Thirty-Five

And then there was the best visitor: Matt came over every day.

It was July now, with plenty of summer left. We carried the sails and rudder down to the JY15, rigged the dinghy, and sailed out from the beach. We sat side by side. I had the tiller, and we kept the sails tight and the rail in the water, sailing fast and gulping air as we rushed along. Eventually we headed to the raft. I wrapped the line around the cleat, and he and I climbed out of the boat. We lay on the salty, splintered wood, just as we always had during summers gone by.

In September, we would be juniors. I felt so much older than that, as if I’d lived a whole lifetime already. I looked at Matt and wondered if he felt the same way. He looked inscrutable, his eyes squinting in the bright sun.

“What was it like?” I asked him.

“What was what like?”

“Having to trick Fitch into believing you were with him,” I said.

“It was the hardest thing I’ll ever have to do in my life,” he said.

“How do you know?” I asked. “You haven’t lived your whole life yet, there could be much worse things.”

“Worse than having to pretend to go along with someone who was hurting you, Oli? No, I don’t think so. Nothing will ever be harder than that.” He paused. “What did you really think, when you saw me with him?”

I wished I could lie, tell him that I knew all along that he was good: that my old friend Matthew Grinnell would never be anything like Fitch Martin. But gazing into his clear, serious, blue eyes, I knew that everything between us was true and real, and I had to tell the entire truth, no matter how hard it was.

I had to sit up to say this. He could tell I was about to say something difficult, and he sat up beside me, so we were at eye level with each other.

“I was scared,” I said.

“Of me?” he asked.

“Yes.”

He looked away. I saw I’d said something to him that I could never take back. I wanted to make excuses, erase or at least mitigate the effect of my words: backpedal and tell him that I had been terrified, that my world had been turned upside down, that my senses were skewed, that trust in everyone and everything—not just him—had exploded, and, especially, that I had known all along that he was good.

I regretted how terribly I had misjudged him, even for so short a time. But I had had no choice—I had been afraid for my life. And Matt had been playing a role designed to trick Fitch—he had also fooled me.

Right now, looking at Matt and seeing how affected he was by my saying I’d been scared of him, I knew that more words would be inadequate. Sometimes hurt is so deep, apologies can only make it worse. Actions were all that counted. Way more than thoughts, memories, even wishes.

So I reached for Matt’s hand. His skin was warm from the sun. We laced our fingers together, but he still hadn’t looked at me. He was still upset. The waves rocked the raft. We sat there, our legs dangling into the salt water.

“You, Matt,” I said after a long time.

“You, Oli,” he said.

He turned toward me with that mischievous smile that showed me we were okay. He squeezed my hand, and I squeezed his. The sun beat down, and the salt crystals dried on our skin.

My whole body tingled, and I felt as if something was going to happen.

And it did. But not what I thought it would be.

He didn’t kiss me.

“Feel like seeing some birds?” he asked.

“Always,” I said.

“I know somewhere we can go. We have to turn it back into the place we always loved. The place we know better than anyone,” he said.

He didn’t have to tell me where it was. I just knew, as surely as I had ever known anything before. We climbed into the dinghy and set the sails. The wind was at our backs, and long and slow, we sailed downwind back to shore. We went to my house, and I ran upstairs to change. I grabbed my Sibley birds guide, my binoculars, and a sun hat. I had hardly used them in months.

Twenty minutes later, we drove into the Braided Woods.

We had to drive past the grave. It was unavoidable, in order to get to our real destination. I was relieved to see that the yellow crime scene tape had been taken down—for the second time. It had been there for three investigations—Fitch’s murder of Eloise, his attempted murder of Iris, and his eventual capture. Now those rock croppings, the stately boulders, that granite crevice, the white pines, and the red oaks could return to their ancient loveliness. The terror was over.

