30 | wendy collier

CHAPTER THIRTY | WENDY COLLIER

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As days go by and I get busier, losing any opportunity to care about anything else other than not falling apart and falling behind on schedule, I realize something important, courtesy of my surprisingly fulfilling conversation with Mrs. Chang. Difficult conversations won't stop being difficult or disappear from existence just because you don't feel ready for them.

Much like how I know now that hardships don't necessarily have to build character or make you stronger, I also know that these confrontations, for lack of a better word, don't need to be planned in advance to the most infinitesimally small detail or be fulfilling to complete their purpose or enlighten you about your past, your present, and your future. Sometimes, you just have to have them if you want to move forward with your life, no matter the size or the importance of the obstacle.

Even my conversation with Claudia during the New Year's Eve party, one that wasn't predicted or considered, served its purpose. Though I can't call us close friends and I still sense a slight cold distance between us, especially when her other friends are around, she's still someone I feel at ease around, and it's taken me months to feel this way around people besides my family and my closest friends in Juneau.

It brought to light issues I wasn't aware of before, behavior that I don't think is appropriate. Most of what I do now is excused by a deep desire to protect myself from potential threats, but I never stop to think about how it comes off to other people, regardless of whether they're aware of this and my past or not.

I knew I didn't talk to Claudia for a period of time there, out of fear she'd judge me for running out on her, but I didn't think about how she'd feel about getting the cold shoulder out of the blue. I don't want to feel bad for choosing myself and my well-being for once, so I don't, but I also make a mental note to be more considerate of other people moving forward. Balance. Balance is good.

Giving people a chance also involves giving myself a chance. It involves granting myself forgiveness that shouldn't even be needed in the first place, but the thing about guilt is that it's not always proportional to the trigger. It involves placing myself in someone else's shoes, even all those other Final Girls; I would never blame them for surviving something that awful, so why am I punishing myself for it?

It's not a perfect solution and there are times when it doesn't work, as my anxious brain can always find flaws in my train of thought to use against me, not to mention how cognitively demanding it is to fight against deep-rooted belief systems. I try to convince myself it matters that I'm at least trying instead of giving up after the first disappointment, and sometimes that has to be good enough.

Forgiving myself, in turn, involves forgiving myself for the little things, not just the biggest conflict of my life. When I realize I've forgotten about Doctor Albott's birthday, I come back during the session immediately after with a cream cheese bagel in a paper bag, wondering about whether it's inappropriate to give your therapist a belated birthday gift or not, and swallow my embarrassment.

"You didn't have to get me anything," she tells me, with polite caution.

"Is this inappropriate?" I ask, fidgeting with the anti-anxiety ring on my thumb instead of biting my nails. "I feel like it's very inappropriate. I'm sorry."

"It's debatable. At least it's a bagel and not, like, expensive jewelry, or something, which I definitely couldn't accept. A bagel, though . . ." She opens the paper bag, peers inside to determine whether it's poisoned or not, and calmly sets it aside. "It's ethically questionable whether therapists can accept gifts from their patients, but I don't think this will affect our therapist-patient relationship too much. It's thoughtful of you."

I sit back, attempt to relax, and it ultimately falls flat. Though I thought I was just doing something nice for her, the one time I needed my brain to anticipate the consequences, it failed me. I don't want this to be the thing that completely wrecks my relationship with her, after how hard we've worked to build it up, after all the effort I've put into believing in her, into trusting her, into using that belief and trust in her to help me believe and trust myself, but it's also a harsh reminder of how quickly things can go sour.

I don't focus much on what we discuss during our session, unable to ignore the way my chest cramps whenever I think about how she can send me packing over a bagel. It sounds so idiotic, so small that it's genuinely embarrassing; the way it completely ruined my mood and my afternoon should be studied. It's that easy.

"I really don't want you to obsess over this, Wendy," she tells me, in lieu of a proper goodbye, see you next session, thanks for your time, and all that. My breath is hitched halfway up my throat, blurring the edges of my vision, and my hand instinctively reaches for the door. "Giving me a bagel isn't the end of the world. Cravings are weird in that way." When I look at her, she sets a hand on her protruding belly, and I wonder how I could have possibly missed a pregnancy. I've been seeing her for months, and still fail to remember she has a personal life outside of her office. "It's fine, I promise. I'm not ending our sessions because of this."

