“Upstairs. Second door on the right.” I start to walk her there, but she scurries ahead.
As she disappears upstairs, Mark reaches into the canvas bag he carried in. “I picked these up for y’all.”
“Fashion magazines?”
“She and Hannah are entering Miss Lone Star. I just found out myself. Tell her you picked them up. Y’all can look through them tonight.”
“Hannah is doing Miss Lone Star?” I ask, taking the stack from him. Hannah is my best friend’s daughter, which means the girls have been besties since birth. I’ve known Hannah her whole life, and she’s about the furthest thing I can imagine from a pageant girl.
Mark shrugs and checks his watch. “I better get going. I promised Em I’d grill up some steaks tonight.”
“Don’t want to keep the wife waiting,” I say.
He breathes a laugh through his nose.
I place the magazines in a drawer, shutting it before Olivia returns. At the foot of the stairs, Mark pulls her into a hug. “Have fun,” he says into her hair. Then low, probably so I won’t hear, he adds, “She’s trying.”
Olivia pulls away and starts up the steps again, but as she does, she turns her face to me and gives me a tight smile. She’s trying too, in her own teenage way.
The dining table is set for four—four china plates, four cloth napkins with silverware, four crystal glasses. When the Thai food arrives, I pick up the place settings and put them aside. I set out the curry in the Styrofoam containers, then call Olivia down, and we eat with plastic spoons.
“I was thinking we could watchThe Princess Bride,” I say, because Olivia was obsessed with that movie when she was little. I can’t remember how many times we watched it. Mark worried the giant rats would give her nightmares.For the love of God,he’d say,turn that off. Even then, his instinct was to shield her. But the rats were her favorite part. She’d sit up on her knees, eyes wide as poker chips.
“I haven’t seen that movie since I was, like, five. Isn’t it kind of cheesy?”
“It’s a classic,” I say.
“Whatever you want,” she says, and it’s just another reminder of how long it has been since I’ve truly known her. I should be up to date on which actor she has a crush on or which Netflix series she quotes nonstop with her friends. We both push rice around in our containers, and Olivia eats a single green bean.
I switch tactics, getting up and making my way over to the kitchen drawer. “Your father told me you’re entering Miss Lone Star Princess this year.” I pull the magazines out. “He picked these up and wanted me to tell you that I did.”
Olivia cuts her eyes up from her plate, and I’m hoping my honesty will create even the smallest crack in her walls.
“I’ve already looked at dresses online,” she says flatly.
I turn back to the drawer before she can see my eyes, before she can see that all this trying is starting to break me. I think of when she was little, when I’d hear her stirring from her naps, when I’d crack open the door and find her lying in her crib, babbling at her toes. When she’d finally see me peering over the railing. The look on her face, that smile, like I was the sun and she was so happy to see it rising again in her sky.
Then, while my back is still turned, Olivia says, “There’s this one dress.” I look over to see her pulling her phone from her lap onto the table. “It’s really expensive, but Dad said maybe.”
I hold my breath as she swipes through her phone.
“Want to check it out?” She doesn’t look up at me when she asks.
I return to the table, drop into the seat beside her, and she tilts the phone toward me. I catch a glimpse of a sequined dress that looks like liquid silver. My pulse quickens. I feel like I’m on a date with someone out of my league. I’d do just about anything to make her like me. “How about we pick a time this week to go try it on?”
Her face lights up. “Yeah?” There’s an eagerness in her eyes, and it’s the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen.
Then, there is a sudden knock on the front door. I know before I answer that it will be Sheriff Ryan, and there he stands, white mustache combed neatly, shirt tucked into Wrangler jeans, cowboy hat in his hands. Behind him, the Texas Hill Country stretches out, hills rising into the horizon, with cedars and live oaks. The evening is quiet, just the sound of the flag snapping in the wind, the metal clasp hooks clanking against the pole. And in the distance, the flowing water of the river where we all used to float as kids.
“Like clockwork,” I say.
“Picked this up for you, Cat. Comes in handy, what with all the construction.” Sheriff Ryan hands me a can of Fix-a-Flat. “Just shake it, screw that doohickey on there, and press the button on top. It’ll take care of the rest.”
He doesn’t come by every day, but he finds his reasons to pop in. The sheriff doesn’t like me staying here alone.
He catches sight of Olivia over my shoulder. “Well, hello, darling.”
“Hi, Sheriff.”