I Liked My Life(58)

I wait until the movie ends and the TV is off to say, “I guess we should stop pretending this is working.”

“Yeah.” For the amount of emotion in the room I might as well have said, “Pass the Doritos.”

“I know things changed when your mom died, but it doesn’t have to stay different forever,” he says after a minute.

I bite my lip. “I don’t miss it the way you think I do. I’m not, like, sinking into depression. I just have different priorities.”

“I wish I was one of them.”

“Me too.”

In some ways I mean it. There are times when I would return to my old self-absorbed existence if I could. It was easier being clueless. But I don’t think a person can go back like that. Now that I see a bigger picture, how can I possibly hang out and stare at the little one?

John stands to leave and I remember I’m his ride. I’ve always sucked at timing. We drive with the radio loud to cover up the fact that there’s nothing left to say. After getting out of the car, John hangs over the open door. “You know she loved you, right?” It takes me a second to process the pronoun—she not I. I can’t speak without crying so I just sit there, looking straight ahead. “It wasn’t your fault,” he says before shutting the door.

I hold my breath until he turns toward his house, then I bawl. I might not be the reason she jumped, but I wasn’t enough to keep her here. I was an afterthought to her, when she was my everything.

*

The bell dings for the third time of the day, marking the end of the last camp session.

It’s weird to put words to, but I’m grateful the accident happened because it brought me to this place, where five hours a day I focused on other people’s problems instead of my own. I’m probably the first person on the planet who’ll miss mandatory community service.

Robin calls everyone to the parking lot to share a camp highlight. I make my way to Kathleen so we can walk together. “I smell you coming, Eve,” she says.

“If anyone else said that, I’d take it as an insult.” She laughs.

“Okey dokey,” Robin says, once the wheelchairs and children have been maneuvered into a misshapen circle. “Who wants to kick things off?”

Kathleen’s arm shoots in the air as she shouts, “Eve was the best part of camp this year!” A bunch of other kids nod and clap. My heart flutters. Maybe I’ll be a teacher. I can almost picture it—reaching out to kids who are struggling, like Rory has to me. The thought freezes me: It’s the first time I’ve considered a future without my mom in it.

The circle moves clockwise from Kathleen. The other four delinquents pass on sharing to Robin’s visible relief. When it comes back around to me, I pause, thinking of all the things I wish I’d said to my mom when I had the chance. I don’t want to keep living a life where I pass.

“I came here hoping I could be of help,” I say, “but you all ended up helping me.”

“What a perfect reflection to end our two weeks together,” Robin says. “Time for a group hug.”

That first day I would’ve been distracted by the kids’ disabilities and assumed a group hug impossible, but now I link arms with Kathleen, and we fan out to the people on either side, me scooching down to Hanna’s wheelchair, careful not to catch the ventilator tubes, and Kathleen linking arms with a boy using a walking brace.

The energy in the circle is indescribable—there is power in the act of us all leaning on each other. I can feel it.

An impatient parent beeps the horn, ending the moment. I herd the kids where they need to be, amazed that I know every parent by name.

Once the campers are gone, Robin jogs to me in the parking lot with her huge smile and famous clipboard. “Any interest in signing up for next year?”

“Sure thing.” I write my name on the top line of an otherwise blank list.

“You surprised us all, Eve. The first day everyone was skeptical, but a voice in my head told me to stick it out, and you grew into it. Camp Ray needed help and you delivered.”

“I needed Camp Ray too,” I admit for a second time.

She puts her sacred clipboard on the ground and wraps an arm around my shoulder in a half hug. “I had a pretty crappy hand dealt to me too,” she says. “Nothing cures a chip on the shoulder like giving back goodness.”

I’ve wondered all summer if Robin knew my story; I guess that answers my question. We hug right there in the middle of the parking lot.

Brady

I can’t stop thinking about my mother. If she loved Phillip so much, why didn’t they marry? What happened to those kids? Why did she love them as her own when they weren’t? Why couldn’t she love me when I was? Her secrecy compels me to learn more about the story.

I let Eve in on it, forking over the journal entry about her grandmother’s mysterious life. Maddy used to say the key to earning respect is vulnerability. “It’s easier to admire people who put themselves out there,” she explained. I didn’t challenge her at the time, but in the business world you earn respect with killer execution. Now I see that while Maddy’s strategy wouldn’t work in an office setting, mine sure as hell doesn’t work on Eve. So I put myself out there, hoping Eve will take comfort in the idea that my mom had skeletons too.

Her eyes illuminate with intrigue. I’ve been unwittingly living with a CIA agent. I laugh as she dives in, scanning a copy of the journal entry, saying she’ll have “a lead” by the time I get back from my run. And she actually does, sort of. I return, dripping sweat, to a bombardment of questions.