Page 41 of Picking Daisies on Sundays

But the second the words were out, I wanted to pull them back in. My mouth was trying to catch breaths I couldn’t hold. I didn’t know what to say.

He looked at me like I slapped him in the face, and my body was shivering with anger as if I had done just that.

“Well, I’m sorry if you think I’m acting like your brother, but that’s been my job for the past ten years without any choice, so it isn’t exactly easy to not interject when I don’t think you’re being careful. I care about your safety and well-being and need to know that you’re okay at all times. So, if I don’t think you’re safe, I’m not going to be quiet about it for one goddamn second.”

I was completely gutted when he finished talking. His chest was rising and falling. You’d expect anger in his tone based on his words, but all that lingered was sadness. He looked as defeated as I felt regret. I reached forward to apologize but his exhale cut me off.

“If you’re not going to drop him as your advisor, then I’m picking you up after your meetings with him.”

Oh. “That’s not necessary.”

“Maybe you don’t think so, but for my sanity it is. Now let’s go back out there before Rhea thinks we’re actually making babies.”

18

my heart was so full of our memories that it painted

my body like a scrapbook

"I royally screwed up, guys.”

“Yes, that’s obvious.”

“Gabe!” I shouted over the phone, mimicking the tone of a child.

“Well, Dani, you told the boy he’s acting like your brother when he’s been forced into a father role for the entirety of his life because of his dad’s death,” Jia exclaimed. “Your words, not mine,” she added quickly.

“Aghhh, why did I open my mouth?” My hair clip snagged on strands of my hair as I pulled it out in frustration, redoing it.

Sitting face down over my sewing machine trying to finish the last of my dresses while my hair got stuck in my mouth wasn’t the most convenient scenario. I called Gabe and Jia in desperate need of social interaction, putting my phone on speaker while I continued to work on the pleats.

I would’ve called them sooner, but when Levi dropped me off last night, I just wanted the comfort of my bed, a blueberry milk candle, and to send an email to Dad in peace.

“Because you need to voice how you’re feeling or else it’ll all build up, babe,” Gabe reassured me. “Why don’t you just apologize?”

“Because I’m beyond embarrassed,” I groaned.

“What did you usually do when you guys fought in high school?” Jia asked.

I almost ran my finger under the moving needle. “Jia, you’re a genius! I’ve got to go, I’ll text you!” Hanging up before I could forget, I started writing the letter.

When Levi and I fought in high school over me not showing up at his sixteenth birthday, I wrote him a letter. I knew how much he loved the way words strung together into a sentence could sound like a song without the music. And he knew I lacked the ability to form coherent thoughts, so if I took the time to write him a letter, then he'd know I was serious.

I wrote him a three-page letter explaining that when I was half up the walkway to his house for his party, one of the guys made a comment on my clothes and body, laughed, and then walked into the house. It only took me thirty seconds to process his words, another two for the tears and shaking to start, and then sixty for me to run down the street back to my house. Tears painted my face like excess make up that refused to come off. Mom and Mandy—who had been living with us for a year since Dad died—rushed to me with glossy eyes.

I didn’t tell Levi what the kid had said or which kid it was—Brad Harris you suck—but that it was enough for me to feel embarrassed and leave. I definitely didn’t want to see him then, with puffy eyes, and apparently, prude clothes. So I walked back to my house with his present in my arms.

That was the first time I’d ever told him something like that.

I was always nervous that if I shared the unkind words people threw at me, then that’s all they’d associate me with. That’d they begin to notice that my skinwastoo blemished, or that the clothes I madeweretoo cliché, or that Ididdress like a 70-year-old woman who’d given up on life. If I were to tell them what others said, then that’s all they’d see.

So, I never told anyone when I was criticized or mocked. Those memories became skeletons in my closet on every date and every interview and every first impression, knocking on my door to remind me of my flaws. Keeping them in was a protective instinct.

I had dropped off the letter the next day when he had sent me a text over how upset he was that I hadn’t shown up.

He showed up that night teary eyed at my front door, pulling me into a hug, telling me how sorry he was for getting upset. In which I apologized for not telling him what happened in the first place.

He, of course, told me to stop apologizing.