Matt drove the Jeep to the place we had always gone, the site of endless birding happiness: the location of the blind. Sunlight shimmered through the leaves overhead. July was beautiful in its own way, but most people would say it wasn’t the most exciting time for birding. Nesting was over; the first broods had been hatched. Fall migration was at least a month from starting—that would begin in August, a good month before it was fall on the calendar. There weren’t too many rarities around now; the possibility of seeing a life bird—a first-time sighting—was low.

But summer birds were alluring, too. Two different osprey families had built nests at Hubbard’s Point. But here in the woods, this was an excellent time to concentrate on identifying sparrows and finches, the less flashy “backyard birds” that tend to look so much alike.

At first, their dun-colored plumage looked dull. But the more you gazed, the more you saw shades of chestnut, mahogany, silver-gray, molten gold. You’d notice white eye rings and wing bars, black masks, pointed bills, cone-shaped bills. When Matt and I entered the blind, sat down on two of the tree stumps that we had always used as makeshift benches, I was looking forward to settling in, focusing on learning more about species I had been seeing forever.

“Hey,” he said, reaching for a piece of paper wedged into the blind’s weathered wood.

“What is it?” I asked.

Matt unfolded the paper. It was unlined, three-by-five inches, torn from one of the Moleskine notebooks most of us used to keep notes about our birding excursions. I leaned closer and saw Chris’s handwriting.

Oli, Matt, both of you.

I’m sure you’re going to see this sooner or later. I know our main birding time is during migration. We did it in spring, and we will do it this coming fall. That’s going to remind me of last year. It’ll remind you, too.

It’s when we were all together for the last time. You two, me and Eloise, Adalyn, and Fitch.

“Me and Eloise”—Hurts to write that.

Hurts to write “Fitch,” too.

I know I haven’t been around much. I wasn’t there for you, with you, when the stuff with Fitch went down. I still can’t believe it. Did you have any idea about him? I didn’t. I drove to the prison yesterday and sat outside for a long time. I wanted to visit him, ask him why he did it. Can he even have visitors? I have no idea.

He killed Eloise, that’s the thing. So why would I ever want to sit there and listen to him say anything?

It’s hard with friends, to see the worst in them when you’ve always seen only the best. When that’s all you thought there was. I don’t want to say I held him on a pedestal, but I imagined us going through school together. Black Hall, but maybe even college and med school. I pictured us becoming doctors and supporting each other’s practice and research.

I thought we’d be birding together our whole lives.

All of us—I thought we’d be hanging out in this blind for a million more migrations. I am dreading fall—next time I’m here, it will remind me of last October. The ninth. The last time I saw her. Can we come here together that day? Can we look for owls? She loved owls. That might make it better. If anything can make it better.

See you,

Chris

Matt and I sat in the blind, not speaking for a long time. I thought about October. It was still months from now. October 9 was an anniversary that would come every year. I had been pushing the thought away, dreading it, but somehow Chris’s note made it possible for me to let it in. Days ticked by, month after month. That was the way of life. Good memories, unwanted memories. Eloise and I had learned that when we had lost our parents.

Now I was learning it all over again, and so were our friends.

“I like his idea,” Matt said. “Meeting him here that day.”

I nodded. “He’s right. Being together might make it better.”

“If anything can make it better,” Matt said, watching me, to see if I really believed that. I wasn’t sure I did, but I was willing to give it a try. I pictured us here, the core group that was left: Adalyn, Chris, Matt, and me. There would be owls, and I would bring something that Eloise had loved. I would carve a pumpkin for her. Instead of a jack-o’-lantern, it would be the face of a great horned owl.

“We could have cider,” Matt said, sitting beside me as I held the note. “Hot, in a thermos.”

“Apples, too. Or a pie,” I said. “Our grandmother used to bake great apple pies. Maybe she’ll be up to baking another one this year. I can help her.”

“Yes,” Matt said. “That would be great.”

The leaves on the maples, oaks, birches, and sassafras all around the blinds would change color. They would turn scarlet, crimson, orange, bright yellow, and they would twinkle down from the branches to the ground. The Braided Woods would smell like spice—black walnuts, bayberry, bittersweet, the last of the goldenrod. Dusk would fall, and owls would call.

