Chapter 4

CHAPTER FOUR

An hour later, I met Penny in front of the inn. As I pushed the door open to greet her, she turned to smile, and the sunlight reflected off her hair just right—making it look like it glimmered with the glow of a thousand diamonds. I drew in a breath, unsure why I was blushing when what we were doing was very serious. This wasn’t about the pretty inn owner; this was about Anna’s last wish.

“You ready?” Penny chirped, her soft smile never waving.

“Where are you taking me, anyway?” I asked as I followed her through the parking lot.

“It’s hard to explain to out-of-towners,” Penny said.

I narrowed my eyes with a laugh. “Are you a serial killer?”

Penny’s laugh made my soul brighten in a way it hadn’t since Anna died. It took my breath away.

She shook her head. “I swear, I’m not.”

“That’s exactly what a serial killer would say,” I replied lightheartedly. She unlocked her truck, and I climbed into the cab of the old blue vehicle.

“Tell me about Anna,” she said as she started the engine and backed out of the space.

I drew in a breath. No one ever asked about that. They told me they saw her on the news; strangers confessed their condolences, but none of them ever offered to know who Anna was, or why her loss cut so deep.

“You don’t have to,” Penny rushed when I paused. “I just know that one of the things that helps me get up every day is talking about my mom. It keeps a part of her alive, I think.”

“Tell me about your mom,” I said instead. A thick lump formed in my throat; I swallowed it down.

Penny lit up. “The original Penelope Brookside,” she started. “My mama was the brightest person I’ve ever known, full of sunshine and fire and strength. My dad was a good-for-nothing who left when I was ten, and my mom raised me and my two sisters with everything she had. She did everything for us. She opened Brookside for us, to give us a future and a legacy.”

While Penny talked, I watched the city pass us by. My eyes lingered on a bookstore, Lucky Books, and a coffee shop on the corner, Shooting Star Cafe. Every piece of the town looked handmade, every shop was a little different than the one next to it—and all of it was surrounded by trees and framed by the mountains.

“She couldn’t cook for shit, but she tried her best. We didn’t always have a lot of money, so when we wanted a sweet treat, she would take a tortilla, put peanut butter, chocolate chips, and marshmallows inside, and toast it in the oven. I make Wanda keep that on the menu at the inn, even though no one ever orders it.” Penny paused, glancing over at me. We pulled off the main road onto another highway, speeding away from the city.

“Where are your sisters now?” I asked, still unable to bring myself to talk about mine. It felt strange. My parents refused to talk about Anna, like pretending she never existed was an easier way for them to heal. I was realizing, though, that even if it was healing them, forgetting my sister had been tearing me apart piece by piece for the last seven months.

“Rosie moved to Oregon a few years ago, before Mom got sick. She came back to help me and Winnie take care of her, but after she died, she went back to her life. Winnie still lives here in Harluck. She works at the bookstore,” Penny explained.

“It’s wonderful to have a sister,” I breathed.

“Yeah, it is.”

An hour later, Penny parked her truck on the side of a mountain trail and motioned for me to get out and follow her. The rest of our drive had been filled with easy conversation about the town and interesting people she met at the inn. We did not talk about Anna.

I hopped out of the truck, breathing in the fresh mountain air. It soaked into my skin and my soul, revitalizing me. Penny set off down a small, barely noticeable walking trail. I followed.

Anna’s note felt heavy in my pocket while we hiked through the evergreen forest. My stomach flipped with the thought of letting her go like this. What if she didn’t come to Harluck because she wasn’t ready to make her wish? What if she never really wanted to make it?

My spiraling felt stupid. Of course, Anna wanted to make her wish. She was just the kind of person who believed in a town with magical abilities to make wishes come true.

After about twenty minutes of walking, I began to hear the sound of water running and perked up. Penny glanced back at me, still wearing that soft, breathtaking smile.

Selfishly, I thought that Penny might be the most beautiful woman I’d ever seen.

“We’re almost there,” she said.

Moments later, the water grew louder and louder. We turned a corner, and beneath us was a rushing river. Penny glanced over the cliff at the water, something glittering in her eyes as she watched the water before beckoning me along. The mountain sloped upward, and we fell entirely silent, with only our heavy breaths echoing around us as we ascended.

