Stay Sweet(8)

Amelia would normally chastise Cate for any or all of these behaviors, but she doesn’t say a thing about Cate’s driving today. Instead, she rolls down the passenger window for the breeze and watches as the green graduation tassel hanging from Cate’s rearview mirror twists and spins. At the end of August, she won’t be riding in Cate’s truck anymore. Cate will be taking it with her to Truman University. And Amelia will be up at Gibbons, an airplane ride away.

Eventually Cate reaches over and rubs Amelia’s shoulder. “Are you feeling okay? You look pale.”

Amelia flips down the visor. Cate is right. There’s no pink in her cheeks, and even when she pinches them, the flush slips away fast. “I guess I forgot to eat.” Amelia holds out her hands in front of her. They quiver.

“What about your blueberry muffins?”

“I gave them to the police officer to bring back to the station.”

“Pizza Towne might be open.”

“Honestly, I’m more tired than hungry. I should probably go home and rest.”

Cate frowns. “You seriously don’t look good. Let’s get a quick slice.” She pulls a U-turn in the middle of the road. After a silence, she glances over at Amelia and says, “I’m trying to remember the last time I saw Molly Meade. I think it was at the bank.”

Amelia nods. “Same for me. The day you bought the truck.”

It was late last fall. Amelia had gone with Cate to take the truck for a test drive. Cate’s neighbor was the one selling it, and though Cate felt the price was fair and withdrew exactly that amount from her savings account, she still planned to try and talk him down a couple hundred bucks for the rust and the lack of working AC.

They were in the outside lane of the bank drive-thru waiting on Cate’s money, Amelia looking at something on her phone while Cate begged Amelia’s mom through the intercom to send them two lollipops. That was when a pink Cadillac pulled into the drive-thru lane beside them.

Cate elbowed her and Amelia looked up, and together they watched Molly like they’d spotted some kind of rare, beautiful bird. Molly’s hair was curled; she had makeup on, and earrings, and a fashionable, if slightly dated, gabardine wool coat. She looked the way people did when they dressed up for church, except Amelia never saw Molly Meade at church.

Molly handed Amelia’s mom a deposit bag and waited for a receipt. Amelia silently willed her to look toward them, though she wondered if Molly would even have recognized them if she had.

Cate says now, “It seems weird that she got all dolled up just to hit up the bank drive-thru. Maybe Molly had a hot date.”

Amelia rolls her eyes. “Stop.”

“What! She was a good-looking lady! She totally could have shacked up with some handsome widower.”

“She probably had a doctor’s appointment. Or maybe lunch with a friend.” Except, as far as Amelia knew, Molly never had company. Certainly Amelia never saw any cars, besides the mailman and the Marburger Dairy truck, head up her driveway. Amelia remembers her grandmother complaining that the worst part about getting old is outliving all your friends.

Cate pulls into a spot in front of the darkened windows of Pizza Towne. “Do you want to go somewhere else?”

Yawning, Amelia says, “Sure, wherever.” She kicks off her Keds and puts her bare feet up on the glove compartment.

Cate decides on Starbucks, where they each get an egg and cheese sandwich and an iced mocha, and she refuses to let Amelia pay. “See? Don’t you feel better?”

“Yes,” Amelia says. “And sorry if I’m being a downer.”

“You found a dead body today! You’re forgiven.”

Amelia nods, though she knows it’s more than that. “I knew Molly would die eventually, but not this summer. Not our summer.” Cate’s profile blurs as Amelia’s eyes flood with tears.

“Hey!” Cate says, turning toward her. “Amelia, it’s okay. It was Molly’s time. Please don’t cry.”

Except crying is exactly what Amelia does. Even though she knows it’s stupid, because it’s just a summer job, and she didn’t even know Molly Meade, not really. “The walk-in freezer was full of ice cream, Cate. Ice cream she made with love that no one will ever get to eat. And I’m sitting here trying to remember what Home Sweet Home tastes like. I’ve probably eaten that ice cream a million times, nearly every summer of my life.” She rubs her tongue against the roof of her mouth, swallows. “But I can’t remember. It’s . . . gone. And in a few weeks, you and I will leave—”

“Amelia!” Cate says, startled. “Stop it!”

Except Amelia can’t hold back the tears now. Can’t even try to. She keeps talking, pushing as many words out as she can between hysterical gasps. “We’ll leave Sand Lake and go off to college and everything’s going to be different. I know that. But I thought I’d have this summer to get ready. One last summer where it’s you and me, the way it’s always been.”

“Okay, all right,” Cate says, and rubs Amelia’s back. “Let it out.”

Amelia cries some more, quietly. She’s aware that Cate’s a bit uncomfortable by where Amelia has just taken things. Not that they wouldn’t have had this conversation eventually. She’s just unprepared to have it right now. “Sorry.”