And fear’s a sea that pulls away.
Time crawled and crawled, until Anne eventually sensed she’d been there long enough to make a getaway. After one final round of tearful congratulations from Arthur and a long squeeze to her shoulder from James’s warm, firm hand, she took her leave,promising as she did it to come with them to a lecture on queer art at the community center.
The note she’d found in Sadie’s chapbook was now folded safely in her pocket.
Back in her car, Anne placed her purse on the other seat, then winced. She’d been too upset on the way over to notice, but Sadie had left her gold-and-onyx earrings in the cupholder. The uneven dark ovals looked like stretched, mocking mouths, reminding Anne who wasn’t sitting there.
She looked at her watch. Over three hours since she’d left Hedge Nettle, and nearly as long since she’d glanced at her phone, unable to focus on anything but her own raw self.
Had Sadie called? Had she texted? Was she calmer now, like Anne, or was she still furious? And if she was, what did that mean?
If Sadie hadn’t tried to reach out—
Panic threatened, and Anne had to work hard not to breathe it in. She fumbled with the flap of her purse and dug until her hand closed around the hard rectangle of her phone.
Hal Rosenthal-Clark 8 minutes ago
iMessage (34)
Claire Lowell 1 hour ago
Voicemail
Brooke Mulrenin 2 hours ago
Voicemail
Hal Rosenthal-Clark 3 hours ago
Voicemail
Nothing from Sadie. Not even one text.
Unlocking the screen, Anne pressed the series of buttons that took her to her voicemail, trying to quell the sick fright thatpressed on her lungs. Sadie hadn’t reached out to her. Which meant that Sadie was still angry. In fact, Sadie was perfectly fine with letting the seconds they’d gone without speaking stretch into hours, or even days. She preferred it. And maybe Sadie had realized she didn’t need more time to think about things after all. As a matter of fact, she’d already reached a final decision about—
The first voicemail.
“Anne? It’s Hal.” He sounded agitated, far outside his typical emotional range of calm to extremely calm. “So, uh, I’m working from home today, and good thing I am because Mom showed up at my place ten minutes ago. She’s acting like she did when Dad left, like the light’s gone out of the world, and I don’t—I keep trying to get her to tell me what happened, but all she’ll say is ‘This story has two writers,’ which makes no sense. And when I asked her where you were, her face got all—it was weird. I’m really worried. Please call me back as soon as you get this, okay? Or come over? We need to talk. It’s Hal.”
Oh no.
The second voicemail.
“Mom, what the hell is going—Colton, stop hitting your brother right now. We don’t hit in this family, you know that. Because wedon’t. Mom, Hal just told me he called you an hour ago and you haven’t called back. Where are you? Why is Sadie at Hal’s telling him that she’s ‘a lily-livered wreck of a human’? What is she talking about?” In a much softer voice, nearly a whisper. “Does this—okay, I’m just going to say it outright. Does this, by any chance, have anything to do with what you and Claire and I talked about at—” Louder again. “Maverick? Don’t you dare pick that up. Don’t you—Mom, I can’t do this right now, but you need to call me back. I swear to God, Mav—”
Ohno.
The third voicemail.
“Hello, Mommy dearest—sorry, I know you hate it when I call you that.CherishedMother. Care to enlighten me as to why your BFF is currently giving her neurotic son enough material for several therapy sessions? Is that related to why you’re not answering your phone? Look, Hal and Bee both called me. They want me to drive up to Topanga to see if you’re home, but Xiomara’s got me on a hard deadline, and if I don’t get the fall collection fabric swatches to her before six o’clock, I’ll be designing aprons for Home Depot next season.” A pause. “Did Sadie get bad news or something? Is she okay? Hal said she’s shut herself up in his backyard tiny house for the last hour. What’s going on? Call me back.”
Oh fuck.
Anxiety crawled up Anne’s arms, wound around her ribs, sped up her heart rate. Brooke sounded like she was about ten minutes and half a Xanax away from figuring it all out. And, knowing Claire, she wouldn’t be too far behind. Coming out was one thing, but the thought of their entire family knowing about her unresolved situation with Sadie was something else entirely.
She wasn’t ready for them to find out. Not until she’d had a chance to speak with Sadie again and figure out exactly where they stood.
If Sadie even wanted to talk to her. If Sadie would actually listen.