“What?”
“She’s worried about you.”
“I’m okay,” I whispered. Even I didn’t believe my own words.
“To some extent, I know you are. But mostly you aren’t.” We stopped in front of my classroom. She touched my arm. “When you’re ready to talk, I’m here, okay?”
I nodded and entered the classroom before I could break down in the hallway. I took my usual seat and opened my book, reading the current chapter we were working on furiously, trying to imprint it on my mind, so it would take over the emotions that wanted to spill from my chest.
***
Armed with honey, crackers, and my sketchpad and pencil, I plopped down on the armchair in the living room and turned on the TV with the remote control. I went directly to Netflix and put on some random Gilmore Girls episode. I had seen the entire series while it was airing years ago, but with my messed up mind, it was nice to put on something familiar and not have to focus on it.
I spread a healthy amount of honey on a cracker and popped it in my mouth. Then I tugged my legs under me and lay my sketchpad on my knees. Like I usually did, I simply drew, without paying attention to it.
Sometime later, my phone dinged a few times. I reached for it and gasped. I had been in this same position, drawing my heart out and eating all the crackers and half a bottle of honey for over two hours.
What was wrong with me?
Shaking that off, I read the text message.
Racheclass="underline" When are you coming down to visit us?
Sophie: Yes! We miss you!
Racheclass="underline" It’s my birthday next week. You could come down then.
She inserted a lot of winking emojis at the end of the message.
Me: I don’t know.
It was true. I hadn’t given it much thought. I knew Mama expected me for Thanksgiving, then Christmas, but I wasn’t sure I was ready to go back after spending three months there. I was still trying to get back into my routine here.
Then there was grandma. I wouldn’t leave her along during those important holidays.
My phone dinged some more, but I put it down. My mood was too sour to read through their messages. Instead, I went to the kitchen, grabbed more crackers, and went back to the living room, where Gilmore Girls still played.
The front door opened. I looked over my shoulder and saw grandma coming back from her card game. Every Friday evening, she got together with a group of seniors and played cards. She loved it, and I loved it that she got to go out and be with friends.
As she stepped into the living room, she smiled at me but just for one second.
“Jessica Grace Hayes!” she said, her tone military-like. It reminded me of Papa and I winced. She grabbed the TV remote and turned it off.
I sat up. “Hey!”
She put her hands on her waist. “Don’t tell me you’ve been here in this same position for the last two hours?”
“Well …”
“Why aren’t you out with Kristin? That’s what you used to do every Friday and Saturday.”
I shrugged. “I’m not in the mood.”
She sat down beside me. “Hon, you’ve been home for six weeks. It’s almost October. I thought you would be over this sour mood by now.”
Me too. But the worst part was, I didn’t understand where this sour mood was coming from. I was home, I was still studying architecture, I had broken up with Gavin, I had said goodbye to Papa, I had reconciled with Sophie and Rachel, I had Kristin here, and I had found closure with Ryan. Why then didn’t I feel good? Satisfied? Happy?
“I don’t know what the matter is,” I confessed.
Sighing, she reached over and took my hands in hers. “I think I know.” I watched her expectantly. A sad smile appeared on her sweet face. “You came back, but you’re not home.”
“W-what?”
“Your home is in Lexington.”
“But—”
She raised her hand. “Think about it, hon. Since you came back, you’re all mopey, just going with the flow. It’s like you’re a machine, just going to classes and coming back; working on your projects and sketching and nothing else.” She gestured to my sketchpad. I glanced down at it and did a double take. My breath caught. Grandma went on. “You feel like something is missing, but you don’t know what. You think you have everything, and in some way, you do. You have a house, you have friends, you’re in college, and there’s me too. But it’s not the same anymore.”
The façade of a house filled the paper of my sketchpad, a house I knew too well, having lived sixteen years there. But what really made my breath catch was the people in front of it. Without realizing, I had drawn people. People! I hadn’t drawn people in four years!
Mama, Jason, and I were in front of my childhood home. My brother’s bike was in the driveway with Luna lying beside it.
I returned my gaze to my grandma. “I … I don’t know,” I muttered. A turmoil of emotions swirled in my chest and tears brimmed in my eyes. “Even if I felt like going back, I couldn’t leave you.”
She smiled. “I love having you here with me, hon, but I always knew it wouldn’t be forever. One day, you will leave. It may be when you graduate and go for your master’s degree in two years, or it may be when you fall in love and want to move in with your beau—whenever that happens.” I chuckled at her choice of words. Beau. It had been a long time since I had heard her use southern words. “Don’t worry about me, hon. I’ll be fine. I want you to worry about you, your future. You have to do what’s best for you, whatever that may be.”
She kissed my cheek and stood. She returned the TV remote to me and left the room.
I threw the remote aside and stared at the drawing on my lap. My family and I at our house in Lexington. If I were superstitious, I would think I had drawn this for a reason.
Now I only needed to swallow my pride and admit the reason to myself.
***
Ryan
I finished my six practice laps and brought the bike back to the garage, where John, Ethan, and Luke waited for me. I stopped my bike outside the garage door.
“Ninety-seven seconds,” John said, looking from his stopwatch to me. “We need to shave at least twenty seconds.”
Nodding, I took off my helmet and dragged a hand through my damp hair. “I know, I know.”
I had gone back to practice two weeks ago. I hadn’t realized how much I had missed being at the tracks, how much it was part of me, until I was back at it, speeding my heart out and feeling the wind pressing on my body, with the roar of the engines filling my ears. However, I was still rusty and getting used to my bike. It had taken me a little over two months to fix it to the point it was good for racing again. Even so, I didn’t think it would last much longer. Besides all the fixing, the bike was five years old—an eternity in this sport.
I climbed off my bike. Luke walked by me, patted my shoulder, put on his helmet, and hopped on his bike. It was his turn at the track.
I watched as he peeled away from the garage and went to the starting line. I envied him a little. This was his full-time job. He was here day after day, doing what he loved, and he was good at it. Me? I was here only on weekends since I still had a month before my parole and community service ended.
Alan and his crew still helped at the Habitat for Humanity site, mostly on the weekends, and that was a big help. We had recovered the damaged the storm had caused and now were ahead of schedule. It was actually nice to see them giving their time to such a good cause. Even though I wasn’t sure what I would do with my time once the parole was over, I considered continuing helping out at the site when I had some free time. They needed all the help they could get.
I walked in the garage and stopped dead.
A girl stood beside Ethan. A girl I thought I wouldn’t see again so soon.
“Hi,” Jessica said, her voice low. Her cheeks gained a red tint. It contrasted well with her fair skin, dark blond hair, and bright blue eyes, reminding me of how beautiful she was.