“Your running—”
“You do actually make fun of that.”
“And your numbers—”
I freeze. “What do you mean?”
He narrows his eyes at me. “You recite numbers when you’re nervous.”
“How did you know that?”
“Because I’ve heard you?”
“I do it in my head!”
“And sometimes out loud. What’s the big deal?” He blinks at me.
I had no idea I did that out loud. Enough for Seth, of all people, to notice.
He clears his throat. “Let’s start with that night. Did you see anything or anyone weird? Before or after your fight with Fiona?”
I close my eyes.
Fiona died the night of the Founders’ Day Parade. It was exactly one week before she was leaving for the American Ballet Academy. It was tradition, our whole family going to the parade together. Things had been off between us for months at that point. Fiona had always taken dance seriously, but ever since she’d gotten into that school, it had become her whole life. I felt her pulling away from us as surely as if it were something physical, dragging my heart out of my chest. She never hung out with me anymore, didn’t want to stay up late talking. She was keeping secrets from me. I used to wonder if she was doing it on purpose, pushing all of us out of her life. I told myself we had time. To repair whatever was broken between us. It never occurred to me that time would run out so fast.
That night, instead of coming to the parade, she wanted to stay home and pack for school. In the end, I convinced her to come, but once we got to our spot on the parade route, she wouldn’t stop fidgeting and checking her phone. It was clear she didn’t want to be there. So I snapped at her.
Just admit you didn’t want to come.
Fiona, closing her eyes and then opening them, like I was some kid who didn’t understand. I didn’t want to come, Addie. I told you I have a lot to do before I leave.
And packing is so much more important than spending a few hours with me and Davy.
That’s not what this is! She actually raised her voice, and I felt a twist of satisfaction from getting her to get mad, to react, to do anything other than dance away from me.
She paused. I remember it so clearly. For a second I thought she was really going to tell me why she’d been acting this way. What that fight with Thatcher was about. Why she’d stopped confiding in me.
But then she shook her head. You wouldn’t understand.
So explain it to me! I shouted back.
By then, people were looking. But I didn’t care.
Fiona kept her voice low. Addie. This is about the fact that you don’t want me to go.
Fine! I don’t want you to go!
I’d never said it out loud. But there it was, hanging in the air between us.
Fiona stared. So the thing that’s mattered most to me my whole life, the thing I want most in the world, just means absolutely nothing to you?
Ballet shouldn’t be the thing that matters the most to you your whole life. We should matter the most to you.
She closed her eyes. It felt like another way to shut me out. Addie. I’ve basically been the mom of our family since I was ten. I just can’t do it anymore. I need to live my own life. I’m sorry that upsets you. But that’s your problem, not mine.
Then she turned and walked away from me.
So I hurled the worst words I could think of after her, and then I never spoke to her again.
And I’ve hated myself for it ever since.
“I didn’t see anything weird,” I tell Seth. “People were looking at us, but that’s because I was shouting.”
“So after that, you went and got in your fight with Jeremy?”
I was startled. “How do you know about that?”
“You told me about it. That night. Right here.” He taps the rock we’re sitting on.
I don’t remember telling him about my fight with Jeremy. I don’t remember telling him much of anything, once we started on the cider. “What else do you remember?”
I brace myself for some embarrassing comment, but instead Seth looks thoughtful. “You said you felt bad for wishing Fiona never got the scholarship she needed. You were afraid she’d join some traveling dance company and you’d never see her again. You were also…a little jealous, I think. That Fiona had dance. That Jeremy had football. And you didn’t have anything. You said, ‘Why don’t I know what I love yet?’ ”
I can’t remember telling him that. But I can remember feeling it. Because I still feel it.
“I’ve always remembered that,” he says, half to himself. “ ‘Why don’t I know what I love yet?’ ”
“You love old rocks,” I point out. “And falling-down castles. Anything buried in the ground you can uncover.”