty sure the guy who is there knows who I am though, due to his furrowed brow when I wave and walk out the doors. At least in Idaho, I didn’t always feel like everyone knew more about me than I did. Was I nice to the guy or were we childhood enemies? Who knows?

I put in my earbuds, scroll through my running app, and turn on my music. I’m in this whole grunge music phase. My mom says she doesn’t remember what kind of music I listened to, but she doesn’t think it was this dark. I’d like to ask Adam, because I think he’d know, but he doesn’t seem too willing to share information with me.

I start off on my run, hoping I don’t get lost in the woods and eaten by a bear. I’m not sure how much time passes, but I’m running up a hill, about to cross over a two-lane road to continue on the wooden trail, so I slow to a standing jog and look both ways. There’s a slight hill to the right. I’m about to step on the pavement to cross when a Cadillac whizzing by makes me backstep. All I see is white and blue hair through the windows. I shake my head and jog across the street, hoping to get back into the zone again.

The Cadillac’s wheels screech to a halt, the back fishtailing slightly. I glance over my shoulder, pulling my earbuds from my ears to see if something happened or if I need to sprint for my life because it’s an ax murderer.

“I spilled my coffee!” a woman yells.

The car door opens, and I take my cell phone out of the side of my leggings, prepared to call the police. My thumb hovers over the nine.

My fear relaxes when Ethel, Adam’s grandmother, climbs out of the Cadillac. Not only is it nice to see her, but it’s nice to know who she is as soon as I do.

“It’s all over me!” the other woman yells.

“Relax, I’ll get you another one.” Ethel shakes her head.

“My car or my clothes?”

“Shh, you old bat, my granddaughter’s returned to town.” Ethel opens her arms and crosses the street boldly, as though the oncoming cars will just stop for her. “Lucy!” She hugs me. “Oh, my Lucy. I heard a rumor you were back. Figures the one year I miss the night before tourist day. The struggles of getting old.” She leans in and covers her mouth. “Constipation is a bitch.”

“Good to know,” I say, hugging her back, thankful that I remember her.

“I knew you couldn’t forget me.”

I laugh. “It’s good to see you, Mrs. Greene.”

“I’m hard to forget.” She winds her arm through mine, walking us back to the car. “Come on. Dori and I are headed into town to celebrate tourist day.”

I stop in the middle of the road and slide my arm back out of hers as politely as I can. “I’m not ready for all that commotion just yet.”

“Oh, completely understandable.”

The passenger side door opens, and a blue-haired woman gets out. I feel as though I should know her.

“Lucy,” she says. “How nice to see you.”

“Thank you.” I smile.

“I’m Dori. You know, I have a granddaughter-in-law who’s a doctor. You should go see her. She’s brilliant.”

“She’s a family doctor, Dori, not a head doctor,” Ethel says.

“Don’t knock Stella. She has more of a degree than you have,” Dori says.

These two are something else.

“Sorry, Dori’s in a bad mood,” Ethel says to me.

“I wasn’t in a bad mood until you spilled coffee all over me.” She looks down at her pants that match the blue in her floral shirt. The outfit seems to pull the blue in her hair out more.

“Because I saw Lucy.” Ethel smiles brightly at me. Maybe she’ll explain to me the whole situation between my mom and Adam.

Shit. I look at my phone. It’s eight-thirty. I’ve been running for well over an hour. As though my mom feels my panic, her name flashes on my screen as my phone vibrates.

“I have to go. It was very nice seeing you again,” I say before hugging Ethel and smiling at Dori. I’ve decided I’m not pretending to know someone if I don’t anymore. It’s weird to hug people when we both know I have no clue who they are.

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