“Okay.” He let out a breath. “I waited this long, how much worse can it get?”
So he wasn’t optimistic, but it was a start.
“Thank you,” I whispered. Then I took a deep breath and changed the subject. “I have something to show you.”
“Oh, so now you have a surprise?”
“Just…follow me.” I grabbed his hand.
We walked towards the firepit and he grabbed a seat.
“Wait here.” I smiled.
He raised an eyebrow. “What’re you up to?”
I went to the garage and grabbed the bag of clothes from my truck, hiding them behind my back so he couldn’t see. When I walked back towards him, he knew something was up.
“C’mon, what’s behind your back? Seriously.”
“Close your eyes,” I said with a grin. “Do it.”
Clay shook his head but did what I told him. I laid the clothes on his lap and said, “I thought you might be tired of wearing clothes that are two sizes too big.”
He looked down at the clothes, and then up at me.
“Anna.” He picked up the dress shirt. “You didn’t have to—”
“I did,” I said, cutting him off. “I had to do something. Plus, you deserve more clothes that aren’t older than both of us put together,” I joked.
I finally got a smile out of him.
“Oh, look! A smile. What timeline is this?”
“I just….” He drew out his words. “Haven’t really gotten a gift before.”
“Well, why don’t you go try them on? There’s a mirror in the garage,” I said, poking the dying fire.
In the garage, I watched Clay button up his new shirt while looking in the mirror. It fit perfectly—I guess the mannequin situation was worth the trouble to see him in clothing that fit.
“It’s a lot more comfortable than your grandfather’s scratchy old sweaters, that’s for sure,” Clay said, throwing the old sweater he had been wearing in my truck. I was glad to see him happy. It wasn’t even about me regaining trust; he just looked good with a smile on his face.
I noticed his braids were looking a little soft, and it didn’t take long for me to grab a hold of them.
“Hey! What are you doing now?”
“Just sit tight for a minute.”
“Oww,” he whined. “What are you—”
“Sit tight,” I said again. I looked around and spotted an upside-down plastic bucket and pushed him down onto it. “I’m fixing your hair. Don’t move.” I ran into the house to find a comb, brush, and other supplies.
When I came back, I didn’t have to see Clay’s face to know he was frowning. I got him to move from the garage to the tree house because he kept whining—it was probably loud enough to wake up Mom and Nan. But the view of the lake wasn’t bad, either.
“You know I’m doing you a favour, right?” I laughed.
As I took my seat behind Clay, I was remembering how my grandmother used to braid my hair. It was all muscle memory. Clay’s hair was kind of long, and I loved it.
“That doesn’t make it fun,” he said with a sigh.
“Stop being such a pessimist, you’re going to look great.”
“If you say so.” He looked towards the water. After a minute, he mentioned, “It’s been a while since we’ve both been up here.”
“I know,” I said, holding a fistful of hair. “You think of it often?”
“It’s one of the only things I think about.”
I paused, hands full of his dark hair. There was the guilt again, using my heart as a doormat. I’m not saying I didn’t deserve to feel it, but it hurt.
“I’m never leaving you again,” I said. “I promise.”
“Don’t promise,” Clay said, picking up a mirror I had brought from inside. “Show.”
He grinned when he saw his reflection. In the background I caught my half smile as I finished up the braids.
“Look how much better this is!” My half grin became whole.
“It is a lot better.” Clay admired my handiwork. “Thank you.”
“Any time.” My eyes drifted away from our reflections, and back to the journal, which was sitting on the floor of the tree house.
“You wanna go back, don’t you?” he asked.
“How’d you know?”
“I can feel whenever the journal is open,” he said. “You found Rudy’s passages, didn’t you?”
I nodded. “I did.”
“You could always just read them, y’know.”
“I….” I was so embarrassed to say. “I never learned cursive.”
“Well, luckily you have me.” Clay picked up the journal. “Rudy wrote those entries long before you ever wrote about me, but I feel his memories inside of me as much as yours.” He paused. “I assume you wanna go back and see for yourself, right?”
“Is that wrong? He never liked talking about his childhood. He always kept quiet about it. I want to respect that. But I also miss him so, so much.”
“You know he ripped some of the pages out, right?”
“Yeah, I saw. Why would he do that?” Was he trying to hide something?
“I wish I knew, but they were ripped out well before I came about.” Clay turned to another page. “But he has other things in there, not just about himself.”
I perked up at that. “Like what?”
“Let me show you.” Clay extended his hand in my direction as his eyes turned blue. I hesitated, but I trusted him. I extended my hand….
The starry sky, the tree house, the lake, and the sound of crickets all vanished. We were surrounded by darkness. I looked over at him, and a bright blue energy resonated around us.
The stars reappeared around a half moon. Small buildings rose from the darkness as a street appeared and street lights turned on. Everything was still.
It looked similar to downtown Yarmouth, but was clearly some time ago. The roads had fewer potholes, and the buildings were in better shape. The street lights looked entirely different—not straight and silver, but tall, black, and curly. This was way more than a couple years ago.
“Woah.” I looked around. “This is…downtown, isn’t it?”
“It is.”
