The two signs attached to the purple canopy that covers the craft table full of crystals for sale makes life seem incredibly simple: Let the spirits help guide your way. The other: Have questions? The cards have answers. Life, though, as I’m well versed, is never that simple.
The Watermelon Festival is bustling with people, young and old, and Main Street is lined for as far as the eye can see with fair vendors. A gaggle of children are gathered on their tiptoes at the we - bring - the - birthday - party - to - you business that’s set up next to Glory’s booth. The whish of air being pumped into a balloon and then the associated screech of it being twisted into the shape of an animal is like music coming from the Pied Piper.
My friend Camila Sanchez is in the center of the mob. With her sleek, recently dyed platinum-blond shoulder-length hair and ambitious personality, Camila is surrounded by a plethora of children. She manhandles balloons while simultaneously explaining the pricing of the parties for her parents’ business. Due to the smile stretching across her lips, no one would know she hates children, balloons and balloon animals.
When a little girl complains that her dog’s legs are uneven and not long enough, Camila’s smile widens, but it’s not sweet. “It’s a short dog.”
I snort, and she glances around. Camila spots me then gives a conspiratorial wink. It’s 5:45, and her parents are letting her off at six. Mr. and Mrs. Sanchez are awesome parents, and if they said six, they mean six. They’re the parental unit of my dreams.
“I thought you said you were meeting Camila.”
I jump at the sound of Dad’s voice and spin in his direction. “I am.”
Dad studies me, and I hide my hands behind my back to conceal the slight quiver that could announce my guilt. When I left him, he was in good spirits, but his moods can quickly shift. There are two patched-up holes in my bedroom that can testify to this. Dad replaced the drywall, covered it with fresh paint, but the perfection can’t take away the memory of the way my heart pounded through my chest as he drove his fist through the wall.
He inclines his head toward the booth of balloon animals. “Camila appears to be working.”
“She’s getting off soon,” I say too fast as I bite back the need to ask why he didn’t go home like he said he was.
“Why did you leave us if she’s still working? You said Camila would be done by five-thirty.”
My mouth dries out, and the tremble in my hands travels to the rest of my body, but I force out a cleansing breath. Show no fear. Don’t give him any reason to doubt a thing I say. “She was supposed to be off by now, but her parents asked her to work a few more minutes.”
“If Camila isn’t getting off until later, you should have told me.” There’s a subtle sharpness to his tone that causes hurricane warnings in my brain. “I was showing you a great deal of trust by letting you find Camila on your own.”
“She’s only running a few minutes late. Her parents are watching me so I’m okay.”
Out of the corner of my eye, I glance over and my heart lifts when I notice Camila’s mom watching us. Her stare gives credibility to every falsehood rolling off my tongue. She’s not watching because she thinks I need a babysitter, but probably because she’s mentioned to Camila that she’s perplexed by my father’s strict rules.
I touch the crystals on the table as if I’m interested in them. It’s difficult to act normal as Dad looks at Camila’s mom then studies me. Please believe me, please believe me. Please.
I’m so stupid. I should have never left Dad early. I should have never lied. But I did. Dad was having fun at the fair, Mom was having fun and my sister, Isabelle, was having fun. They were all laughing and smiling. They’ve forgiven him, and I haven’t. I can’t, not again, and this is one of the many ways life is no longer simple.
I want to peek at him in an attempt to understand my fate, but I don’t. Eye contact doesn’t help when he’s angry. It only makes it worse.
Being in public won’t soothe his temper. He’ll just be more discreet. Like last year when Dad had arrived early to pick me up at a football game and saw me heading to the bathroom by myself. After I had returned to my friends, he called me away with a smile on his face. He had placed a seemingly loving arm around my shoulder, but his fingers dug into my arm as he severely whispered in my ear how I was irresponsible and that it was time to go home.
Dad didn’t cause a scene at the game. The yelling started the moment we were alone in his car and continued until he left me in my room. I stayed on my bed for hours, curled up in a ball and sobbing.
My throat swells as I think of how this will play out. Will it be like Christmas? Will he throw a lamp and force Mom to clean it up as I watch? Or will it be like this past spring and he’ll flip the kitchen table, breaking all the dishes that had been placed there for dinner?
Dad steps closer to me, and I’m filled with dread. “Next time, in a situation like this, you return to me and have Camila text you when she’s done working. I don’t like the idea of you being alone.”
All I want is to be alone, for my thoughts and actions to belong only to me. But he’s not angry, he’s believing me, and I release the breath I had unknowingly held and take the small win. “Okay.”
“I worry about you,” he says with such sincerity that I feel guilty for causing him anxiety.
“I know.” I keep my eyes locked on the crystals on the table, terrified if I meet his gaze, he’ll change his mind and flip out.
“I only worry because I care.”
“I know,” I say again.
“I miss you talking to me. I miss us being close.”
