Where We Left Off (13 page)

She wasn’t one of the usual talkers, so it surprised me that Sabrina spoke up in again. “Always?”

“No, not always. Of course not. But what I’m trying to say is that you can’t base your happiness on things out of your control.”

“I’m not sure any of it really
is
in our control, sir,” Lucas said. His large shoes planted underneath him as he sat up straight
in
his chair. I noticed the way Sabrina watched him from her seat next to him, how she tracked his movements, and it was something I’d never recognized
between
them, this interest on her part. I wondered if he was at all aware. Probably not—he was a high school-aged boy and being clueless often came with that territory.

“I don’t think much is in our control, except for our choice in choosing happiness,” I answered.

Mark laughed. “You sound like a greeting card.”

“Do I?” I chuckled. “I sure as hell hope not, because I don’t want to give you the wrong impression. Life sucks sometimes, plain and simple. I’m in the
suck
of it right now.”

“Preach it, Teach!” I didn’t know who hollered it out, but I took it and rolled with it.

“You think love and life is hard as a teenager? I hate to break it to you, but it’s not any easier at my age. You don’t suddenly figure it all out. You might think you have, but then someone makes a choice that affects your whole world. They pull out that one wrong Jenga piece and it all crashes.”

It was May. I’d had this particular group of students for nine months now and their attention had never been as rapt as it was in that moment. Eyes wide and perceptive, ears alert, minds focused. Maybe I’d been teaching them the wrong things this entire time because my audience had never been so captive.

“Kayla was your latest Jenga piece,” Tabitha said.

“One of many. But you have to keep playing the game. Keep
restacking
the pieces.”

Lucas shifted toward Sabrina, unintentionally, I figured, but she sensed it. I saw the nerves straining her brow and quickening her breath. “Who pulled out the first piece?”

“My parents. They yanked me from my school when I was a junior—moved me back across the country away from everything I loved.
Everyone
I loved.”

“What was her name?”

They were quicker than I gave them credit. “Love of my life.”

“Aww!” Tabitha cooed.

Lucas looked right at me, ignoring his classmate’s fawning. “Where is she now?”

“I have no idea.”

“You have no idea?” There was a bit of anger in his voice, at the very least, annoyance. “How could you be in love with someone and not know where they ended up?”

I officially scrapped today’s lesson.

“I
was
in love with her. A long time ago. Back when I was your age.”

Mark hissed disapprovingly through his teeth. “I will always know where Vanessa is. Until my dying day.”

“And that, my friends, is what we call a stalker,” Lucas teased with a nudge to Mark’s elbow so that his arm slipped out from him and slammed onto his desktop. His friend shot a glare, but it was playful in nature. They had the sort of relationship where they could get away with being an ass to one another, and I was admittedly jealous of their easy camaraderie. It wasn’t so simple the older you got. There
was
baggage and walls and insecurities that only deepened over the years. Age and time complicated so many things.

“We lost touch.”

Not fully a lie, not entirely the truth.

“You do realize that we live in the era of the Internet, don’t you, Mr. McBride?” I didn’t know why I kept Tabitha in the back of the class when she so eagerly engaged and interacted. She had to raise her volume so I could hear her from the front of the room, but she had no problem doing so with her
cheerleader
lungs. “There’s this really incredible thing called Google.”

“I’ve Googled her.”

“And?” Mark, Sabrina, Lucas and Tabitha all formed one loud, inquisitive voice that caught me off guard.

“And she’s married. I stopped searching after that.” Just in
case
they didn’t catch my drift, I added, “Off-limits.”

“In fairness, McBride, you were married until recently, too,” Mark said. “And now look at you.”

“Thank you for that reminder, Mark. But I can guarantee she is still happily married.” Emotion sneaked up on me, a force unexpected but not unwelcome. There was a hollow feeling in my stomach, this dip-on-a-roller-coaster type of sensation. My seventeen-year-old
self crashed
in. I was sweaty. Nervous. I was flustered, all from thinking of her.

“How are you so sure, sir?”

“Because she isn’t the type of girl you willingly leave.”

Again with the surprises, Sabrina looked up suddenly from her book, the one she’d been fake-reading for the last five minutes. “I don’t consider you to be the type of person someone would leave, either, Mr. McBride.” She closed her book sloppily and it
tumbled
to the floor. Clearly embarrassed by the commotion, Sabrina’s freckled cheeks reddened, and the pigment only deepened when Lucas bent down to retrieve her novel. “Thank you,” she muttered as he placed it into her hands.

“Sure.” He smiled back. He wore the grin even after she’d looked away.

I cleared my throat for the second time this period. “Why are we talking about my teenage love life?”

“Because you are sad and lonely and maybe looking up this chick might make you not so sad and lonely.” Mark flashed a toothy grin. He was all muscle and dark features, cocky and confident. The girls adored him. The guys wanted to be him. And apparently he was also a cheerleader. He broke into the chant, “Google her, Google her,” and the entire class joined in, their voices of encouragement pulsing around me.

“If it will get you all to move forward and focus back on your schoolwork, then yes, I’ll Google her.” I surrendered, but it wasn’t that hard. It was one thing when my mom suggested calling. That was a step I wasn’t about to take, to hear her voice—matured and full—
on
the end of the line. But a simple Internet search—this I could do. I pushed up from my desk and grabbed my reading glasses from my top drawer, then closed it shut as I pulled my book from my messenger bag, readying for some Flannery O’Connor.

“I expect a full report tomorrow,” Mark said, one last request before we started today’s studies.

“Be sure to cite your resources,” Sabrina added.

“Be sure give us all the juicy details,” Tabitha interjected.

