“Okay,” I murmur. Sy tosses his beer bottle in the garbage can by the garage then leaves. I don’t know how long I sit there alone before Momma appears from inside the house, the dishtowel still slung over her shoulder.
“That went all right, didn’t it? Fairly painless,” she coaxes.
“Yes Momma. Not bad at all. It was great talking to him like we used to. I’ve missed my friend,” I reply.
“So why do you look like you dropped your ice cream cone in the dirt?”
“I don’t know,” I grumble.
“Is it possible you don’t just want to be friends with Sy?”
“I think—I know I’ll always want Sylas, Momma. But wanting and having are two different things. He’d feel guilty if he knew the truth and I don’t want to hurt him.”
“So you break his heart to keep from breaking his heart?”
“It’s complicated,” I murmur.
“Sweet girl, tell the man. Least that way he will understand that you have run from him because that was your idea of protecting him because as it sits, he just thinks you don’t want him.”
“I know,” I say resignedly.
Hours later save for the music coming from my laptop, the house is quiet and my hair still damp from the long shower I took where I tried to sort out my own thoughts. I swallow hard and stare down at my cellphone.
“Just do it,” I mumble to myself. I quickly go to my settings and unblock Sy’s phone number then type out a text message and hit the send button before I can back out.
Me: What are you listening to?
Several minutes pass and my phone remains silent. No response. I’d be lying if I claimed that fact didn’t make an ache the size of Texas spread out in every direction in my chest.
I toss my phone on my pillow and sit down at the foot of the bed. Feeling a growing sense of urgency to find Sy and talk to him, I grab the keys to my rental, which thank god isn’t a compact green roller skate. Slipping my index finger through the key ring, I twirl the keys around my finger.
I fire a text off to Bethany who is in Ellie’s old bedroom down the hall.
Me: It’s weird for me to drive by Sy’s house to see if he’s home, isn’t it?
Bethany: I mean… is it weird-ish? Yes. Is it Glenn Close, Fatal Attraction weird? No. Want me to go with?
With her text she includes a GIF of a dancing Chihuahua dog. I snort as I text back thanking her for her input but passing on the chaperone. I fire off a text to Momma letting her know that I am going for a drive. She simply sends back a thumbs up. Glancing at my clothes I shrug, happy to go as I am, in yoga pants, a tank top, and flats. It’s not like I plan to get out of my car.
The streets through Palmetto Grove are peaceful and quiet, even on a Saturday night. Most folks are already at home, tucked in for the night. The diners and boutiques and stores are closing for the night, flipping their lights off and turning their signage to closed. With my windows rolled down, I take the streets through town, soaking up the sights and the stillness. A sense of being at home comes over me that I haven’t felt in such a terribly long time. My smile is full and sincere and likely makes me look like a total lunatic given that tears are also collecting in my eyes. They’re happy tears though. My feelings toward my hometown have been a great obstacle for me. It has been very high on the priority list regarding issues I have been working through at my therapy sessions with Doctor Banker. She will be glad to hear that I am not crawling out of my own skin to escape the place I should love. Looking around, listening to the crickets, hearing the occasional car driving down the road, it does feel homey and safe. It feels welcoming and reminiscent of a simpler life.
This was Teddy’s beloved hometown where he painted it red as much as he could before he left for the Army. He loved Palmetto Grove and the folks in it. Ellie adores our hometown and the kids she teaches at the same elementary school my niece or nephew will probably attend. Those kids are the same kids at the church on Sunday and at the annual fair. This place is one big family and my hatred for one period in my life that traumatized me deeply, stained my view of this place and everyone in it. I hate that it has taken me this long to separate the two, to draw a clear line between that sort of ugliness and the beautiful community we have here. I could have been assaulted in any town, it just happened to be here and Palmetto Grove had nothing to do with it. But, in my mind, the whole place was a crime scene that made me break out in hives.
I may not be healed, and maybe I never will be but I am better and that has to count for something. It better, anyway. I have a brand new baby niece or nephew coming in a matter of weeks and I intend to be here every chance I get. If being a key figure in his or her life means I have to keep putting in the work to get over my past, then that is precisely what I am happy to do. I’ll keep working toward finding as much peace as possible. I will figure out what the new Rae and Sy looks like. Maybe we will be awkward around each other forever, but I hope not.
I hope we can… I don’t know what I hope for and a big part of me is afraid to hope for anything at all. Still, I am willing to make peace with Sy and figure out where we stand. Of course when I ran from him a year ago he warned me to not expect that I could just waltz back into town and into his life whenever I felt inclined to. I didn’t take that warning lightly. Still…
As I’m driving through town, taking street by street, mentally cataloguing the businesses that are new while admiring the ones that have been around my entire life, my cellphone buzzes in the cup holder of my rental car. I pull off the road and put the shifter in park to check my phone. I ignore the butterflies in my stomach.
S:- You wanna know what I’m listening to, you’re welcome to come to the bayou and find out.
You really wanna do that? Self-Preservation chimes in, uninvited and I cram her away, refusing to go the rabbit hole that is internal debate. The only answer I have for Self-Preservation is to do a U-turn in the center of town and aim myself toward the secret bayou behind the baseball fields and a mass of giant trees.
Like it is muscle memory, even I the dark I maneuver my rental car around the baseball complex and over the walking paths, around the edge of the tree line. The bayou comes into view, its surface mirroring the moonlight above. Sy’s truck is parked close to the water where I can see him standing on the bank. I park behind his truck and hop out suddenly regretting not wearing clothes suitable for public.
“Hey,” I say quietly as I ease up to where he is.
“Shush,” he says holding his finger to his lips with one hand while holding a fishing rod in the other. “Hear that?”
“I don’t hear anything,” I whisper.
“That’s cause I’m not listenin’ to music, Rae.”
“Oh. Right.” Suddenly nervous by his mood I back away ready to get in my car and leave. “Catch anything?” I ask mostly in a perfunctory way. Like, what the hell else do you ask someone that’s fishing?
“Nothing but that’s not why I’m fishing.”
“If you don’t want to catch anything then why are you fishing?”
“I fish to relieve stress, to think.”
“Right.” I nod to his back, looking around at the place that holds so many memories for both of us. I turn away from Sy and meander away, my eyes finding the old magnolia in the moonlight. I wander over to it and illuminate my cellphone screen to look at the trunk, nearly fearful that the old heart around our initials has somehow worn away like we did. Without turning to confirm his presence, I say the first thing that comes to mind.