Me, too, but I stay silent because I don’t trust either of us to continue this conversation—for his mood not to change and for me not to cry.
There’s a beat of awkward silence, and I wish he would leave. I take a risk and peek at him. Dad’s staring past the tent and into the hole his mind goes to when he thinks of his sister.
Dad and I are opposites. In mood, demeanor and appearance. Where he has light brown hair and brown eyes, I resemble Mom with my black hair, blue eyes and some long lost generation of Mediterranean olive complexion. There are many times when I’m thankful I favor Mom. When I look in the mirror, I’m glad I don’t have to be reminded of my father.
“Your mom and Isabelle are feeding ducks at the pond.” Dad blinks as he returns to the real world then grins at me as if the gesture can wash away the past few minutes. “Do you remember when you were Isabelle’s age and you fell in the pond feeding the ducks and I jumped in to save you? Do you remember, to make you laugh, I put duck feathers in my hair?”
I do remember. I had ruined my favorite outfit, I was cold, I was wet and I was crying because I had gone under the murky water and couldn’t swim. But my father had rescued me, had hugged me, had given me his jacket to make me warm and then made me laugh.
Standing beside me now, Dad has this expression like he’s considering good-naturedly bumping his shoulder into mine, just like he did when life was easier. I step away from him, not a ton, just a fraction. Enough to let him know I’m not ready.
Necklaces dangle from an iron holder, and I run my fingers along the different colored stones tied to the leather cords. The black stone beckons me. It’s cool to the touch, smooth and makes me feel safe.
“Would you like one?” Dad asks. “I’ll buy the necklace for you.”
I’ve gone out of my way to avoid situations like this—where Dad has the ability to buy or do something for me. After what’s happened between us, accepting anything from him makes me feel like he’s purchasing tiny portions of my soul that I wasn’t even aware were for sale.
“It’s obsidian.” Glory Gardner approaches us from the other side of the table. Locks of her curly, long dirty-blond hair fall from the jeweled barrette near the base of her neck. Her gray eyes meet mine. No, not meet—lock with mine and her stare causes an itch near my bones. “Obsidian shields us from psychic, physical and emotional attacks. It’s a very powerful stone.”
I swallow because the way she said it is like she knows what I’m hiding, and Dad must feel the same way. He shifts beside me and rubs the back of his neck. Dad doesn’t ask if I want the necklace again. He’s probably scared I’ll say yes.
A customer asks Glory a question, and she wanders to the other side of the booth. Dad stares at the ground before meeting my eyes again. “Scarlett, I know you’re upset with me.”
My eyes to snap to his, and my heart stalls.
“I know you’re disappointed, but I don’t feel comfortable with you applying to the University of Kentucky and being so far from home.”
Yesterday, Dad informed me he’s sending me to the private college in town. Dad and Mom agreed it was perfect. I could live at home and continue my education. My choice of study was up to me, but my choices there are limited.
I want to become a speech therapist—to help children like how my speech therapist helped me. I haven’t stuttered at school in years, my articulation is fantastic, and I can’t remember the last time anyone teased me over how I spoke. My experience with speech therapy was life altering. I want to save someone like my therapist saved me.
The closest this college has to my chosen field of study is one class in public speaking.
“Do you see those girls over there?” Dad motions toward the group in a tight-knit circle. “Each of them are going to graduate from college with huge student loan debt. They would give their right arm to have what I’m offering you. I’m paying for all of your college education. We don’t even have to fill out a single scholarship application form or fill out the FAFSA. In return, all your mom and I ask for is that you stick close to home. Just for four more years.”
My dad is controlling, and I hate it. But I also understand. His older sister disappeared when she was a freshman in college. He loved her, very much, and one day she went to a party and then no one ever saw her again. My father says that not knowing what happened to her is like having a terrible slashing pain in his muscles he can never reach, even if he digs into his skin with his own fingers.
I know that must be awful, but what he’s doing to me—it’s smothering. What happened to his sister gnaws away at him like a flesh-eating parasite. But living with my father, with how his emotions can spiral in a blink of an eye . . . I place a hand on my abdomen as my stomach churns.
Behind Dad, several booths away, Mom has Isabelle by the hand. With her eyes, Mom begs me to not create problems for her, Isabelle or me. I can almost hear her in my head. Please play along and allow us the good day. It’s been so long, and we deserve it.
There’s fear in Mom’s eyes, a fear that plays a constant game of hide-and-seek in my psyche. So rooted in me that it’s now part of my DNA.
“Please tell me you understand our decision,” Dad pushes. “I don’t like you upset.”
Mom tilts her head in an additional plea, and I hate that somehow my entire family’s happiness depends on me. “I understand.” I don’t, and I’m not sure I ever will.
Dad’s smile is good-natured, and I should feel like I was just rewarded, but I don’t. I don’t want to live like this for another five years. I don’t want to live like this for another day, but I don’t know how to escape. “Mom’s waiting for you.”
