“Something wrong?” she asked, glancing over her shoulder at me.
I shook my head and forced a smile. “Jack had something come up last minute.”
Before she could respond, I went to my room and sank down onto my bed. My mind was filled with thoughts of Jack and Ellie, their laughter echoing in my ears. Despite telling myself I could be happy only being friends with Jack, it was becoming clear thatthe reality was far more complex. Perhaps in some unspoken corner of my heart, I had been harboring feelings for him that had remained dormant until now.
The world seemed to be closing in on me. The hoots from an owl in a distant tree, the whispered rustling of leaves outside my window, everything just seemed to amplify the gnawing emptiness within me. I rolled onto my side, my gaze falling on the framed photo on my bedside table. It was a picture of Jack and me, taken last summer at the county fair. We were both smiling, cotton candy clutched in our hands, the Ferris wheel a joyful blur behind us.
In that picture, Jack was mine. He wore the same lopsided grin I adored, his eyes lighting up the way they only did when we were together. The memory of that day was so vivid—the sugary sweetness of the cotton candy lingering on my tongue, the warmth of the midday sun on my shoulders, our laughter as we competed in the potato sack race. I remembered how he reached out to wipe a blob of cotton candy off my nose, his fingers lingering just a moment too long. There had been a thrill in that touch, which I took as an unspoken promise.
Now that felt like a distant dream, a mirage of a perfect friendship that was beginning to fade and warp as reality set in. I couldn’t reconcile the Jack in my memories with the young man who now rode around with Ellie. Feeling as if the floor had dropped out from under me, I let the picture frame slip from my fingers. It landed with a muted thump on the soft quilt, echoing the heaviness in my heart. I closed my eyes, trying to block out the smiling faces that seemed to mock me from within their wooden frame, but it was no use. The damage had been done.
Present
“In retrospect, I should have approached both Jack and Ellie with an open heart and tried to be friendly, but I didn't. Believe it or not, I wanted more than anything for Ellie and I to be friends. I wanted to show her that I too was someone she could trust and rely on, and that she could rely on me. But every time I thought about reaching out, jealousy would rear its ugly head, reminding me of what I had lost and what I could never have. So I bottled everything up, locking it away in the deepest corners of my heart, hoping that time would wash it away like the ocean does to footprints in the sand. But just like the ocean, time was indifferent to my plight.”
Diane studied me for a moment, the muscles around her eyes relaxing a bit. “Perhaps we should take a little break.”
We rose from our chairs and made our way outside. The afternoon was unusually mild, reminding me of fall days back home.
We strolled along the edge of the garden, Diane beside me. I felt her gaze on me every now and then but didn't turn to meet it. Instead, my eyes were drawn to the blooms that dotted the landscape. Pops of red, purple, and yellow contrasted beautifully with the lush green of the garden.
“I wish I could tell you things got better after that, but the truth is they only got worse. Sadly, most of it was my own doing. I let my jealousy fester, turning it into destructive force that would not stop until it had consumed everything in its path.” I chuckled, thinking how misguided I had been in those days. “And to think, I had convinced myself that Ellie was the storm. But in reality I was the tempest. All Ellie ever did was fall in love, and I punished her for it. Jack, too.”
Diane nodded thoughtfully, her eyes flicking to me and then back to the pathway. “Unfortunately, I’ve crossed paths with a few Ellies in my time. It’s hard, isn’t it? To watch someone you care about fall in love with someone else?”
“It was like watching a car crash in slow motion. I wanted to look away, but I couldn’t. I was so caught up in my own misery that I couldn’t see the happiness they found in each other. I became the monster in their love story, shadowing their joy with my bitterness.”
We walked down to the beach and took off our shoes, letting the sand seep between our toes. I looked out at the ocean and took a deep breath, tasting the salt on my lips. While Diane kicked at the water’s edge, I stared silently into the murky water.
“Love has a funny way of blinding us, doesn’t it?” Diane said, folding her arms over her chest.
“Yes, it does. And when we finally see the reality of the situation, most often it’s too late. But losing my best friend to Ellie was the most painful awakening I’ve ever experienced. I didn’t lose Jack physically, but in every other sense, he was gone. And it wasn’t as if I had time to prepare. One minute, we were going along fine, and the next, it was over. It took me a long time to get over that.”
“But you did get over it, didn’t you?”
I considered that, thinking that perhaps “over” wasn’t the right word. Life had simply moved around it, like water flowing over a stone. “Yes,” I finally answered. “In a way. But it’s more like you learn to live with it. That empty space…doesn’t go away. It just becomes part of you.”
11
After a quick bite to eat,the interview resumed. I’d already revealed to Diane how Ellie had swept into town and stolen Jack’s heart, but there was more to the tale than just an ill-fated love story. So much more.
I took a moment to gather my thoughts, letting the silence stretch out comfortably between us. Diane looked at me expectantly, her pen at the ready, as if she sensed the climax was on the horizon.
“Once I realized that Jack and Ellie were more than just friends, I decided to intervene. It’s something that to this day I still regret, but at the time, it seemed like my only option. My heart belonged to Jack, and watching Ellie become the object of his desire was a pain I couldn’t bear. I knew there would be consequences, possibly devastating ones, but the thought of losing Jack forever hurt even more.”
Sims Chapel, TN
June 1950
A few days after I had seen Jack and Ellie at the dock together, I was finishing up some chores when the phone rang. It was Connie, calling to tell me she and Yvonne had run into Jack earlier that afternoon.
“And he was getting into George’s truck with some girl,” she said, her voice ripe with gossip.
“Some girl, huh?” My insides churned. “Who was she?”
“I don’t know. I didn’t recognize her, but she was really pretty. It must have been Clara’s niece, the one you were telling me about.”
Of course, I thought bitterly. It had to be her. “Yes,” I forced myself to say calmly. “I’m sure that’s who it was.” The line between us crackled with tension. I drummed my fingers on the kitchen counter, images of Jack and Ellie flitting through my mind, each more painful than the last. “Do you know what they were doing?” I finally mustered the courage to ask, forcing down the lump forming in my throat.