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GABRIEL

THIRTEEN YEARS AGO

Next week is finally the trip. Finally, I’ve saved enough money to take Gabriel to San Francisco. He can see my home and where I came from. He can see all the restaurants I spent all my money at as a teenager.

Atticus has been kind enough to let me save up for this. I’ve worked long hours and odd jobs. My goal is to save up enough to help Gabriel get into a college out here. I don’t want him to lose the connection with where I came from. Sometimes it feels inevitable, being in a town like this one, where everything is so tightly knit. It feels like I’ve been washed away.

He’ll have a different life from mine. I know it.

“You’re reading that one again?”

The old letter fell out of my hands, and I turned to see my stepfather, Atticus, leaning on the doorframe. I was on the floor of Mom’s office. Atticus never changed anything about the room, and I wasn’t sure why.

Papers dotted the floor, all lined with Mom’s neat handwriting. I hadn’t meant to read this one, but I always ended up here.

“Yeah. It’s the last one she wrote before . . .” I trailed off, thinking of the night before our trip, when police came to our house to tell us that she’d been hit by a drunk driver.

Mom had been full of life. She was loud, happy, and never failed to make me smile.

It never made sense that she was here one day and not the next.

Her letters were the only thing left. Just the handwriting of her wishes. Memories that I needed to fulfill.

Atticus’s arms crossed and his eyes went distant. I knew he was thinking about her too. He wasn’t a bad stepfather, and in a lot of ways, I’d gotten lucky with him. He didn’t resent me, and once Mom was gone, he took me in without a second thought. Because of him, I didn’t go to a distant cousin whom I didn’t know.

But there were moments when I knew he was my stepfather and not my father.

Just like now. If he were my father, something would fill the silence. He could give me the same advice he gave Simone, his daughter. Even if I’d fight him on it, it would be nice to see that same man who coached my stepsister through her struggles in high school.

Atticus simply wasn’t like that with me. One day, I’d accept that.

I waited for far too long, just like I always had.

“You should sleep,” Atticus said. “You need as much rest as you can get.”

I looked back at the letters, hoping that the ink would bleed from the paper into my soul, and it would feel like I was connected to her in the way she always wanted me to be.

When it didn’t happen, I put them away. I got to my feet before going to my room.

“Night, Gabe.” Atticus’s voice was soft, and I waited for more.

It would never come.

“Good night,” I replied as I shut my door. I waited for him to go down the hallway before opening my window. He took forever to go downstairs. I knew he thought I was in bed, but in reality, my ear was pressed to the door, and I was about to sneak out the window and go next door.

The only thing as important to me as Mom’s letters was the girl who lived there. Being in a small town meant my neighbor was quite far away, and I was in for a journey. I had to get to the yard and go through a line of trees. I nearly tripped and fell on my ass, but I made it just in time.

For a moment, it was just me and the late summer air. Frogs and crickets sang their tunes, and the humidity clung to my skin. I was in sweatpants and a T-shirt. I couldn’t wait to get back inside.

The front door opened, and my heart leaped into my throat.

Her bright hair was mussed from sleep. She stumbled down the front steps of her house and I rushed to catch her.

Jade wasn’t like anyone else in Strawberry Springs. When we were fifteen, she broke into my house with hair dye and told me she had a plan for the homecoming dance. It had looked so bad that the town’s hairstylist had fixed it for free, and she’s colored it ever since. It had been pink, green, blue, and bright red, all of which she looked incredible in.

But right now, it was my favorite color.

Purple.