Chapter 8

Laura

August—The Year Before

It all starts with the milk.

I mean, obviously milk doesn't have much to do with what happened next, but when I think back, when I sit down to write this diary, that's the thing I land on. That hot August day, and the milk.

This is my chance, I guess. To get it all out. But I keep sitting here, staring up at the dark skylights in the attic studio Pete built me, thinking about the milk my brother, Jack, wanted me to get that day.

I close my eyes and I'm back there, and as I remember, it spools across the insides of my eyelids, like it's happening now.

It's early when the text message pings onto my phone.

It's from a number I don't recognize, so at first I ignore it. I'm in the bathroom with Ella, who's showering while I test her on her Spanish vocab. It's the first day back to school, but Ella is an overachiever. She throws her heart and soul into everything, the school play, softball, Spanish. She likes to be the best, and only the best will do.

Pete calls out to me from the hall. "Is Ella almost ready? We need to get going."

Pete drops Ella at the elementary school, then takes Alice with him to the high school, where he teaches history.

"Ella, time to get out." I brush my hair off my sweaty forehead, my colorful bracelets jingling.

My phone vibrates from the pocket of my floaty peasant skirt.

I know what you did.

My heart jumps into my throat, the bathroom contracting around me. My legs turn to rubber, and I drop to the toilet seat.

"I'm washing my hair," Ella says.

"Hurry, Dad's waiting." I take a deep breath, trying not to let my fear show.

Pete pops his head in.

"Sorry, she's still washing her hair," I say.

I know what he's thinking. He's been cleaning up the breakfast bowls, putting away the cereal, and wiping down the counters while I've been sitting here on my ass.

He doesn't say it—my husband isn't the type to get angry. But I feel his annoyance. Pete hates being late.

The shower turns off. I grab a fresh towel, toss it over the shower curtain, phone still in hand. It must be a wrong number, I decide.

"Mo-om," Ella whines. "I need to get out."

"Sorry. Leaving now."

My eyes are still on my phone as I step into the hall. I bump into Alice as I'm deleting the text. She's bleary-eyed, exhausted. Hormones at sixteen are a bitch, and Alice is more sensitive than most. She is my orchid child, a girl with an eggshell heart, fragile and prone to breakage.

I wish I could protect her from the world. She soaks up emotions like a washcloth, sadness and pain, but also beauty and joy. As a child, she got overwhelmed by bright lights and scratchy clothes, by strong smells and unexpected changes. She clung to me when I dropped her off at school or took her to the playground. Unlike Ella, my confident little diva.

"Morning, sunshine." I run a hand over Alice's tousled hair.

She grunts something indecipherable. I catch Pete's eyes, and we share a grin. Parenthood is a crafty bastard. You think you're finally getting the hang of it and then everything shifts and you're shit at it all over again.

My phone pings again, causing my heartbeat to ramp up. But this text is from my brother, Jack.

Grab some milk on the way into work, yeah?

That's it. A demand more than a question. So very Jack.

Pete raises one eyebrow as he slides his arms into his corduroy blazer.

"Do you have an administrative-assistant emergency?" he jokes.

He doesn't mean it in a cruel way, but I stiffen, offended, and he can tell.

"Jack wants me to pick up some milk," I say. "He has a big meeting today. Some shareholders, I guess."

I lace up my sandals, then go into the kitchen. I pour myself a glass of orange juice, but I've just brushed my teeth, and the taste it leaves in my mouth is bitter.

Lately, since I lost the art studio and stopped painting, if I'm honest, I've felt a little lost. And okay, maybe angry, too. Sometimes I wonder if I have a single notable thing about me. Artist, wife, mother. I look at Alice and Ella, and of course I love them, but I also wonder if this is all I am? Sometimes I daydream about becoming someone more exciting, more ... just more.

It hasn't helped, being forced to accept a job working for my twin brother. There's failure and then there's rock-bottom failure, and then there's being rescued by the rich, successful guy you shared a womb with. Even our house is owned by Jack. We'd probably be living in a moldy two-bedroom apartment if Jack hadn't given us such a good deal on rent. It's generous and fortunate and really, really humiliating.