But still, for now, it was summer.

Just then I heard an unusual call, but I knew it right away: a cedar waxwing. A favorite bird of mine and Eloise’s, pale gray with a yellow tinge, a red wing-stripe, a subtle crest, a dashing black mask. Delighted, I turned to Matt, assuming he would be focused on the direction in which the call had come. But instead he was gazing at me.

“Did you hear that?” I asked.

“Yeah,” he said.

“A cedar waxwing,” I said.

“Oli,” he said.

“Matt.”

“When we were just out on the raft,” he said.

I nodded, thinking back to earlier that afternoon.

“We almost,” he began.

“I know,” I said, feeling heat rise in my chest. I was almost too overwhelmed to look at him, but at the same time, I couldn’t look away.

Some things had already happened, weeks or months in the past: We had hugged, he had brushed his lips across my cheek, held me while he whispered in my ear. We had held hands. He had given me the rope bracelet that I still wore—now worn and frayed, still brown from that day.

But until now, one thing hadn’t happened.

And then it did.

We were looking straight into each other’s eyes. He put his arms around me and pulled me even closer. I always thought people closed their eyes. I was sure of it. But we didn’t, not at first. And I’m glad. Because I wanted to see him. I wanted him to know, to read in my eyes what I was feeling when?.?.?.

When he

When he kissed me

And he did: He kissed me

Or maybe I kissed him

Or we both, or we both, or we both?.?.?.

Either way, we kissed.

It was my first kiss. And I closed my eyes. All of me tingled. I wanted the kiss to go on forever. I reached up to touch his face, and he touched mine. And then we opened our eyes again.

“Oli,” he said.

I tried to say “Matt,” but my voice wouldn’t work.

It was summer.

I had just had my first kiss.

I was wearing Matt’s bracelet.

And we were here.

It wasn’t an accident that we had come back to the Braided Woods. This was my place. This was where I had loved birds. Had loved looking for owls after sunset. Had loved coming with my sister. This was where I had loved life. I thought I had lost it, but now I had it back. I’d reclaimed this magical spot. I’d reclaimed myself.

My life could begin again. Not the same as it had been. Not better, not worse, but different. I knew more. My heart was bigger. For a while it had seemed my world had gotten very small, but now it was wide open, and it was mine.

Matt had been holding Chris’s note, but I gently took it from his hand. I stared down at it—not at his handwriting, not at what he had said. It made me think of that other note, the one I had written to Gram. If anything happens to me ?.?.?.

Writing was so powerful. Gram’s memoirs, Chris’s note, the way writing can make us feel, make us look at what we have, at what matters more than anything.

I thought of Gram’s journal, the book of her memories that were fading so fast. Maybe I could help her finish her memoir. I could keep listening, and I could pull up all the stories she had told me and Eloise over the years. I could write them down for her. Maybe I could write my own story, too. I began to think of a title. If Anything Happens to Me?.?.?.

A whole lot had happened to both me and Gram. And it had made us stronger. It had brought us closer.

I knew my way now.

I looked up at the sky. It was so blue, a blue that would forever be my favorite color. I wished I could tell Eloise. Not just about the kiss, not just that I was wearing Matt’s bracelet, not just that Gram and I were going to be okay.

But I wished I could tell her everything. Everything that had happened, that would ever happen, for the rest of my life. For the life I wanted to share with her, for all the happiness, all the adventure, all the sadness.

Not just anything, but all the all and the all the all.

And sitting right there, next to Matt, holding his hand, I did just that.

I whispered to the blue sky, to my favorite color, to my sister.

“Everything,” I told Eloise.

“What?” Matt asked. “What did you say?”

I turned to him, looked into his eyes, saw his beautiful smile with the space between his front teeth. Matt, the boy I loved.

I smiled at him and I said:

“Everything.”