Page 43 of Never Forever

The commercial made my mom happy, so I said yes. An apology for hurting her the other night. The money was good and I could leave them with some cushion before I left for Boston. I would miss graduation, but I didn’t care. I was ready to leave high school and start my life.

Matt drove me to the airport in Portland.

“Are you sure everything is okay?” I asked him, breaking the silence that surrounded him.

“Yeah,” he said heavily. He flashed me a smile but it wasn’t very convincing. “I’m sure.”

“This is only for a few weeks. Then I’ll be back and we’re on our way to Boston.”

“Yep,” he nodded, looking at the road in front of him.

I bit my bottom lip. “It feels like you’re still mad at me,” I said. I told him that I had the conversation with Mom. That I laid it all on the line and she didn’t like it but she seemed to accept it. “It feels like I’ve let you down.”

It felt like I’d let everyone down. Like I couldn’t do anything right.

He pulled the truck up to the departure area for the airline I was flying. Portland wasn’t a busy airport so there was no traffic behind us.

He turned to me, his arm stretched across the back of the truck seat. “You didn’t let me down, Carrie. You told your mom the truth and that’s all I wanted.”

“Good. Yes. Because I could never be embarrassed of you, Matt Sullivan. I love you and we’re going to have a freaking awesome life together.”

He smiled. A real smile. A believable smile and it felt like everything was going to be okay.

“I’ll call you,” I said.

He threw the truck into park, grabbed my luggage from the back and set it down on the curb. I hugged him and when I lifted my face to his I thought I saw something sad in his eyes, but it was gone when he kissed me.

“Knock ‘em dead,” he said, running his thumbs across my cheeks.

“It’s a toothpaste commercial,” I reminded him. There would be no knocking anything.

“Then smile them dead,” he joked.

“I love you,” I called with a wave over my shoulder.

It wasn’t until I was sitting at the gate that it occurred to me, he hadn’t said it back.

10

When He Broke Both Their Hearts

Four Weeks Later

Carrie

Annie was hugging me like she’d never let me go. I was hugging her back the same way.

“You can visit,” I told her. “Maybe come to school in Boston. There are so many great universities.”

She burrowed against me harder. She’d taken the ferry with me because she wasn’t ready to say goodbye back at the house.

It was officially my last day in Calico Cove.

Gran had given me a joint and some sound life advice about always having my head on a swivel. My mother had taken to her room with another sudden migraine.

“Don’t worry about Mom,” Annie said. “She’ll be fine. She just wants to make a scene.”

“I feel bad leaving you with her,” I said. Mom’s emotional blackmail had only gone into hyperdrive the last month.