"I'm sorry I missed your birthday," I blurt out. Her eyes drill deep into mine, like she can see my neurons processing information through those little electric shocks. "And your pregnancy, too. I've been so caught up with . . . everything that's been going on in my life that I've had a hard time being present for other people. Balance, and all. I know that's important."

"Putting yourself first sometimes is important too, you know."

I sniffle, wiping away the stubborn tears building up at the corners of my eyes with the heels of my hands, partially covered by my sleeves. "Does it matter, though? Every time I'm not focusing on myself, I'm screwing things up. My first instinct after all this was to run away. Final room my ass."

She doesn't even blink at my borderline vulgar language. "Sometimes, there is no final room. Not physically, at least." Her lips curve into a gentle smile. "Running the risk of sounding terribly cliché, sometimes the final room is one you carry along with you. It's your home away from your physical home. What comes to mind when you think about that?"

One thing she's good at, it's at delivering devastating lines that force me to do a double take, even when I'm already standing by the door once my forty-five minutes are up. Even then, I stop and think about what she's saying, my home away from home, what remains constant.

A few months ago, I was drifting, shipwrecked in the middle of a stormy ocean. My only lifelines had been lost to the current, and there was nothing for me to hang on to, no sliver of hope to get me through it, but I still pushed myself to the limit and got out—not completely unscathed, but alive. I survived. Furious at the world and at myself, I couldn't allow myself to show off any vulnerabilities that could be exploited and endanger me.

In the rare bursts of light, the ones I tentatively reached out towards, I saw my parents. Sidney. Then, Betty. Odette. Even Callum, in his own way. People who have my back, who have seen me at my worst, and still stayed. As more and more light finds its way inside the shack I've been slowly building up for the past few months, there's always something missing, something I've been debating whether to leave the door open for or not. Seaweed clings to the walls, sea foam lingers on the tip of my tongue. It reminds me of the perils outside, of the raging sea, of everything I have lost and can't ever get back.

However, that's not the truth. Not the full truth, anyway.

There are days when it's calmer outside, when I can leave the windows open and enjoy the light weight of the sea breeze, smell the rust growing on the hinges of the door. The sun enters freely then, easily weaving through the cracks on the boards, and the creaks of the floor when I walk across the room don't scare me anymore. The cliffs are steady.

This time, I open the door. I run straight to my brother.

"Xavier," I say.

"What are you waiting for, then?" She gestures towards the door. "Go home."

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Home can be many things, I've found.

It's not necessarily the home you've spent your childhood years in, the house where you grew up, or the house you've been whisked away to for your own good. It's not necessarily the house where your boyfriend lived, or the house your best friend always wanted to turn her back on and grow out of.

Going home today means sliding to the passenger seat of Betty's car, as usual, after having to cross the parking lot under the pouring rain. This time, Betty is prepared, and there's a towel covering the backseats so Sidney won't drip water all over the place, so we're all feeling pretty cozy and appreciated this afternoon. The warmth on my chest spreads even further when she raises a paper bag, identical to the one I've just dropped at Doctor Albott's office, and my stomach growls the second my brain processes the sweet, spicy scent of cinnamon and gingerbread biscuits.

"I went back and got them for you during your therapy appointment so you'd have something to eat once you got out," she tells me. My heart has melted, pooling in the hollow of my throat, and this should be the moment when I put my feelings into words and tell her I love her, but I don't, like the ugly coward that I am. "How was therapy?"

"Stressful," I confess, reaching out into the bag to grab a biscuit. "Doctor Albott is pregnant, so that part of her appreciates the bagel, which is nice. Unfortunately, I failed to account for the unethical nature of giving your therapist a gift."

Her smile falls. "Oh. Oh, no. What did she say? Did she refuse it?"

"She thanked me for it, and I think she'll eat it, but I don't know. It felt weird. I spent the entire time thinking I'd screwed everything up, damned all our progress." I lean the back of my head against the seat, the heat of the gingerbread scorching my throat. "I don't know, it was stupid. I felt like an idiot for mulling over it, even when she told me it was fine, but that wasn't even the worst part."

"Do you want to talk about it?"