The higher we climbed, the closer to the river we became. Soon enough, I was covered in a thin layer of water from the overspray. It was refreshing in the warm sunlight, even though there was still a chill in the air.

And then… there it was.

The biggest waterfall I’d ever seen.

Sunlight reflected off the mist in the air, creating a hundred different rainbows as the waterfall rained ahead of us. I drew in a deep breath, my lips parted.

“Come on,” Penny said. “We’re going to the top.”

It took almost another hour to hike to the top of the waterfall, and the afternoon began to creep by. By the time we stood above the roaring water, I was drenched in sweat and had gulped down half the water we started this trip with.

Penny said nothing when we stopped; she approached a rock near the water and sat on it, ignoring its wet surface. I trailed after her silently, sitting and watching the water.

“People come to Harluck to make wishes,” she said. Her voice was barely audible over the water. “They wish on a star, or blow out a dandelion in the summer, or they break a wishbone. But this place… only locals come here to make a wish, and only when they really, really need it to come true.”

I was quiet. The air around us suddenly felt much heavier.

“When my mom got sick, my world fell apart. The cancer was aggressive; they gave her six months to live.” Penny looked at me then, her eyes shimmering with tears. “I wasn’t ready to live without my mama.”

“Penny-” I started.

She shook her head, turning back to the waterfall. “I hiked up here alone, and I wished for more time with my mom. I knew I couldn’t have forever, but six months wasn’t enough.” Again, she was quiet for a moment. “The river gave me three more years.”

Without realizing what I was doing, I took her hand in mine and squeezed. She did not pull away. Holding onto her made me feel stronger—strong enough to begin talking.

“Anna was my twin sister,” I started. “My other half. My best friend. And yet, she was so much more than me. She was brighter. More adventurous. More romantic. More ambitious. She had this laugh that drew the whole world to her. She went on these wonderful trips—anywhere and everywhere—because she saved every penny of her money. She died in a flash flood in March.”

There it was. As she likely remembered seeing Anna’s face plastered all over the news, recognition flashed on Penny's face. I frowned and took a deep breath.

“Since then, my parents haven’t spoken about her. They don’t let me talk about her. And I didn’t realize it, but my life without her has become so dark and so heavy.” I paused and swallowed another lump in my throat, eyes burning with tears. “Anna wouldn’t have wanted that. She would have wanted us to honor her by going on the adventures she couldn’t, living the life that was taken away from her.”

Next to me, Penny wiped tears off her cheek.

I looked over at her then, sucking in a deep breath. “I’m so happy you got more time with your mom. I would do anything for just one more moment with my sister. Anything .”

Penny squeezed my hand once, then threw herself around me all at once.

No one had hugged me since Anna’s funeral. Not my parents. Or my friends. Especially not a stranger. Something in me broke when Penny touched me, the last pieces of me shattering in her arms. I buried my face in her shoulder, letting the forest hear my grief. All the pain I’d been suppressing in favor of trying to move on and living a ghost of the life I had with her came to the surface and overflowed. The void that had swallowed me finally cracked, letting the light in.

Penny and I held each other until we could breathe again. When I raised my head off her shoulder, she reached up to wipe the tears from my face, her thumbs lingering on my cheeks.

“Thank you,” I breathed.

She sucked in a shaking breath and motioned for the waterfall. “So, what about her wish?”

I stood off the rock and pulled Anna’s wish from my pocket. “What do I do?”

Penny shook her head and smiled gently. “Whatever feels right.”

I turned the little piece of paper over and over in my hand as I approached the edge of the water.

I wish for an everlasting love.

A movie kind of love.

A love worth living for.

Anna’s words seemed to echo in the air around me as I gripped them for the last time. I raised the paper to my lips and kissed it hard.

Then, I dropped it into the water with a final wish of my own.

I wish to live a life Anna would be proud of.

The pink paper swirled in the rapids for a brief moment in time before disappearing entirely and going over the edge. Right as it did, a breeze rushed through the air, making the trees around us sing. Water sprayed into the air, catching the late afternoon sun and sending rainbows over our heads. I laughed as water rained down around me. An unimaginable weight lifted off my chest.

In the breeze, I swore I heard my sister laugh.