Page 3 of Only and Forever
Ziggy turns bright red. Seb wiggles his eyebrows as he throws an arm around the back of her chair.
“So,” Ollie continues, “I told her you weren’t in Escondido. According to phone tracking, you were poking around Culver City. And, in fact, you hadn’t been to Escondido for the past seven weeks.”
“You two have a disturbing lack of boundaries,” Axel mutters.
Rooney beams a smile our way. “I think it’s adorable.”
I scowl at Oliver. I used to think it was pretty adorable, too, but I’m not such a big fan now that it means my family knows my migratory patterns have changed. It means they’re going to be sniffing around me even more, and if they happen to follow me, catch me at the—
No. I’m getting ahead of myself. My family wouldn’t follow me. We’re a debatably overengaged bunch, but no one’sthatfar in each other’s business.
Except maybe me. And I’m me, so I don’t have to worry about following myself.
“Well then,” Oliver says, setting his chin on his clasped hands, smiling sweetly. “We’re all ears. Go on.”
I glance around the room, my family’s side conversations now brought to a stop. All eyes are on me.
As much as I want to confess and unburden myself, I can’t make myself share this risk I’m taking, this hope I have that could fail andfall apart. Not yet, not when I’m already so raw from this family staycation that brought Ziggy’s boyfriend here, declaring his feelings, making their relationship official and leaving me surrounded for the first time byeveryonein my family being happily paired off.
“What can I say?” Scooping up a handful of pistachios and throwing them back, I tell them around my bite, “Escondido’s zoo is killer. I can’t stop going back.”
Everyone groans and grumbles, going back to their conversations.
“You don’t believe me?” I ask.
“No!” they all yell.
I snort a laugh, chewing my pistachios, as that bittersweet bubble of being loved yet lonely swells inside me. I adore my family. I’m grateful for them. And I also feel further from them than I ever have before, because of how their lives have shifted while mine has remained fixed.
For now, just a little longer, I’m going to keep my secret.
Ding-dong.
The A-frame’s doorbell ring echoes, silencing conversation once again. Ziggy shoots up from her chair and squeals happily. “They’re back!”
“They” are Ziggy’s childhood best friend, Charlie, and her partner, Gigi. Ziggy met Charlie Clarke when we were young, right after Charlie and her siblings moved to Washington with their mother during their parents’ first acrimonious divorce (they have since divorced and remarried each other twice—it’s a bit of a mess, according to Ziggy). Knowing my sister and Charlie’s history, I wasn’t surprised when Charlie showed up with Gigi earlier this week to celebrate Ziggy’s birthday, which, in addition to enjoying a spring break of sorts, is why all the family’s here. Whatdidsurprise me was when Charlie pulled me aside this morning over coffee and asked me for a favor that sent me spinning sideways.
Charlie, my baby sister’s best friend, looked at me with those big hazel eyes and asked me for a favor I couldn’t refuse:
“My sister,” Charlie said, “her life has sort of blown up lately, and I’m worried about her, so I’m going to try to bring her here. I have to dosomething, and I feel like if I bring her here, it might help. You Bergmans can make anything better. If she says yes, if she comes, will you help me?”
“How?” I asked.
Charlie smiled, bright and trusting. “Just by being you. Put a smile on her face for me. She needs someone to make her smile. If anyone can do that, it’s you.”
It was on the tip of my tongue to explain how much harder that was going to be than Charlie thought. But that would have required admitting something I was much too proud to admit:
I’d already tried to make Tallulah Clarke smile, years ago. And I’d failed.
“Did Ziggy mention,” I ask Seb, “if Charlie and Gigi were... bringing anyone else back with them?”
Seb frowns at his tiles, rearranging them in their tray. “No. Why?”
I don’t know how to answer that without giving myself, or the secret favor Charlie asked of me, away.
Seb peers up, clearly curious about my silence, and rakes back his dark wavy hair, frown deepening as his sharp gray eyes lock on me. “Viggo. Why?”
Ziggy grips the front door’s handle and wrenches it open. I lean back in my chair, tipping onto its two rear legs, craning for a better view.