I shake my head. "I'm making it sound a lot more dramatic than it actually is, but . . ."

I take a deep breath, inhale all the foam again, and lay it on her, knowing she'll get it—at least partially. Trusting Betty with this information, fully aware it gets the gears in her head turning with the influence of her true crime fanaticism, is something I would've laughed at months ago.

When I'm done, she's quiet, staring right at the road ahead of us, and only speaks when we're stopped behind a long line of cars at a red light.

She turns to me. "Talk to him. I know I've been pushing you to do it for a while now, but I think this is the right time. You're in the right headspace."

"I'll be at the right headspace some other time, too."

"See, I've also heard you say that several times, and you never go through with it. If you don't do it now, you'll keep postponing it and finding new excuses to not do it. I know you, Wendy. Stop sulking."

"I'm not sulking."

"Yes, you are. Just do it. You'll feel a lot better."

She takes my hand, resting by my knee, and a quick jolt of electricity shoots up my nerves. She doesn't notice it, still staring at the road while I'm staring at her, and something in my brain shifts. I think I see her differently, from an angle I'm not used to—the glow of the streetlights reflecting off her hair, like a living flame, the freckles speckled across her cheeks.

Oh. Oh.

Home, sometimes, is the redheaded girl driving you around town. Home is the way her fingers fit around yours in a way you didn't think possible.

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It's Xavier's day (well, night) off, so I'm convinced the universe is plotting in favor of us finally having this conversation. It also means I can't keep ignoring all the signs pointing me towards it, almost desperately so, and I reluctantly stagger out of Betty's car towards the lit front porch, Sidney in tow.

"Don't judge me," I ask her. She tilts her head to the side, then presses her nose against the curve of my knee to urge me to keep moving towards the warmth of the living room. She all but shoves me aside once she notices Xavier is inside, pacing around the living room to stoke the flames in the fireplace, and I know there's no going back from this.

Xavier is as eager to talk as he is to stick his hand inside a blender, which I completely understand and sympathize with, as my own feelings aren't much different from his, but we both find ourselves sitting across from each other. Sidney occupies the space in the middle, curled on the rug to rest from a long day of doing nothing, and we don't even have any food or drinks around to use as a distraction. Betty kept the biscuits, and I'm not bold enough to bring my stash of scones downstairs.

"Mom told me she asked you not to fly home," I say. It's not the best opening line and I'm so nauseous I'm unsure how I even get these little words out, but I thought it was best to get straight to the point. "I told her that hadn't been her decision to make, that you could've been there if you wanted to, and I also know no one can force you to do anything you don't want to do, so I'm assuming there was some free will involved. Even if she influenced you to not go, the final decision was yours."

Xavier scratches his stubble, pensive, and avoids my eyes. I don't know why I expected otherwise. "That's the short version of it, yeah. We both agreed it wouldn't be good for you if I showed up out of the blue only to leave again. It doesn't make it okay, but it felt like the right thing to do at the time."

"The right thing to whom?"

He lets out a sigh. "To me, I suppose. It's never been my place to decide what's best for you, even if I thought that's what it was."

"Then why? What was going through your mind?" I lean forward, with a sudden burst of courage exploding inside my chest. "I just want to understand what happened. I want us to move forward, and we can't do that unless we finally talk about this. I was hurt. Big fucking deal. If hurt feelings don't get sorted out, they sizzle. It builds up inside you until it turns into resentment, and resentment is like mold. It tears entire families apart, and I don't want that to happen to us. I almost lost you once; I don't want to go through that again."

Finally, finally, Xavier looks back at me with my own eyes. "I left because I felt like Chicago was holding me back. I felt like, in there, I would always be this . . . this shadow of myself, unsure of what I wanted to do with my life, unsure where I belonged. I spent years trying to figure it out, jumping from one occupation to the other to make some cash on the side while hoping someday there would be a miracle that would show me the right path, until one day I had enough. I realized there would be no miracle. I realized there was no one coming to save me from myself and this dark hole I was spiraling into. I bought the bar, packed my bags, and decided I wouldn't look back out of fear I'd regret leaving everything behind. I'd left Mom and Dad, I'd left you; I'd left everything I'd ever known for the sake of what could very well have been a fever dream.