"I'm sorry." Pete comes up behind me, wrapping strong arms around me. "I was just joking. I didn't mean anything by it."

"I know." I lean into him. "I love you."

"Love you, too."

My phone pings again.

"Sounds like Jack really wants that milk."

"Gotta run." I kiss him goodbye, even though it's ridiculous to rush off for milk.

But this is my life now. Jack pays me a good wage, and Pete and I need the money. Now that I have a real salary, we've finally caught up on our bills. Our student loans are almost paid off. We have health insurance. Life insurance. Soon we'll be able to start saving properly. Retirement, 401(k), vacations, maybe even buy our own place.

I call a quick goodbye to the girls and rush out the door. At the grocery store, I go to the milk aisle, but I don't know what milk Jack wants or how much. Exasperated, I pull my phone out to text him and see another message.

I'm watching you.

My gaze darts down the aisle, the elderly lady bent over cheese, a dad with his toddler looking at yogurt. My palms are sweaty, my stomach twisting.

"Laura? Laura O'Brien."

The use of my maiden name behind me is confusing. I whirl around.

"Theo Moriarty!" A surprised smile spreads over my face. "Oh my God, how are you?"

"Damn, Laur, I can't believe it's you!"

Theo's grinning from ear to ear. He shakes my hand, like we didn't spend a year of our lives together in college. A year in which we were wholly consumed with each other, physically, mentally, emotionally. A year in which my best friend Mel, now Jack's wife, worried I'd "lost" myself. Looking back, maybe she was right.

Our relationship was passionate, the kind of unfettered intensity only a first love has. Where you become subsumed in it, two people folding into one entity. It was like I was hypnotized by him. He could get me to do things I never dreamed I'd be willing to do. Only later did I see that not all of it was good.

I can't stop staring at him. Theo Moriarty is still magnetic, amiable. Still good-looking in that edgy, almost dangerous way. His black hair is longish, a little tousled, hanging into bright blue eyes. Even now, in his forties, his body is sculpted, his chest broad.

He's wearing a light black jacket, dark jeans, and a dark T-shirt, even though it's a million degrees outside. It reminds me he has a darker side, too, the tortured, angst-ridden hero. The artist in him coming out, I suppose.

Back in college, he played guitar in a band. He loved Radiohead, Smashing Pumpkins, Pixies, sure, but also Ani DiFranco and The Posies. I wonder if he still plays.

"Wow, how long has it been?" he says. "Twenty years?"

"That long?" I brush a strand of hair from my forehead, aware I haven't dyed the gray from the red in months. Years? Who knows anymore. Sometimes I still feel like that teenage girl, just buried inside a middle-aged woman with a sagging body.

Theo and I broke up midway through sophomore year in college. Some relationships just aren't meant to be. After all that had happened, I needed to walk away, to move on. And I did. We never spoke again.

Until today.

We talk about what we've been up to since the last time we spoke: marriage and kids for me, two divorces and a work-based accident that broke his back. About his music that went the same way as my painting (the trash). About failed dreams and hopes.

As we talk, the years fall away right there in the dairy aisle. I need to get to work, and yet something holds me here.

"So what brings you to Black Lake?" I finally ask.

He flashes me that mischievous grin I remember so well. "The lake."

He draws the word out long enough for me to die of embarrassment. My cheeks burn. Of course that's why he's here. The lake is the only reason people come.

"I'm meeting a buddy for a few days of fishing. He works over there." He waves at the sports store across the street, his eyes twinkling.

I don't know why I do it. Inviting my ex out for a drink is a little brash. Maybe it's something about the past, the nostalgia it brings, draping over me like a wintertime fog. The reminder of youth, of all the optimism and excitement you feel when you're young, before family and marriage and responsibility change you.

But as I grab the milk, I ask, figuring it's just one drink. What harm could that do?