Page 45 of The Breakup Artists

“What about your sister?” she asks, and my heart nearly stops. I’ve never mentioned Des in a case before, much less talked about her like I did that day at the pool. Ella must be able to read the discomfort on my face because she doesn’t wait for my answer. “Sorry, you don’t have to answer that—”

“No, it’s fine,” I lie, and this time our seat moves fluidly and doesn’t stop. “I’m just... not that good at talking about her.” Another truth.

Ella watches me, and the open-air seat suddenly feels confining.

But instead of being awkward or spewing platitudes, she says, “I get it.” And for a few seconds we stare out over the glowing lights of the carnival, quiet and contemplative. “I lost my grandmother a year and a half ago.”

Now I look at her. How did I not know this? Her parents never said anything, and there was no hint of it on her social media.

“It’s funny,” she says, stretching her slender fingers around the cool metal bar. “When you asked me who my best friend was, she was the first person who popped into my head. Stupid, right? To have your best friend be your grandmother who isn’t even here anymore?” She looks up at me, and her expression is one I haven’t seen. She’s not her showy, popular self or her combative, humorous self; she’s raw and vulnerable, carefully handing me something important she hopes I won’t crush.

“Not stupid at all,” I say, finding my voice. “Do you still talk to her? I mean—”

“I know what you mean,” she says, relief in her voice. “And yeah, I talk to her all the time. Do you? With your sister?”

“Yeah,” I admit. “More than I want to, sometimes.” My thoughts immediately flit to my line drawings, which were the kind of thing I used to leave for Des with a note or slipped into one of her books when she wasn’t looking. She loved them and used to gush when she found one. She dubbed them our little secret and declared them her favorite gift ever. Which is why I now hate them, even the imaginary version, because every time I think one up, I’m reminded there is no one to give it to.

As if to torment me, my mind begins doing the one thing I wish it wouldn’t.

“Alone isn’t a location, it’s a feeling,” I say to the clouds, but no one answers.

“Like something good happens and she’s the first person you think of?” Ella asks, and I’m relieved to have a distraction from my own thoughts. “Or something bad happens and you want her advice?” Her voice catches at the end of her sentence, and I feel it in my own throat.

“My sister was four years older than me,” I say. “In some ways she was more a mother to me than my mom.”

Again, we fall into heavy silence, wordlessly rotating.

She stares at her hands on the bar before looking up at me. “Do you think it ever gets easier?”

“No,” I say, and she sighs like I gave her the answer she was looking for, like someone finally told the truth. And for a long second neither of us breaks eye contact.

“Nonna’s actually the one who encouraged me to create my astrology blog,” she tells me, and I know by her tone that this matters. “She drew my birth chart when I was a little girl, and she’d spend hours explaining all the bits and pieces to me.”

It makes me feel oddly good that she’s confiding in me. “Sounds like she was a pretty great grandmother.”

“She really, really was. She made everything fun. And she always listened. My parents... not so much. I mean, don’t get me wrong, they care, but they never had time for me the way Nonna did.”

For a moment August overtakes Holden, and I hand her a piece of my world in exchange for hers. “My mom was the one who taught me how to paint. She’s good. Exceptionally so. But when I’d give her a painting, she’d talk to me about technique, teach me a new skill. Des never cared about that.” And while I made the conscious choice to tell her something real, the sound of Des’s name on my lips startles me.

“Des...” she says, considering my sister’s name like she recognizes it for the fragile piece of my heart that it represents. “I like that.”

I can only nod.

Ella leans back, relaxing into the seat. “Sometimes you just need someone who hears you.”

I press my lips together. I know I should be talking, agreeing with her, but I don’t trust my own voice.

“Oh man,” she says, like she realizes we crossed into heavier territory and is trying to pull us back. “Are we having a heart-to-heart on a Ferris wheel? Can you get any cheesier than that?”

“A heart-to-heart in a canoe under the stars?” I offer as a joke, happy to be on sturdier ground.

But instead of laughing, she looks at me like she’s seeing me for the first time. “Holy crap, you’re a hopeless romantic.”

“What?” I choke, the August side of me taken by surprise.

She laughs. “You are. You claim not to understandRomeo and Juliet, but no one who wasn’t a romantic would even think something like that.”

“Wrong and also wrong,” I say, not even sure why I decide to argue. What does it matter if she thinks Holden is a hopeless romantic?