Lucas looked me square in the eye. “Be sure to take a deep breath and just remember that whatever you find, the girl you once loved is still in there and chances are, she’s probably thought about you a few times over the years, too.”

I cocked my head, perplexed by his insight, but appreciative all the same. “Deal.”

“Deal,” they all agreed back.

Deal
.

Mallory

I snapped awake.

Breathe, breathe.

Sweat slithered down my back. My heart sprinted.

The space where I lay was damp with perspiration, all clammy and uncomfortable like I’d used the sheets as a towel after a swim, my body’s outline wet and chilled.

I looked to the monitor on my nightstand and the angelic scene of my baby deep in slumber met my eyes. It slowed my breath.
Steady, steady.

I let the relief slide out as I leaned against the headboard.

A year and a half and yet it was like yesterday to me.

It was actually every night, stuck in a dream.

It was a dangerous job, we knew that. He’d been an officer for a year already when I’d first met him, so it wasn’t as though I’d had a say in his profession. Even if I had, though, I would’ve encouraged it all the same. Some people were meant for that line of work. Dylan certainly was.

He was brave beyond belief.

Now it was my turn to be brave.

I grabbed my terrycloth robe from the closet and slipped into it, tightening the belt around my waist before making my way to the kitchen. The fluorescent lights flickered on, stuttering to illuminate.

2:08 a.m.

Coffee. That was in order for this sort of hour. I took the grounds from the freezer and put a pot on, waiting for it to brew. My stomach
growled,
encouraged by the smell, and I tried to remember if I had eaten any dinner. The plate in the sink reminded me of the chicken enchiladas Mrs. Scuttle from church brought over this afternoon. So I had eaten, tonight at least. That was good.

Once the coffee was ready, I poured myself a steaming mugful and took it with me to the den, my fingers curling around the handle, my palm cozied against the warm ceramic. There was one of my favorite vanilla candles on the desk and I lit it with a match. The flame flickered against the dark as the aroma dispersed sweetly into the air.

That tension from being thrust awake seeped slowly from my body, more importantly, my mind. I could do this. I
could
.

Dad did it for years and we were good. When Mom was first diagnosed, I think he knew the inevitable outcome. The way he enjoyed her—enjoyed all our short time as a family—it was as though each moment would be a last.

I wished I’d paid more attention to how he was able to do that. Treasure the lasts.

I slid into the desk chair and tucked my feet up underneath me, the robe blanketing my cold legs with fabric. With the mouse in my hand, I stirred the computer to
life
. It hummed angrily, reminding me of another inevitable expense. The windows on the screen were still open and I clicked through the tabs. I’d done all the math and every way I calculated it, I came up short. I’d give anything to be with Nana and Tommy again, but the way the market was, there was no way I would ever get back what I owed on this house. I’d be stuck here until things eventually leveled off.

Stuck.

Even still, I busied my mind by searching cottages and townhouses back in Kentucky. Ones that shared the same zip code as my family. Ones where Corbin could walk to his great-grandmother’s house after school for fresh baked cookies or for help with his reading homework. Ones where I could send him over for a cup of sugar. Ones where we
felt as
one again, living life together, even if not within the same walls.

But I had two families now.

Tori was here, at least for another month before she left for college. And Sharon and Boone were just fifteen minutes away. I’d never had a sister, and it had been years since I had a mother and father in the mother and father sense that most people had, but I had
them
. I wasn’t willing to let that go, even though I’ve had to let Dylan go.

So I’d stay up late at night and dreamed of an old life back in Kentucky. I’d decorate the rooms in my head. Practiced writing my name and address on an envelope, just to see how it looked. All my current return address labels still had Dylan’s name printed on them. I tried using a Sharpie to black it out once, but something looked off. A little morbid. But I’d ordered a roll of 500. It seemed like such a waste of a perfectly good label.

My eyes blurred. The screen waved in my vision and I sniffed the tears back, using my sleeve as a tissue.

“Pull yourself together, Mallory Quinn,” I instructed. It didn’t work.

I let myself weep into my coffee mug until the tears were gone and there was nothing left besides a few sighs and the shudders that follow a hearty cry.

“Okay.
Now
pull yourself together.” I let myself have second chances when it came to things like this.

Two hours passed quickly, one click leading to another until I was looking at plantations in Georgia where I could own a “small piece of history and huge portion of southern charm.” I had no idea how my search led me to the opposite coast, but it was a distraction and I welcomed it. In this particular house I’d found, Corbin and I would breed and raise French bulldogs and compete in chili cookoffs with the award-winning recipe we’d discover behind a broken board in the pantry. We would call ourselves the
Chili-Bulls
because it was convenient to lump our two titles as one and because that was as creative as I got at four in the morning. Our prize pup, Sir McDoodle, would win the 2025 National Dog Show, allowing Corbin to go to Duke and major in neuroscience with the earnings.

I giggled to myself.

Was that the life I really wanted to lead? I’d never even made homemade chili.

This was crazy. Maybe I was crazy. No
maybe
about it.

But what was really crazy to me was that one move—one decision—could change so much.

I’d told Nana to turn right that day.

Dylan offered to cover his partner’s shift.

So here I was, a twenty-eight-year-old widow and mother.

And I was lonely. God, I was so
lonely
.

I reached for my cell phone and unplugged it from the computer where it had been syncing.

Three rings and she picked up. “Nana?”

“Mal, sweetheart.” Her voice was thinner than it used to be, shakier. Despite the frailty to it, she spoke with a chipper tone and I could tell she’d been up for a while. I was thankful for the three-hour time difference between us on nights like this. “Can’t sleep?”