Page 92 of One Last Summer
She looked up at me, glowing. “I was wrong. That? Just now? Was genius. That was fucking going rogue.”
“Well, I probably should get out of here before I change my mind and go rogue on going rogue,” I said, digging into my bag for my phone. My fingers brushed up against something smooth and round and I tugged it loose, holding it up in the morning sunlight.
The medal.
I’d left it with Mack in his Jeep a few days ago; a peace offering, a sign that I believed in him, completely and unconditionally. And somehow he’d slipped it back to me, just like we’d always done. Except this time, I knew it meant something different. Or at least, I hoped it did.
I’m rooting for you.
“Clara?” Lydia asked. “Are you okay?”
“I’m fine,” I said slowly, dropping the medal around my neck. “Actually, no, I’m not fine.”
“Wait, you’re not?” She winced in confusion.
“I’m great. I’m really great, actually. And I need to get to New Hampshire.”
“I can split an Uber with you back to your apartment,” she said. “Help you pack?”
“Yeah,” I said, thinking. “I just need to hurry because, you know, there’s a baby coming.”
“I can move fast,” she agreed, already tapping on the Uber app on her phone. “I’ll get us a car.”
“Hey, Lydia, let me ask you something,” I said, an idea twenty years in the making solidifying in my brain in real-time.
“Sure,” she said, glancing up at me expectantly, still in assistant mode even though I was no longer her boss. “What’s up?”
“Have you ever cut anyone’s hair?”
39
EXACTLY THREE HOURS after I’d hugged Lydia goodbye in front of my building and gunned my Prius through the streets of Boston and onto the highway, I was at the hospital, clomping through the lobby in the heeled sandals that I’d worn to Alewife this morning.
“Can I help you?” The bearded, white-haired man behind the reception desk peered up at me from behind his glasses.
“Oh,” I huffed with an anxious exhale, slowing down for the first time today long enough to notice that my heart was bouncing in my chest like a pinball machine, shoulders tight and pinched. Even my butt muscles were, well, clenched. “Yes, please. I have a friend in the maternity ward?”
He pointed a long finger toward the hallway to his left. “Waiting room is thataway,” Hospital Santa said and then looked back down at his computer screen.
I hustled off, following the trail of flickering overhead lights down the hallway and around the corner, which emptied out into a waiting room that was decidedly more cheerful than the one we’d crashed in a few nights ago. Cozy couches were positioned around a coffee table, and the walls were a soothing, inoffensive yellow.
And in the middle of the room was Eloise, pacing in a circle as she inhaled a Snickers bar.
“El!” I called, bolting toward her.
“OhmahgodClawa,” she said through a full mouth, collapsing against me as I caught her in a hug. “I’m so glad you made it.”
“Me too, how is she?” I rushed.
Eloise took a step back, gawking at me. “What. The. Fuck. Did you do to your hair?”
“I had my assistant cut it today.” I reached up and felt around the jagged edges where Lydia had attempted her best “French bob,” based on pictures she’d pulled up on her phone during the Uber ride to my apartment. “We didn’t have much time, so she kinda hacked it off in like, two chops. I might have had a little bit of a midlife crisis this morning. But it’s all good. I’m good.”
“I like it. I’ve just never seen you with short hair.” She took another bite, pausing to admire Lydia and my kitchen shears’ handiwork. “It’s, like, crazy uneven, but maybe that’s what’s cool right now?”
“I think you of all people would know if something was cool,” I said, my face breaking out into a massive grin. I was so happy to be back with my friends.
She swatted me away, pretending to be bashful.
