Famous in a Small Town(56)

And on the heels of it, Terrance that day at Teen Zone 2:

I know it wasn’t right. Technically. And I’m sorry. But also I’m not.

“He’s going to leave,” I said. “He told me … I think he’s going to leave soon. I think he thinks it would be better for you guys. If he didn’t live here anymore.”

Kyle blinked. “What?”





forty-four


Kyle put Harper in bed, and I was gathering up my stuff when August came through the kitchen door.

Drunkenness, and its aftermath, had not allowed me to forget You should get a tattoo across your shoulders. And then I can lick it off. It was the first unmerciful thing that popped into my head on seeing him.

“Hey,” August said, and it wasn’t an official declaration of joint remembrance, but it wasn’t not that, either.

And then Kyle’s footsteps approached.

August looked past me. “What’s up?”

“Is it true? Are you planning to leave?” Kyle’s voice was measured, his face neutral.

August’s gaze shot back to me, hurt in his eyes. “You told him?”

“Were you going to say anything?” Kyle said, before I could respond. “Give us a warning? Or were you just gonna skip out?”

Silence. August squeezed his eyes shut briefly and then looked toward the ceiling. “I … I’m really grateful for everything you’ve done for me—”

“This is a weird way to show it.”

I spoke: “I think maybe August—”

“Don’t,” August said. “Just …” He shook his head.

“I think we probably need to talk this one out just the two of us, Soph,” Kyle said evenly, and then pulled his wallet from his back pocket to pay me. “Thanks for watching Harper tonight.”

August turned away when I moved past him to get to the back door. I paused in the doorway, looked back at the two of them—August’s head hung, Kyle with his arms folded—and then I left.



* * *



I couldn’t take back the text messages that Terrance had sent that day in Teen Zone 2, the summer before freshman year.

I’ll come

I’m sorry

I’m only mad cause I miss you so much

I couldn’t tell Ciara that it wasn’t me who had finally answered. And I couldn’t tell her that it wasn’t true, because it was.

By the time I had gotten home that afternoon, thrown my bike down outside, and stomped upstairs, she had sent me another message saying, Please come visit.

And so I replied,

Ok.

Terrance is the reason I saw my sister that summer. We went to the zoo and an art museum. She and Ravi took me out to dinner. We made root beer floats with her roommates, watched our favorite movies. I had the best time. I didn’t know it was the last time.

If I knew—if I had known, and I couldn’t do anything to stop it—I would’ve told her I loved her more. I would’ve told her how I hoped that I could be like her one day, that I could be even half as funny, half as smart, half as kind. I hoped that I would find someone who looked at me the way Ravi looked at her, but even more, I hoped that I would look at someone the way she looked at him. She loved with her whole heart. I wanted to be like that.

I would tell her all those things, if I could, but I wouldn’t change anything else about that week, because it was perfect—its only failing in that it had to end.



* * *



I opened a text to August that night and began to type out an explanation. Erased it, tried to say it another way, to phrase it better. Erased that too.

In the end, I wrote, I hope you can forgive me, and pressed send.





forty-five


I worked the next day, and it was only on my break that I saw a missed call from Heather.

I called her back, and she picked up on the first ring.

“Hey, I saw that you—” I began.

“Is August with you?”

“No. I’m at work.”

“Was he with you last night? Did he stay at your place?”

Something in my stomach seized. “No. What happened?”

She let out a breath. “He and Kyle, last night, I guess they had an argument. I thought everything was okay when we went to bed, but when we woke up, he was gone. His stuff is gone.”



* * *



“Where would he go?” Dash said, both of us standing outside Safeway. His shift was almost finished, but mine was only halfway through. I didn’t care. I left anyway.

“Heather said he didn’t take a bike or anything.”

“So he couldn’t be too far. Unless he hitchhiked.”

I sent out a text to everyone. And then I called August, but it rang out. I texted him too: Where are you? If you’re somewhere close we’ll come pick you up I amended it:

Or if you’re not

We’ll pick you up anyway

Dash tried calling too, to the same result.

Please answer if you get this, I added as Dash started up the car.

We drove through town—past school, and the athletic fields, past Fairview Park. Clouds were gathering, the branches of the willows swaying as the wind made patterns in the surface of the pond.