Page 24 of The Difference Between

Rue eyes the box truck in the driveway. “I think you have the wrong address.”

“That’s me.” I nudge past her to take the clipboard from the man. “I’ll show you where to take it.”

“You hired movers?” she asks.

I scoff. “Of course I hired movers. I’m here for three months. I couldn’t fit all that in a suitcase.”

“But movers?” Rue is incredulous. “How much shit do you have?”

Remy cranes her neck as a man rolls up the back door of the truck. “Is that a Peloton?”

“You think this ass just happens?” I turn to the man. “This way. And make sure you’re quiet.”

Seven

Amoving company was a bit over the top for twelve boxes of clothes and a stationary bike, but I like my things. Plus, it was a crapshoot on knowing what to wear. Fontain is far from formal, but I don’t want to be unprepared, so I brought everything. Dress clothes, casual clothes, winter clothes should an unprecedented blizzard occur in the middle of the dog days of the North Carolina summer. I’ll be here for fall; I need transition pieces. And my extensive shoe collection is a given.

Once Rue and Remy left, my first matter of business was posting signs at the end of the driveway and on the front door telling people not to knock, ring, enter, or make a noise louder than a whisper.

Mom’s major symptoms before the surgery were slight memory loss—mostly names—headaches, and a somewhat severe depletion of impulse control. Time will tell if those are fixed, but my sisters said that right now she’s extremely sensitive to loud noises and has a relentless headache. The last thing she needs is people.

Alone in the doorway of my childhood bedroom that’s now filled with boxes—I put the Peloton in Rue’s old room—my reality becomes real.

I’m in Fontain.

For three months.

Mom left our rooms the same when we moved out, but mine feels smaller than it did when I was a teenager with my whole life ahead. Like every part of who I was has been compressed in a vacuum-sealed bag, and being here lets some of the air back in, inflating the past with the present.

The walls are covered in posters of Alanis Morissette and Counting Crows along with a few snapshots of me and the friends I’ve long since fallen out of touch with. A few of Amanda and me, my once-upon-a-time best friend. I haven’t talked to her since my dad’s funeral a decade ago. She was pregnant then and married to her high school sweetheart Greg like we both knew she would be. I got the invitation to the wedding but was in the middle of a deal I couldn’t miss. I sent a gift instead. Last I heard, she was doing hair at a local salon.

We were barely in touch up to that point, and after my dad’s funeral, any contact we had fell off.

I didn’t have time; she stopped making an effort. Not that I blame her. She had a baby and a life; I was hundreds of miles away in meetings trying to make a name for myself.

She’s probably had four kids since. I’ll look her up while I’m here. Maybe convince her to have a drink.

On the corkboard above my desk, there are a few ticket stubs from movies—Kill Bill and Mystic River—and my life’s plan checklist on a now-jaundiced piece of notebook paper.

Graduate top of class—did that.

Get a bachelor’s degree in finance—and that.

Get an MBA—and that.

Get a kick-ass job—verdict is currently out on that one.

Make enough money to retire at age thirty-five and buy any Fontain winery I want—I smile at this. It was the only thing I wanted when I was young. I was going to come back to Fontain after making my millions and buy a winery to settle down. I’m five years past that vision, but I could do it if I wanted to. I’ve made the money.

But move back to Fontain?

Despite what Trish thinks about my life, everything I have is in Chicago now. My job. I don’t know what I’d do if I moved back here. Sure, I’d love being closer to my mom and sisters—I think—but I’m not sure where I’d fit.

At the next two items on the list, my smile drops. Find a perfect man to marry and have two kids.

Those twenty-three-year-old words written on lined paper shine a spotlight on missed milestones. What I haven’t done. It’s ridiculous to care about pie-in-the-sky goals written by a teenager, but I do. I put a hand to my belly as a rogue wave of loneliness crashes over me.

I was supposed to be with the perfect man and have kids by now, but here I am with neither. Here I am, finally getting to one because I was backed into a corner and forgoing the other because there aren’t enough hours in the day for me to find someone right for me. Someone who might not exist.