Page 64 of True Blue

I turn back to Layla, chewing my lip. “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you. It was really new, and we wanted to get more solid before we?—”

Layla pulls me back into a hug. “I know, Axel explained. I’m not mad. To be honest, I’m a little jealous you have two boyfriends.” She chuckles. “Don’t get how my idiot brother fits into things, but I'm happy if you’re happy.” She pulls back, placing her hands on my shoulders and looking me in the eye. “He told me about your mom and Christopher too. I’m so sorry she did that.”

I sniff. “She called me ungrateful. As if I haven’t gone along witheverythingshe’s wanted me to in the last five years. I dated Christopher because she wanted me to!” Layla nods, squeezing my shoulders.

Axel’s hand lands on the small of my back. “Let’s go get in the car and you can fill us in on everything that happened.” I nod, taking his hand as Layla lets go of me and takes my tote bag from me. We walk out together, heading across the street to the pickup lot and get into Axel’s sedan.

As we’re pulling out of the lot, I start telling them about what happened when I got home. Axel’s hand stays on my knee, and I turn in my seat, looking at Layla in the back as I talk. Layla cuts in with disbelieving anger, but Axel just tightens and loosens his hand on my knee, not speaking once through the whole thing.

“And then I left. I just walked out and headed down the street, not really sure where I was going to go until you texted me.” I look at Axel and he glances over at me before looking back at the road.

“What a bitch,” Layla exclaims, arms crossed over her chest as she leans back against the middle seat disgruntled. “To not even listen to you after you said you were seeing someone else and that you didn’t want to be with Christopher. I can’t believe that’s the same Aunt Sandy who used to let us dress up in her clothes and steal cookies from Mom’s baking trays for us before dinner.” She shakes her head, and I look outside the car for the first time.

We’re still at least ten minutes from the Clifford’s house, but already I can recognize the streets around me, even under the dim streetlights. Things have changed, but the old is still there around the new. The road that leads down to my elementary school. The carwash Dad used to take us to every other weekend that had a huge gumball machine. The currently closed ice cream place right next to the park. I stare out the window, seeing it all again after so long. Seeing Dad around me again after so long. Axel’s hand starts to rub my knee and I realize tears have spilled down my cheeks again. Layla leans forward and puts her hand on my shoulder.

“I would see her everywhere too. Especially right after the accident. It was like every place we ever went held her ghost. It still hits me sometimes, remembering Mom’s laugh at Tina’s Diner or how mad she got outside Target that time we jumped into the puddle in our suede boots.” I laugh, swiping away more tears as I remember that trip. Mom had calmed her down, laughing at us and reminding Aunt Tati that they had sprayed them with water resistant stuff for precisely this reason.

“I still remember Uncle Levi the most at Tigerland up the road,” Axel says, voice thick. “He and Dad would take me mini-golfing and we would play laser tag when you guys had your ‘girl's days.’” He smiles, still rubbing my leg.

We turn off the main road, into the residential area that starts my old neighborhood. I grip the door, realizing I'm going to have to come face to face with my old house. In the whole four-hour trip from Georgia to here, I never once thought about what I would feel staying at the Clifford’s and looking across the street to where my old life used to be. I thought about what Mom said, what I wish I had said to her, what I wish I had told her all these years, and what it would be like to see Uncle Jack again. If he would get mad at me for showing up out of the blue after five years of radio silence.

Axel turns down the street that his and my old house are on and the first thing I notice is the missing tree on the corner.

“It’s gone,” I whisper, head turning to look at the clear patch of grass with a stop sign at the corner.

“Yeah, they got rid of it after a big storm while we were in high school. A few branches fell down and blocked the road so after they cleared it up, Mr. Burgen had it removed,” Layla says, looking at the spot with me.

“So, kids just stand in the rain when they wait for the bus now?” That tree had sheltered us countless times from a deluge of water coming down in the early morning while we waited forthe bus. Not to mention the snow. Mom or Aunt Tati usually would drive us if it was bad enough, but there were a few times I remember being huddled under there together, waiting in the cold dawn.

