Chasing Spring(67)

I closed the book and rested my hand against the front cover, trying to process everything at once. The value of the journal was in the details. Her messy handwriting had illuminated something for me that I’d never thought I’d understand: my mother loved me the only way she’d known how. She'd loved me fiercely and now I had tangible proof of it.

In the end, that's all that I could ask for. Her love was different from other mothers’ love, but that's the thing about life. We have grand visions of our lives because we assume we are the center of the universe while in reality, the universe doesn’t even realize we’re there.

New mothers are made every day, most with tears of joy in their eyes. I think my mother's were tears of sadness, not because she didn't want me, but because she knew she couldn’t be the type of mother that a daughter needs.

She'd done the best she could, and as I let her gardening book fall onto my chest with a soft thump, I felt wholeheartedly content in a way I hadn’t since the day she’d left.

I took a deep breath, a breath that cleansed my spirit, and then I reached for my computer to pull up a map.





Chapter Sixty-Six


Chase





I’d just settled into bed with Harvey at my feet when I heard a tap on my window. It was quiet, hardly there at all, but a second later, there was another tap, and then a third.

I pushed up out of bed and padded toward the window. I pulled the blinds up to find Lilah standing in the flowerbed in front of my window, armed and ready to throw more pebbles.

When she saw me, she loosened her fist and dropped the unused rocks.

“What are you doing?” I asked, pushing the window up a few inches.

“Let’s go,” she said, waving me out of my house. No explanation, no please.

I turned to look at the clock on my bedside table: 11:45 PM.

“It’s late.”

She made a show of rolling her eyes and then propped her hands up on her hips.

“Chase. C’mon! We have fifteen minutes until my birthday starts.”

“Hold on,” I relented, scanning over her. She was wearing jean shorts and a tank top. Wherever we were going, it wasn’t fancy.

“Psst. Bring Harvey too!” she called after I’d turned away from the window.

Harvey was already scratching at the door.

Five minutes later, I crept out my front door with Harvey at my heels. My dad was a heavy sleeper, but our door’s hinges were ancient and I swore as I swung it closed it could have woken the dead. I froze for a few seconds, listening to see if I’d woken him up. Nothing.

I was in the clear.

I turned to find Lilah behind the wheel of her dad’s truck, waiting for me to join her. She looked the same. Same cropped black hair. Same f*ck-all attitude. Same green eyes that reminded me of every important moment of my life.

“Did I make it in time?” I asked, opening the door so Harvey could hop in.

“Nine minutes,” she said, tapping the dashboard clock.

“Nine minutes left of seventeen-year-old hell,” I said, sliding in beside her.

“Nine minutes left of being stuck in this small town.”

She started the car and pulled away from the curb.

“Nine minutes left until you can buy cigarettes,” I offered.

“Nine minutes left until I can buy all the cigarettes I can carry and light them on fire,” she responded.

I laughed.

“Are you going to tell me where we’re going?”

She scrunched her nose. “No. That’s not fun.”

I shrugged and stared out the window. The street lamps did a poor job of lighting our path, but Lilah seemed to know where she was going.

Harvey curled up into a ball between us as we started our drive away from Blackwater. An hour passed, then two. I wanted to ask where she was driving, but I never did.

“Thanks for giving me time,” she said a few hours into our drive.

We’d gone a month without speaking and then out of blue, she’d arrived outside my window, no apologies, no explanation.

Sometimes life is too short for explanations.

“Did your read the book?” I asked.

She gripped the steering wheel with both hands and nodded. “Every page.”

“And?”

“And here I am.”

Her hand dropped from the steering wheel to Harvey. Her palm was an open invitation, and I reached out to take it. Just like that, I knew she was mine for good. There was no going back now.

“A part of me thought you’d never be ready to come back.”

She nodded, scanning out over the road. “I worried about that too.”

We drove for miles, slipping between small towns without much notice. We stopped for gas and food around 2:00 AM. She grabbed two coffees and I grabbed an armful of candy and chips—road trip supplements. The gas station attendant eyed us with curiosity when we dropped our loot on the counter, but he withheld his questions. Did we look like two teenagers running from a small town? Was that what we were doing?

When we got back to the car, I pulled out a Hostess cupcake and stuck a half-eaten Twizzler into the center of it like a candle.

“Happy birthday, Lilah,” I said, holding it out for her.

She smiled and then squeezed her eyes closed to make a wish.