Page 50 of A Thousand Little Goodbyes

I don’t deserve her, either. None of us do, but that doesn’t stop us from taking what we can anyway.

“Is…everything okay?” Mitchell asked, looking back and forth between them. “Are we going to the party now?”

“It’s up to Scarlett,” Grimshaw said. He shrugged in a way that showed just how little he understood about this situation, his girlfriend, the whole freaking world. “If she wants to ruin all Chrissie’s plans over a few hundred bucks that her parents can definitely afford, I’m not going to stop her.”

In that moment, Scarlett desperately wished she was the kind of person who would get on that bus—who could stick to the force of her convictions and refuse to take anything else from the friend who’d already given her so much.

But she wasn’t. She wasn’t even close. In the end, she was just another greedy, self-important, boring-ass Grimshaw Pemberly.

“No, we can wait until Chrissie is ready.” Scarlett’s voice sounded defeated even to her own ears. “She’s obviously put a lot of time and effort into this party. The least we can do is show up when she’s asked us to.”

“Thatta girl.” Grimshaw slung his arm over Scarlett’s shoulderand led her back into the bookstore. He squeezed as though to say he understood just how far she’d fallen—and just how willing she was to accept this state. “Now let’s go get you a cheap, trashy romance novel—emphasis on the ‘cheap.’ If we don’t at leastpretendto make it look like I care enough about you to get you a birthday present, then we’re both screwed.”

Chapter SeventeenBlack River Falls, Wisconsin

Present Day

The three-hour drive from the chain hotel to their first stop at Black River Falls—home of the Karner Blue Butterfly Festival—was one of the longest of Chrissie’s life.

She wished she was a teenager like River, who could simply plug in a pair of headphones as a way to avoid interaction with her fellow passengers, or a professional talker like Scarlett, who could while away the time in an endless stream of chatter that conveyed both nothing and everything, but she wasn’t.

She was a suburban single mom who’d spent the better part of the night crying into her pillow—and she both looked and felt the part.

“According to this, Black River Falls is the place to be if you want to go fishing or if you’re in witness protection and want to make sure the Mafia never finds you to finish the job they started.” Scarlett folded up her map and tossed it in the back seat, narrowly missing River in the process. “Personally, I’d choose somewhere like Florida if I had to go into hiding from the mob. Not only is it a hell of a lot warmer than this place, but you could easily get lost in the crowd. The best youcould do here is slip on a black bear costume and hope a hunter takes you out before a hit man does.”

Chrissie parked the car in a lot designated for daily ATV use and sat with her hands on the wheel. Long after the engine stopped purring, she found herself unable to move from that position, her hands locked in their ten and two positions.

“Sooo,” Scarlett said, imbuing the word with enough syllables to make all three of them feel uncomfortable. “Did you need to use the restroom, or are we just here for the view? Because I gotta say—at the very least, I expect a water feature if we’re going to do some local sightseeing.”

“River, could you please give us a minute?” Chrissie said by way of answer. She didn’t move her hands, but she did manage to toss a tight smile over her shoulder at the girl. “I know there’s not much to do here, but—”

“Say no more.” River had the door open and was halfway out before Chrissie could finish her sentence. “I saw some bored-looking guys over by the entrance. At this point, I figure I’m better off with them than stuck another minute between the two of you.”

Chrissie felt an immediate sense of guilt and was about to protest, but Scarlett’s rich chuckle stopped her short. “Sorry, River. We haven’t been very good company, have we? We’ll have a loud, cathartic airing of our grievances and be back to normal for the next leg of the trip.”

Chrissie didn’t share her friend’s amusement. Loud catharsis had never been her way of dealing with problems, and Scarlett knew it.

Naturally, that didn’t stop Scarlett from making the attempt.

“So much for being a caretaker,” she said as she pushed her seat back and gave a languid stretch. In honor of her medical condition being outed, she’d opted to wear a formfitting tank top for the day. It highlighted not only her too-thin frame, but also the fact that she wasn’t wearing one of her prosthetic bras.

And why would she? The cat was out of the bag, the lies exposed. And Scarlett, in true Scarlett fashion, now only wanted to put it behind her. Her past was a graveyard of all the skeletons that had been ripped unceremoniously from her closet and just as unceremoniously discarded once they’d been freed.

“It’s not like this was unexpected,” Scarlett added in a voice that was far too irreverent. “Mantle field irradiation is a bitch. They told me that when I was a kid, and they’ve continued telling me every year since. I should’ve had my stupid boobs removed years ago and saved myself the trouble, but you know how vain I am.”

Chrissie was in no mood to be charmed. “It’s not funny. When were you going to tell me? Why did you go through all that on your own?”

“I didn’t. Mitchell was with me for most of it. He’s been a real sweetheart during the whole process.”

It was a good thing Chrissie was sitting down, because that bit of news—dropped like an anvil to the head—would have knocked her flat.

“You’re talking to Mitchell again? Since when?”

“I wouldn’t say thattalkinghas been our primary activity.” Scarlett laughed and slid a hand over to forestall Chrissie from jumping out of the car—a thing she hadn’t even realized she was in danger of doing until she felt the press of her friend’s palm. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t joke about that. If Mitchell hadn’t been there to ferry me to doctor’s appointments and force-feed me protein shakes, I probably would have broken down and called you. But he got a job at some tech company in San Jose last year, so hewasthere. And I hoped…”

She let her voice trail off and slid her hand from Chrissie’s. For what was probably the first time since they’d started this trip, the insouciant mask slipped away and she looked exactly like what she was—a thirty-four-year old woman battling cancer for the second time. The pixie-short hair, which had looked so chic a few days ago, now spoke of a struggle to grow back what had likely been lost to chemo. Theway she slept all of two hours a night said the same thing. Scarlett had never been able to close her eyes when there was even a slight chance it might be the last time.

“I’m glad you had someone,” Chrissie said and meant it. She meant the next part, too. “I just wish that someone had been me.”