“I don’t think I've ever seen anyone out there when it rains. Parents probably drive them,” Axel says with a shrug.

We slow down, getting close to the house and then I see it. And I freeze. My old home. We turn the corner, Axel heading into the driveway, and I stare at it in the side mirror as he pulls up next to a silver van. The car stops and I keep staring, stuck for a moment as I stare at my past in the mirror.

Axel squeezes my knee. I turn to find him looking at me. “You okay?”

I nod, grabbing the door handle and getting out. Layla already has the trunk popped and I head back to help her carry my stuff in. Looking up at the Clifford’s house, I smile. Nothing has really changed with the façade. It still has copper red siding, black shutters and trim making it look unique from the white and beige houses lining the street. The same bushes and trees dot the front yard and walkway area, covered in a light dusting of snow. Uncle Jack must still spend his weekend mornings outside keeping everything clean and shoveled.

“Come on, Blue,” Axel says, grabbing my hand and pulling me toward the door. He grips my duffel in the other hand and jogs up the steps, not even pausing as he opens the door and walks in. “Dad, we’re back.”

My heart starts to thump in my chest, feeling like it’s attacking my skeleton from the inside. Everything looks exactly the same. We walk in on the top floor, the house being built into a hillside. The open living room expands beyond the door, stairs leading down to the first floor on my left. The same white leather couch and matching loveseat sit in the same pattern around the wall-mounted TV on my right and past that, the sliding glassdoors that lead out onto the dark wood second floor deck. I can see the backyard in the distance, sprawling out to meet the tree line of the wooded area behind the house.

And every inch of wall space is filled. Pictures upon pictures upon pictures crowd frames, some singular, some overlapping with multiple photos scrapbooked inside. My young face stands out in several, smiling at various locations with Layla, Axel, and Gwen all around in different patterns. Dad’s face hits me next, finding him in a lot of the adult group photos as well. Lastly, my eyes snag on all the photos of Mom and Aunt Tati, arms around each other every time as they take their traditional vacation photo in different locations. A lot have beaches in the background. One shows them both pregnant and laughing, a cabin in the woods the backdrop behind them. My eyes fly over the photos, getting caught up in the way I’ve seen all of them a million times, but this feels like the first time I've focused on each of them individually.

Layla walks in behind us, kind of shuffling the two of us forward as she shuts the door and toes off her shoes.

“Janette’s here?” Uncle Jack’s voice comes from downstairs. I hear shuffling and see Gwen jogging up the stairs, a big smile on her face. And then behind her, Uncle Jack appears, looking down at his feet as he races up just as fast.

Axel pulls me to the side, making room for his sister and father as they get to the top. Gwen races forward, snagging me in a tight hug that I return breathlessly. Uncle Jack makes eye contact with me over her shoulder and his eyes start to water behind his thick rimmed glasses.

“Oh, sweetie,” he whispers. “You’ve gotten so beautiful.”

Gwen releases me, stepping aside as Uncle Jack comes forward, pulling me against his chest and shaking as he hugs me. I breathe in his scent, burrowing my face in his shoulder as my own tears start up again as well. He always smelled like coffeeand wintergreen mint, drinking several cups a day and then trying to throw off the scent by chewing gum.

Suddenly, I’m thirteen, hugging him in the hospital as we waited to find out if Mom would be okay in surgery while he grappled with the loss of his wife and best friend and suddenly becoming a single parent to three kids. While he grappled with being the one to walk away unscathed but changed forever all the same.

“I missed you,” I whisper. And then I’m talking too fast. “I’m sorry I couldn’t come to the funerals. I'm sorry I wasn’t here.”

“Shhhhh, it's okay. That wasn't your fault.” He runs his hand over the back of my head, holding me tight. “I’m sorry we couldn’t be there for you.”

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