Hazel, the most artistic of the bunch, was tasked with keeping Teddy out of the way while also providing Nichole with creative supervision. “Is there any particular organizational pattern you want to follow for this?” she asked.
Bridget hummed along to the upbeat pop music as she smeared a fresh coat of glue onto a picture that Amy had cut into the shape of a heart. “Our life never was very orderly,” she admitted. “We just took each day as it came.”
Nobody said anything, waiting to see if Bridget had more that she needed to get off her chest.
“I just want all the pictures in the book. It doesn’t matter how you organize them. I trust you.” Bridget offered a sweet smile, but Amy saw right through it.
“You know you don’t have to be fake with us, right?” Nichole said, failing to accept the photo Bridget handed her way. “You can talk about what you’re feeling.”
Bridget sighed. “What I’m feeling is that I need to finish this project, and I need my friends to help me. Is that okay with you?”
“Of course, B,” Amy said, inserting herself right in the middle of what could easily escalate into a fight. “Whatever you want. Today’s your day.”
She picked up her scissors again and tried not to notice the way the people in the photos smiled and laughed as if nothing bad could ever happen. Had Bridget’s mother known her life would be cut painfully short? Had she suspected her daughter would want to cover their memories in rhinestones and washi tape without taking a single moment to revisit the good times they’d shared?
That was when she finally got it.
This scrapbooking exercise wasn’t meant to be fun.
It was a second burial.
Chapter 4
Bridget wrapped her arms tight around Amy, who accepted the windpipe-crushing hug with grace. “Are you sure you can’t stay for the bonfire?” she asked with a pout.
“Tomorrow’s my last day off before going back to school,” Amy explained once Bridget finally let her go and moved on to hug the others. “I still have a ton of work to do to make sure I’m ready for the kids.”
“Lucky,” Bridget muttered. “I missed the start of the new college semester by nearly a month. At this rate, I’ll be, like, thirty before I finally get my DVM.”
“Hey,” Nichole scolded. “There is nothing wrong with being, like, thirty.”
“Call me if you need anything,” Hazel said, giving Bridget a quick peck on the cheek. It seemed she had become the de facto peacekeeper now that Amy had dropped the ball.
Maybe that was the best place to start—getting back to normal with her friends—so that everything else could get back to normal, too.
“You can always call me, too,” Amy added. “Anytime, night or day.”
Bridget rolled her eyes at their concern. “Guys, I’m fine. Seriously. Stop worrying so much.”
Of course, this declaration only made Amy worry more. After a couple tense hours scrapbooking, Bridget had dragged everyone outside to play fetch with Teddy in the deep snow; then they took him on a walk, packed up the buffet, and tidied the kitchen. Always moving. Always doing something. No time for mourning or accepting the tearful condolences of her other guests.
It all made Amy dizzy. Exhausted, too.
Despite their frantic coming and going, the world outside stood quiet and still. Thick layers of snow covered every visible surface. Late January in Alaska was brutal, but being native to the state, Amy knew how to make the best of the long winters and the impossibly long days that came with summer. The hardest part was switching between the two. Maybe that was part of what was going on with Bridget. She didn’t know how to mourn, to transition from death to life, so she simply chose not to.
Of course, poor Keith had been abandoned to the relatives while Bridget whipped her other friends back and forth all over the house, yard, and neighborhood. As he drove them all back to the church to collect their cars now, Amy couldn’t help but ask how he and the others felt about Bridget’s oddly cheery demeanor that day.
“I get why you’re worried. I do,” Nichole said. “But it’s not like Bridget is acting any different from normal. She’s always giggly, bouncy, happy-go-lucky.”
Hazel weighed in next. Her voice was hard to hear as it drifted back from the front seat. “She’ll reach out if she needs us. She promised she would.”
Despite remaining separate from them all day, only Keith shared Amy’s concern. “Everyone handles the loss in their own way. From what you’re saying, it sounds like maybe Bridget isn’t ready to deal with it yet. Eventually, she will, though. And, luckily, she has great friends to help her through it.”
“Yes, she does,” Hazel said, rubbing her hand back and forth over Keith’s shoulder.
The car fell quiet, the only sounds the tires crunching over ice and snow while the heater struggled to provide the necessary warmth. It was such an extreme shift from the boisterousness of Bridget’s party that Amy almost had to laugh.
“It feels like an era ended today,” she confessed, wondering if her friends felt it, too—if any of them felt stuck the way she did these days. “It makes me a little sad.”
“Better sad than sad and guilty,” Nichole shot back. “Every day I thank God my dad got better, but then I wonder why he was spared when none of your parents were.”
“Hey, there’s no guilt here,” Hazel said soothingly with a soft, clucking sound. “We’re so happy that you don’t have to go through this, too.”
Nichole sighed, a gesture that angered Amy given the circumstances. “It feels like I missed something important,” she mumbled. “Like I’m out of the club.”
Amy wrinkled her nose, trying so hard to hold back the words she already felt forming in her chest. No. Nichole had taken this too far. She needed to say something. “Are you actually looking for sympathy because your dad didn’t die? Please tell me that you’re not wishing he did so that you’d fit in better.”
Nichole sucked air in through her teeth, eyeing Amy with a mix of shock and sorrow. “No, it’s not that. I—”
But Amy wasn’t falling for it. “You what? You want us to feel sorry for you when any one of us would kill—kill!—to be in your position?”
“Jeez. Relax, Amy,” Hazel said, turning around in the front seat to shoot daggers her way. “That’s not what Nichole meant, and you know it.”
“Then Nichole should say what she means,” Amy spat. “Between Bridget acting like nothing’s wrong and Nichole acting like everything is, I’m tapped out. At least Bridget isn’t begging for us to feel sorry for her good luck.”
Nichole sniffled into the same tissue Amy had loaned her earlier. Had she really made the toughest of her friends cry? Just as she’d suspected earlier, things certainly wouldn’t ever be normal again.
Regardless, it wasn’t like Amy to be cruel. Even when people deserved it, she still had a smile and kind word for everyone. The last thing she wanted to do was lash out at her friends, to push them away.
Nichole, however, beat her to an apology. “I’m sorry,” she said with another sniff.
“Me, too,” Amy parroted. She was sorry for how she’d acted, but was she really sorry about what she’d said? Her anger with Nichole had been festering ever since her father got the clean-for-now bill of health. Would that rage have eventually consumed her if not given an outlet tonight?