Three Day Summer(47)
Anna, never missing anything, must see the quick glance Ned and I share. Next time she’s near me, she voices my exact thought. “They always know,” she says.
I look at her, both of us understanding exactly what she’s talking about. “Do they?” I ask.
She nods. “When you’re just about ready to move on, they know. And that’s usually when they come back. It’s like the universe’s way of making you figure out what you really want.”
She leaves me to cut up more bandages and I have a perfect view of the back of Ned’s head as he tends to someone.
How will I pass this test? Am I ready to move on? Move on to what, though? A boy I might never see again? One who lives hundreds of miles way and who, not to mention, has a gorgeous girlfriend. Okay, a bitchy girlfriend, but gorgeous nonetheless.
I look at Ned’s soft brown hair, see the one piece in the back that always seems to stick up. I watch the familiar shadow his body casts across the floor and know there was a time when I delighted in seeing that tall, assured shadow holding hands with mine—like the pavement itself was painted with our love.
And I know that something in my heart has changed. That little lump that was always embedded somewhere in my throat whenever I saw him; that little surge of adrenaline; even that ounce of fear of losing him that was always brimming just below the surface when we were together.
It’s all gone.
Instead, unencumbered by butterflies in my stomach or a stuttering heartbeat, I finally imagine what staying with Ned really would have entailed. If we’d gotten married someday, he would be doing what he always did: making decisions for both of us. For our entire family. And who would I be? A wife and mother, I presume. But not a doctor.
In other words, I wouldn’t be me at all.
Throughout all my pining and heartbreak, how did I miss this one kernel of cold, hard truth that would have made it much easier to get over him after all?
chapter 56
Michael
I wish Cora and I had thought to come to these woods together. They are wild and fun. They are also the same woods that we were camping by on the first night. Evan recognizes the way to his pharmacy immediately.
Just as Suzie said, there are vendors spread out among the trees, a lot of them selling homemade tie-dyed T-shirts, some with hilariously rude sayings. One of the shirts has a doodle of the moon landing with the big words “GOVERNMENT HOAX” surrounding it. That guy works impressively fast, considering the landing was all of a few weeks ago.
“Nice shirt,” the guy says to me when he sees me looking at his wares. I think he must be trying to hawk something from his table, but when I look up, he’s actually pointing to the T-shirt I’m wearing. “Were you there?”
“I wish,” I respond, wondering if I had more of an enterprising spirit, could I really have made it out to California as a sixteen-year-old?
“I was there,” the man reminisces.
“Which was better?” I have to ask. The Monterey Pop festival in ’67 was legendary, but I’m really starting to think Woodstock might surpass its fame. Though, perhaps, that’s wishful thinking on my part since this is the one I’m here for.
The guy grins. “It’s all groovy,” he says emphatically, and points behind me. I turn around to see three thin wooden signs tacked to a tree. Each one has an arrow pointing in a different direction and a label: GROOVY WAY, GENTLE PATH, HIGH WAY.
I turn back to the T-shirt guy with a smile. But he has a more serious expression on his face now when he gives me this unexpected bout of wisdom. “There’s no wrong way. Wherever you’re at, you have to make it what you want it to be.”
I look back at him, really mulling over his words. “Thanks,” I say as I walk away, and I mean it, looking at the painted words of the signs one more time as I pass them.
So anywhere I am can be the Groovy Way, or Gentle Path, or High Way? I suppose anywhere could be a billion other adjectives too. Is all of life really just a state of mind? I’m not even currently a time god, and all these thoughts are suddenly rushing my brain in a rare moment of waking clarity.
Everything is better at Woodstock.
The girls are crowded around a small jewelry stand, looking over beaded necklaces and peace-sign bracelets. As I’m hanging back, letting them browse, a stone catches my eye.
I move forward to look more closely at it. It’s a large glass stone, a murky blue with streaks of darker blue within it. It’s shaped like a teardrop and hangs from a thin chain.
It instantly reminds me of being in the rain-pattered lake with Cora. The colors, the shape, everything about it. I want to buy it for her so badly.
I ask the price. “Ten dollars,” the lady says to me.
I don’t think I have ten dollars but, just in case, I check my backpack thoroughly. I ask the lady if she’d be willing to take four dollars and thirty-seven cents for it. She declines.
“Awww, it’s beautiful,” I hear Amanda say behind me, and I turn around to see her beaming at me. “But it’s okay, babe. That’s expensive.”
I just nod, but don’t say anything to correct her mistaken impression that the necklace would be for her. Because I am the scum of the earth, that’s why.
I get the uncomfortable feeling that I’m not the only one who thinks that either. Looking up, I find the source of my paranoia. It’s Cora’s brother, standing at a nearby booth with his friends, his eyes boring into me, as if he were brought to life by the intensity of my thoughts. I wish my thoughts were good enough to bring his sister here instead. But then again, I don’t know if I’d want the dirty look that Wes is giving me to ever cross Cora’s face. Definitely not directed at me, anyway.