Page 35 of A Thousand Little Goodbyes

“But your whole approach to parenting is to tiptoe around her emotions like they’re land mines. Since when do you deliberately provoke her?”

Chrissie drew a deep breath. The answer to that was easy:Since about thirty minutes ago. If someone had told her a week ago that she’d be purposefully antagonizing her daughter and throwing herself into the care and keeping of an entirely different teenage girl, she’d have locked them up and thrown away the key.

But Kat had sounded different on the phone. Playful, even. For the first time in a long time, Chrissie suspected that the thing that was broken between them wasn’t unfixable. She could almost see the little girl who used to fling herself into her arms after school every day rippling underneath the surface, hear the pitter-patter of tiny bare feet as they tiptoed into her bed after a bad nightmare.

That girl was still in there; Chrissie was sure of it. She just had to find a way to breach the gap that time and hormones and their contrary natures seemed to be pushing open mile by mile.

“I don’t have to explain myself to you,” Chrissie said with a sniff.

“Atta girl.” Scarlett started rummaging around in her bag. She had to work her way through half a dozen bottles of pills, three lipsticks, and a set of impossibly tangled headphones before she found the paper she was looking for.

“Oh, geez.” Chrissie groaned. “Not again.”

Scarlett tossed her both the paper and a pen. “You know the drill by now. Write it down.”

Chrissie felt a little foolish doing this in front of River, but she knew her friend well enough to know that she wouldn’t leave her alone until she added to her list.

I don’t have to explain myself to you.

She also immediately handed the paper to Scarlett, knowing she would once again add her own improvements. She did, but with suchquick efficiency that Chrissie was taken aback.

I don’t have to explain myself toyouANYONE.

“Nowyou’re getting the hang of it,” Scarlett said. She started to scoop up her belongings to return them to her bag, but she noticed River eyeing her prescription bottles with intent, narrow-eyed scrutiny. “Can I help you? See something you like?”

“What? Um. No.” River took a step back, her hands immediately shoved behind her back. Chrissie didn’t miss the way she flushed, guilt in every line of her bearing. “What’s all that stuff you’re writing down?”

Scarlett accepted this change of topic, her insouciant air back in place as she explained the list they’d been writing together, but Chrissie wasn’t so easily put off. She was only a massage therapist, not a doctor or nurse or anything, but she was required to take continuing education classes to keep her license current. A lot of the classes were about learning new techniques—she’d done Reiki last year—but others dealt with drug-seeking behaviors and other ethical red flags.

Shereallyhoped that wasn’t the case here. River was already dealing with so much hardship in her life. If she was an addict on top of everything else… Well, Scarlett wouldn’t be happy.

Especially since Chrissie would feel herself honor bound to do something about it.

“Well, Volleyball Mom? Are you ready for the show of a lifetime?” Scarlett tucked her purse securely under one arm and practically pushed the pair of them out the door. “Because if bacon-wrapped antelope is all anyone has to look forward to, you two are about to be the highlight of the evening.”

Chapter TwelvePortland, OR

2007

The first time Scarlett and Chrissie fell in love, it was with the exact same boy.

If Scarlett was honest with herself—reallyhonest with herself, a thing she avoided whenever humanly possible—Chrissie technically had dibs. She’d been the first to spot him, standing bored and slumped over a book at the frozen yogurt shop where he worked. In true Chrissie form, she hadn’t said a word to him other than a shy “hey,” but then again, Chrissie only went to Creamy Dreamy to get plain yogurt in a cup with no toppings, so that tracked.

Anyone who stood facing a wall of chocolate chips, cookie dough lumps, and Marshmallow Fluff and then pickednoneof it was clearly a psychopath.

“You’re a psychopath,” Scarlett said as they slid into the red vinyl booth with their treats.

She dipped her spoon into her yogurt and licked at it in a way she hoped signaled her experience (third base, some heavy petting), butthe boy, Grimshaw, wasn’t looking at them. He was busy reading his book, as usual.

“All right, Chrissie,” she announced as she considered the injustice of it all. How were her powers of seduction supposed to work if he never glanced her way? “The time is now. You’ve made us come here every day for a whole month, and you’re dying to know what he’s reading. Go ask him.”

“Scar-lett!” Chrissie’s cheeks flamed. “I can’t do that. Look at him. He’s gorgeous.”

He was, in fact, gorgeous, and in an objective, unarguable way that appealed to teenage girls everywhere. His hair was a rich, mahogany swoop over his forehead, his dark eyes hidden behind a pair of thick glasses that made him look a decade older than his sixteen years. He carried his tall, wide-shouldered frame with an athlete’s grace, and when he spoke, it was with a deep, velvety voice that was designed to haunt dreams.

If Scarlett, who had risen to her maximum height of five foot one years ago andstillhad to stuff her bra, looked even halfway as gorgeous as Chrissie, she’d have sauntered up there, batted her eyelashes at his brooding perfection, and offered to have his babies right there on the spot.

Only she couldn’t have babies (thanks, cancer treatments) and was pretty sure she didn’t want them anyway. Women who procreated went on to have boring Middle America lives, and Scarlett felt sure she was destined for greatness.