"I lucked out. Stuff like this doesn't always happen, and people don't always get to follow their dreams. It took me some time to get used to the new weather and the people, but most of all, it took me a long time to get used to the new possibilities—everything I could do, everything I could be. No one knew me here, and that was simultaneously the most excited and terrified I'd ever felt up until that point. So, I built my life here, determined not to make the mistakes I'd made in Chicago. Here, I was playing by my own rules.

"And then . . ." He sharply inhales, and I know what's coming.

"And then Camp Comet happened." He nods. "It happened, and the fear crept in again."

"The moment I thought I'd lost you was the worst moment of my life." His words tear me apart, one by one, until I'm nothing but bone dust. "The guilt over leaving you behind without a word, without a goodbye was eating me alive, and I sat there believing that was it. You were gone, and all those opportunities I'd thought I'd have to explain it to you were gone, too. The guilt, Wendy. Jesus Christ." He buries his head in his hands, elbows supported on his knees, and I exhale through my mouth. It comes out a lot shakier than I expected it to. "All those other kids were dead, kids I knew, and the only thing in my mind was you."

"But I didn't die."

"No. And I was a coward, and I didn't know how to look you in the eye with all this regret I was feeling, with these fears lingering behind, and somehow convinced myself you wouldn't want me there, anyway. I'd left you. Why would you want me with you after losing so many other people, all at once? Wouldn't I be just another reminder that life fucking sucked? Wouldn't I make it worse?"

No, my mind screams, but no words come out of my mouth. I needed him there, and there hasn't been a day in my life when I ever thought differently. He knows this, as I've tried to drill into that thick, stubborn skull of his for months now, but I choose to stay quiet.

"I wanted to prove Mom wrong," he continues, voice clogged, and raises his head again. "I wanted to prove myself wrong, too, but I couldn't. I chickened out, and convinced myself you'd be better off without your lowlife of a brother who couldn't even say goodbye to anyone."

"I'd never be better off without you," I argue. "You know that."

"I do now. Having you come here has helped me realize that, but I always thought . . . I always thought you'd agreed to come here because Mom and Dad wanted you to. I never considered the possibility of you genuinely wanting to reconnect after what I did and how I left. I thought we were past the point of no return, and I was convincing myself of that. I thought that was what you wanted—me at arm's length, a place to sleep. I was here for the bare minimum, to keep you alive. I didn't stop to think you wanted a brother."

I don't fall to my knees in front of him or do any dramatic gestures. I do, however, walk up to him the same way I did that one day, wrap my arms around my behemoth of a brother, and hope it conveys everything I'm feeling, everything I've always wanted to tell him. All those letters and emails I wrote and never sent, all those phone calls I talked myself out of making. All those words and thoughts that faded into the night.

"You'll always be home to me," I tell him, "no matter what. No matter where you go, no matter what we do. You're my home in every universe."

His hand curls around my arm as he leans into the hug. It doesn't fix everything, but it's a start—it's a way to keep the cabin door unlocked.

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There are things I won't ever get an answer to—why Xavier's brain is so wired to assume everyone is better off without him, why Jake did what he did, how I survived and made it out. There are things that cannot be answered, no matter how much I exhaust myself by chasing those answers, and that's okay. It doesn't have to eat me alive.

There are things I know or will know the answer to—what a home is, where my final room is.

There are hard days. There are days I feel like throwing all my progress out of the window, because it's easier and comfortable to give into my deepest fears. There are days when I board the windows back up and double lock the doors. However, there are also days when the sun is hiding behind gloomy clouds, when it's just okay. Sometimes, that's the best I can get, and I take it.

Sometimes, I get to say I'm okay. Sometimes, that is enough.

THE END

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we're done!!!! can you believe it??? because i can't.

writing this book has been an adventure and a half, but we've made it out. i don't have any clever puns to make with this one like i had back when i finished writing see you in san francisco (which you should read if you enjoyed the general vibe of this book hint hint), so this lazy note will have to do.

for now. there's still a final note coming up, so read that for more elaborate thoughts on the process of writing this book and for some quick acknowledgments to everyone who made this possible.

thank you thank you thank you for reading this far. if you read everything without skipping any chapters, you're the mvp and i'm very thankful.

cate x

(bi main characters gang rise up)