Page 5 of Rescued By My Best Friend's Brother

“Oh my God, you puked so much!” Josie grips the steering wheel with both hands as she says this. “Remember how Jasper was so pissed at you because you puked in his car after picking us up?”

I groan and pinch the bridge of my nose at the memory. “Yes! Don’t remind me. I had to help him clean the puke out, which made me even more nauseous. He was so unrelenting sometimes.”

“It’s all love. He was just hard on you because he cared.”

I gawk at her as if she has two heads. “He hated that I was always with you partying it up. He still blames me when ninety-nine percent of the time, it was you who got us in those messes.”

She shrugs. “I don’t know why. He knows all the stories. I don’t hide it from him that I liked to have fun.”

I reach out to lay a hand on her but pause. It feels weird wanting to touch her. I pull my hand back and lay it on my lap. I inhale. “So, what grade is Lily in now? It feels like yesterday that I saw you and Jasper posting pictures of her on social media right after she was born.”

“Kindergarten,” she answers as my jaw drops. “I know, right? She’s gotten big so quickly! I feel like yesterday I was seeing pictures of her sonogram.”

I bring my gaze to the window, suddenly feeling forlorn. “Time really does fly.” It feels like time flew for them while I had been sucked in the endless cycle with Bradley. I hadn’t even realized how everyone else continued to grow and accomplish things as I stayed in one place. The days just continued to pile into weeks, and those weeks became months, then years. Where did it go? How did I miss so much, when it feels like nothing has changed for me?

“We’re here!” Josie says as she grabs a small little bus sign with a number on it. She stops behind a whole line of cars waiting to pick up their kids and hangs it on her rearview mirror so that the teachers can see the sign. “I hate pick up. There are always so many parents, but the school does well to get the kids to the right vehicle in a timely fashion.”

I acknowledge her words, just enough to seem like I am listening, but my eyes are watching the other parents. Growing up, all I wanted was a family, someone to love me. My mother did the best she could after my father left, but then she turned to her addictions, and I was taken from her. That’s when I found Josie. We had been acquaintances before, but once I entered foster care and she saw me eating alone, we grew closer. We became inseparable after that. She was my outlet for fun, and her family gave me a little hope that I could have one of my own someday.

We pull up in front of the school. A traffic guard leads a line of elementary students down the parade of cars. Lily jumps up, giving us a wave. Once near Josie’s car, she hops in, buckling into her booster seat. “We off to the park now?”

Josie looks back at her niece and nods. “Yes! We can get something to eat and maybe even some ice cream. I already told Sheri not to worry about us tonight.”

“Yes! Can we get ice cream first?”

Josie glances at me. I shrug. “Why not?” I ask.

“Yeah. Why not?” Josie repeats.

“Yay!”

We drive to an ice cream parlor that is right down the road from the park. Instead of driving to another location from there, we decide to leave Josie’s car and walk. Once there, Lily runs immediately to the playground, somehow already having completely consumed her ice cream cone. I laugh inwardly. I remember the days when I would inhale an ice cream cone without taking breaths in between bites.

Josie sits down at a nearby picnic table, wiping drops of melted ice cream from her hand. Today is warmer than predicted, probably due to the humidity from lasts night’s storm, but the sun is out and drying any evidence of the rain.

“I was just thinking about this, but when was the last time we saw each other?” Josie asks.

I sit down across from her and think about it. “I mean, we texted here and there just a year ago.” She had texted me to check on me. I told her, like I had told so many others, that I was fine, even though it was a lie. She told me how great her life was, and I really didn’t want to impede on her success. “But I think we saw each other at that one bar on Main Street.”

She shakes her head. “It has been a while, Caty and Jasper separated three or four years ago and I am sure it was before then.”

I nod, “I think it was sometime right before Lily was born. I only knew about it from seeing photo’s online so I know we weren’t talking or seeing each other during that time.” I don’t really remember when the exact last time was, it could have been well before Lily was born. With everything going on in my life at that time, my memories feel hazy, like they aren’t even mine. I had forgotten so much these last few years that it always surprised me when someone reminded me of something I didn’t realize happened.

“So, how is Lily taking the divorce?” I ask, more to change the subject, but I am curious too. I may have been in Josie’s life up until then, but I rarely saw Jasper. I didn’t even go to the wedding. I knew he invited me more out of obligation to his sister. Thankfully, some things had come up that gave me the perfect excuse not to go.

“She’s doing really well, she was around three when it happened so she remembers enough to know she isn’t here but also knows this is her normal. She’s a trooper,” Josie says.

I watch Lily chase another little girl around the playground. They climb one of the ladders, running to the tallest slide. A bright, gigantic smile is plastered on her small face. “She looks like she is doing well. Does she ever see her mom?”

“Um.” She pauses as her eyes darken. I can tell she doesn’t really want to tell me. “Sadly, not really. She calls every now and then, but that’s about it. Jasper says she’s out state, traveling, but I don’t know. I feel like Jasper is keeping things bottled up for Lily and is afraid that if he tells me, then I’ll make him tell Lily, which is untrue, but Jasper can be sort of silly that way.”

“I’ll say,” I add. I’m unsure why he still doesn’t like me, at least to this extent. I never understood exactly what happened. We sort of got along when I was in middle school, and then as we continued through high school, things started to change. He was two years older than us but only a grade ahead of us because of starting school late. There was a reason but I’m not sure what. I had heard the story only once from Josie, I think it had something to do with how his birthday fell but I can’t recall for certain.

“He just—” Her voice trails off. “I got nothing. Once he sets his mind on something, it’s hard to make him budge. He never really liked that guy you were seeing in college. What was his name?”

“Bradley,” I answer as I gulp down the feelings of the last few years.

She snaps her fingers. “Yes! Him. I liked him. You seemed pretty happy. Whatever happened with him?”

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