“Promise you’ll stay near Mrs. Sanchez until Camila is off and then text me when you get to her house,” Dad says, which means he’ll be watching me from a distance until Camila is by my side. “I want to know you reached her house safely.”
“I will.”
“Don’t stay out late. There are too many people on the road late at night who drink. I want you at her house by eight, and you should be home by ten.”
“Okay,” I say, and I’m willing him to end this lingering goodbye.
“I might call her parents to check on you.”
I’m aware.
Dad acts like he has something else he to say, but instead shoves his hands in his front pockets. Maybe he’s thinking of how I used to voluntarily hug him when we’d say goodbye. Maybe he’s thinking how I used laugh and joke with him before I would hit him up for money. Maybe he’s thinking of the few times I used to ask him to explore the festival with me. Maybe he’s not, but I am, and that makes the ache in my chest turn into a piercing sting.
“Be safe,” Dad says.
“I will.”
“I love you.” His declaration sends a shock wave of hurt through my body because loving him back is torture. I inhale deeply, as the only way to survive is to never feel.
He finally leaves, and the breath I release is so audible that Glory raises an eyebrow from down the table. I ignore her because I can’t deal with anyone else.
“Would you like me to read your palm?” Glory asks as she walks toward me.
Unlike most of the girls in my senior class, I’ve never had my palm read by Glory Gardner. There’s a part of me that’s curious if the “spirits” and “cards” in question can possibly have more insight into my life than I do. If this, in theory, other realm can wade through the meddled mess of emotions that causes me to be unclear on very clear questions: Is it possible to love someone who hurts you? Is it possible for the person who hurts you to love you? When the person in question asks for forgiveness, is forgiveness possible?
Then there’s the most important question: Does he mean it this time?
Each time I think it’s impossible for my heart to hurt any more than it already does, it finds another painfully imaginative way to twist.
Glory’s forehead furrows, and her eyes slide around my body as if she sees something I don’t. “Yes, you need your cards read.”
“Sorry,” I say. “No money.”
I have money, but that’s to grab a bite to eat later, and even if I did have extra, I wouldn’t waste it on something as frivolous as someone who thinks they can hear dead people.
She does another sweep of me with her gaze and purses her lips. “You definitely need your cards read. I’m assuming you remember where I live?”
Um . . . “Yes.” Jesse used to take me to her house when we were kids, and it’s awkward she remembers.
“Come to my place tonight at nine. I’ll read your cards for free. Your aura is indicating you’re ready for a change.”
That wasn’t intuitive. We live in a small town. Desiring change is a way of life. But I have never heard of Glory doing anything for free and this suddenly seems dangerous. Dangerous as in a person in an unmarked white van asking if you want to pet the puppy.
“Hey.” Camila bounces up beside me. “What are we talking about?”
Mental whiplash. “I thought you were working.”
“I was, but now I’m not.”
“We were discussing how Miss Copeland is going to stop by my home at nine this evening to receive a free reading,” Glory says.
“I’m sorry.” Camila raises her hand to cup her ear. “Did you say free?”
“And for you as well as long as you bring Miss Copeland with you.”
“Oh, we are so there,” Camila says, and before I can intervene to explain that I don’t think this is an amazing idea, Glory is called away by two women in mom jeans.
“How did you convince her to do a free reading?” Camila asks, but I don’t bother answering because she has started talking about their family trip to visit her mother’s family in Mexico over fall break, and she’s terrified she’ll be tragically injured by a shark bite.
I raise an eyebrow at her in a boo-hoo. I’ll take shark bites, exotic beaches and her grandmother’s mouthwatering cooking any day over my family. In fact, I’d willingly give a kidney if her family adopted me.
“Have you heard from Evangeline?” Camila asks, and the hint of sadness in her voice is unlike her. Camila and Evangeline have been best friends since kindergarten, but they argue constantly. Unfortunately, this summer, they’re fighting over a boy.
I’ve been part of group texts where Evangeline described her trip with her family to China, and I can tell by the way Camila holds herself she hasn’t heard a thing.
“She’s asked about you.” It’s not a lie. Evangeline misses Camila, too.
Camila takes my hand, and we start toward the food trucks. She tells me how we’re meeting some guys from school, and if she notices me cringing, she ignores it. Dating isn’t on my radar and neither is her two thousandth attempt to fix me up. She specifically mentions Stewart Mitchell and Bryan Langston, and I wonder which one she wants to date.
As we walk away, I look to the right and find my father staring at me from a distance. Goose pimples rise over my flesh and I quickly glance away, over my shoulder, and find Glory watching me as well. A good portion of me wonders if accepting Glory’s offer is a good idea, but telling Camila no would cause greater issues. Though, I do have to admit, when it comes to Glory, I am curious.