“Okay,” Grace said. She looked sad and confused and uncertain.
Lexi didn’t know how to mend those emotions without making promises she couldn’t keep. Some endings simply couldn’t be what you dreamed. All she could do was make memories now, say good-bye, and hope for a better future. She’d save her money as fast as she could and come back to claim a life with her daughter.
She kissed Grace one last time and uncoiled herself from her daughter; then she got off the bed and stood there, looking down.
Grace was furiously whispering at her wrist mirror and trying not to cry.
“Don’t cry, Gracie. It’ll be okay,” Lexi said, stroking her hair.
“That’s what she says.”
Lexi actually managed to smile at that. “You’re lucky to have such a good friend, but I’ll make you a deal: if you make friends with someone in your class, really make friends, I’ll send some cupcakes in September for the first-grade party.”
Grace wiped her eyes and looked up at Lexi. “How?”
“How what?”
“How do I make a friend? No one likes me.”
Lexi sat down again. “Well, you can’t keep punching boys and lying. If you want to make friends, you have to do friendly things. Who is the nicest girl in your class?”
“Samantha. But she never talks to me.”
“Okay. Tomorrow, you just go up to Samantha and say something nice to her. And you don’t cheat or lie one time. Tell her you like playing with her.”
“What if I don’t?”
“You will,” Lexi promised. “I had a best friend once, and I could tell her anything. She always made me smile. I never felt alone when she was around.”
She hugged her daughter one last time and forced herself to walk away from the bed, past the copy of Jane Eyre, touching it once more (it didn’t mean anything that he’d kept it; don’t think otherwise). In the hallway, she paused and looked back.
Grace sat huddled in the big bed, looking incredibly sad and small.
“I love you, Gracie.”
“Bye, Mommy.” Grace sniffled.
“Tell your daddy I said … hey.” She closed the door behind her.
She should have run from this house as fast as she could. And she would have, if she hadn’t looked down the hallway to Mia’s room. She moved toward it almost instinctively, opened the door.
The room welcomed her as it always had, drew her in. She went to the dresser, where Mia’s phone lay beside an English lit paper with an A written across the top. A row of plastic Breyer horses lined the windowsill. There were a dozen pictures of Mia—at play rehearsal, at dance class, sitting by the beach with Zach. There were no pictures of her and Mia in the room anymore. Once, though, they’d been everywhere.
“I haven’t let myself come in here in … a while,” Jude said behind her.
Lexi spun around, her face hot. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have—”
Jude reached down for the stuffed puppy on the nightstand, picked it up. Daisy Doggy. “I used to sleep in here. It worried Miles and my therapist after a while, so I closed the door. Erica cleans it, but I don’t come in.”
“I can feel her in here,” Lexi said quietly.
“Can you? You’re lucky then.”
Lexi moved closer. “She loved this room but hated that mirror. She always said it looked like an art project. But she knew how much you liked it.”
Jude sat down on the bed. When she looked up, her eyes were glazed with tears and her mouth was an unsteady line. “Why did you drive that night?”
Lexi was actually grateful for the honesty of the question. “I’ve asked myself that a million times. Zach was hammered, and Mia wasn’t much better. Neither one of them could stand up, really. They didn’t want to call you. It was so late, and they were so drunk.” She paused. “I didn’t want to call you. I wanted you to love me so much … and then Zach got behind the wheel. I couldn’t let him drive.”
“Why did I let you go that night? I knew there would be drinking. And I gave him the keys.”
Lexi moved toward the bed, feeling like a ninety-year-old woman with rickety joints and watery eyes and sat down beside Jude. “It’s my fault, Jude. All mine.”
Jude shook her head slowly. “I wanted to believe that, didn’t I?”
“It’s the truth.”
“I’m trying to be a little more honest these days. I know you love Grace. Do you still love Zach?”
“I’ve tried to stop. I’ll keep trying.”
“You should talk to him.”
“I wouldn’t know what to say.”
“He’ll be back soon,” Jude said quietly. “Talk to him. Tell him how you feel.”
Lexi almost broke at that small kindness. It reminded her of all the conversations she’d had with Jude over the years, all the moments when they’d been like mother and daughter. It was because of Jude that Zach had taken Lexi to the dance, where everything between them had really begun. “They were so lucky to have you, Jude. And they knew it. Mia loved you so much.”
“I miss her voice.”
Lexi slipped off the bed and crawled under it, feeling beneath the slats until she found what she was looking for. Holding it, she crawled back out and sat back on her heels, offering Jude the small pink journal with an orange lily painted on the front.
“Oh my God,” Jude breathed, reaching out. “Her journal.”
Lexi placed it in Jude’s hands and then got to her feet. “I’ll go now. Tell … Zach that I’m going to call Grace once a week and I’ll write even more often.”
Jude stared down at the journal, running her palm over it as if it were a piece of expensive silk. “What? Why?”
“I have something important to do before I leave.” Lexi wasn’t even sure if Jude was listening. “A good-bye I should have said a long time ago. But Jude … love Grace better, okay? She needs you.”
Twenty-seven
Mia’s diary.
It had been here all this time, waiting. Jude ran her fingertips over the mottled brass lock, and then, slowly, she opened the book.
Property of Mia Farraday. Private. Keep out. And yes that means you, Zach Attack.
Dear Diary,
I’m scared. Is it okay to write that down? I know how lame it makes me look. But you won’t care, right, Diary?
No one at high school is gonna talk to me. Mom says h.s. will be better than middle school, but she always says stuff like that. How would she know what it’s like to be me? She was a cheerleader and probably Homecoming Queen. What would she have done if Maribeth Astor called her pizza face?
I wish I hadn’t cried. That just made everything worse.
And now I’ll probably have to sit by MB in class.
Crap.
It used to be easy for me. So, like, what happened? In grade school I had lots of friends. Well, so, okay, maybe they were Zach’s friends, but we all played together and I didn’t know there was something wrong with me. Now I know. Boy do I know.
Madre is calling us for breakfast. The most important meal of the day. Yeah, right.
Loser out.
Dear Diary,
You won’t BELIEVE what happened today. Ok I’m gonna write it all down so I don’t forget anything.
First of all, Mom was wrong about h.s. At least at first. I walked into school with Zach, and even though he was holding my hand, it was like I was invisible. Okay maybe I shouldn’t have worn the pink tutu and high tops, but I’m not like those other girls. They know and I know it. The clothes help keep them away. And so what if they laugh?
Lunch was a horrorfest. I walked into the lunch room and almost puked. No one made eye contact with me. Zach was sitting with all his Barbie and Ken friends and he waved me over. No way I was gonna go there, so I took my book and went outside.
That’s when it happened Diary!
I was sitting on the grass by this scrawny tree, chewing and reading (Wuthering Heights) when this girl just walked up and said can I sit with you.
I told her it was social suicide and she smiled. Smiled. Then she sat down and we started talking and Diary, we have like EVERYTHING in common.
I don’t want to jinx it but I think she wants to be my friend …
How cool is that???
Dear Diary,
Lexi stayed the night at my house last night. We totally fooled Madre and pretended to go to sleep at 11 but then we snuck out and went down to the beach. We sat there for hours, talking, about EVERYTHING. She likes me, and she doesn’t care that no one else does. We are gonna be Harry and Hermione. Friends forever.
Dear Diary,
Lexi made me try out for the school play, Once Upon a Mattress. And I GOT THE PART!
What would I do without her?
Tod Lymer asked Lexi to the dance. She tried to keep it a secret, but high school is such a soap opera. No one can really keep a secret. Besides, Haley wanted me to know. She laughed when she told me and called me a loser who couldn’t get a date.
How does Mom always know when something is wrong? When I got home from school, she took one look at me and just walked over and hugged me. I tried to push her away, but she held on, and I burst into tears. Yes, Diary, that’s how cool I am. When I was done telling her the story, she said I needed to remember that good friends wanted the best for each other, and I should remember that.
I do, Diary. I do want Lexi to be happy. Totally I don’t care at all if she goes to the stupid dance.
Lexi didn’t go to the dance. She said she’d WAY rather stay home with her best friend and watch movies, so that’s what we did. We made popcorn and watched movies. Zach even stayed home with us. He said any dance without us was a total waste of
“Nana?”
Jude looked up and saw her granddaughter standing by the bed. In her pink terrycloth sweats, with her curly blond hair a mass of tangles, she looked exactly like Mia at that age, and it disoriented Jude just a little. For the first time in years, Mia felt close enough to touch. The diary had brought her back to Jude.
Grace burst into tears. “M-my m-mommy left.”
Love Grace better. She needs you.
Jude got out of bed and scooped Grace into her arms. “It’s okay, baby,” she whispered, and then suddenly Jude was crying, too. She clung to Grace, crying against the child’s soft, plump cheek, smelling the sweet baby shampoo scent of her hair, remembering …
“I tole her I wanted to st-stay with Daddy,” Grace said sobbing. “An I do wanna be with Daddy, but … but I want my mommy, too. I shoulda told her that.”
“Oh, Grace.” Jude looked at her granddaughter through a blur of tears. In the soft focus, she saw not only Grace, but Zach and Mia, too. And the Lexi who had been a part of them. They were all in Grace’s face, in her eyes, in the pink bow of her mouth. How had Jude forgotten that?
No, she hadn’t forgotten it. She’d known it all along; she’d looked away from it purposely, afraid that the pain would kill her. But not feeling had taken away her joy, too, left her in that gray haze of numbness.
In a way, they were all together again in this moment, embraced in one another’s arms just as they would have been if Mia were alive.