We walk hand-in-hand down the beach as the sun dips in the sky. I am not thinking about the past. I am not thinking about the future. I am full of such gratitude for the sun, the water, the way my feet sink into the sand, the way my hand feels holding hers.
“We should do this every Monday,” she says. “And Tuesday. And Wednesday. And Thursday. And Friday.”
“We’d only get tired of it,” I tell her. “It’s best to have it just once.”
“Never again?” She doesn’t like the sound of that.
“Well, never say never.”
“I’d never say never,” she tells me.
There are a few more people on the beach now, mostly older men and women taking an afternoon walk. They nod to us as we walk past, and sometimes they say hello. We nod back, return their hellos. Nobody questions why we’re here. Nobody questions anything. We’re just a part of the moment, like everything else.
The sun falls farther. The temperature drops alongside it. Rhiannon shivers, so I stop holding her hand and put my arm around her. She suggests we go back to the car and get the “make-out blanket” from the trunk. We find it there, buried under empty beer bottles, twisted jumper cables and other guy crap. I wonder how often Rhiannon and Justin have used the make-out blanket for that purpose, but I don’t try to access the memories. Instead I bring the blanket back out onto the beach and put it down for both of us. I lie down and face the sky, and Rhiannon lies down next to me and does the same. We stare at the clouds, breathing distance from one another, taking it all in.
“This has to be one of the best days ever,” Rhiannon says.
Without turning my head, I find her hand with my hand.
“Tell me about some of the other days like this,” I ask.
“I don’t know . . .”
“Just one. The first one that comes to mind.”
Rhiannon thinks about it for a second. Then she shakes her head. “It’s stupid.”
“Tell me.”
She turns to me and moves her hand to my chest. Makes lazy circles there. “For some reason, the first thing that comes to mind is this mother-daughter fashion show. Do you promise you won’t laugh?”
I promise.
She studies me. Makes sure I’m sincere. Continues.
“It was in fourth grade or something. Renwick’s was doing a fundraiser for hurricane victims, and they asked for volunteers from our class. I didn’t ask my mother or anything – I just signed up. And when I brought the information home – well, you know how my mom is. She was terrified. It’s enough to get her out to the supermarket. But a fashion show? In front of strangers? I might as well have asked her to pose for Playboy. God, now there’s a scary thought.”
Her hand is now resting on my chest. She’s looking off to the sky.
“But here’s the thing: She didn’t say no. I guess it’s only now that I realize what I put her through. She didn’t make me go to the teacher and take it back. No, when the day came, we drove over to Renwick’s and went where they told us to go. I had thought they would put us in matching outfits, but it wasn’t like that. Instead, they basically told us we could wear whatever we wanted from the store. So there we were, trying all these things on. I went for the gowns, of course – I was so much more of a girl then. I ended up with this light blue dress – ruffles all over the place. I thought it was so sophisticated.”
“I’m sure it was classy,” I say.
She hits me. “Shut up. Let me tell my story.”
I hold her hand on my chest. Lean over and kiss her quickly.
“Go ahead,” I say. I am loving this. I never have people tell me their stories. I usually have to figure them out myself. Because I know that if people tell me stories, they will expect them to be remembered. And I cannot guarantee that. There is no way to know if the stories stay after I’m gone. And how devastating would it be to confide in someone and have the confidence disappear? I don’t want to be responsible for that.
But with Rhiannon I can’t resist.
She continues. “So I had my wannabe prom dress. And then it was Mom’s turn. She surprised me, because she went for the dresses too. I’d never really seen her all dressed up before. And I think that was the most amazing thing to me: It wasn’t me who was Cinderella. It was her.
“After we picked out our clothes, they put on makeup and everything. I thought Mom was going to flip, but she was actually enjoying it. They didn’t really do much with her – just a little more color. And that was all it took. She was pretty. I know it’s hard to believe, knowing her now. But that day, she was like a movie star. All the other moms were complimenting her. And then it was time for the actual show, and we paraded out there and people applauded. Mom and I were both smiling, and it was real, you know?
“We didn’t get to keep the dresses or anything. But I remember on the ride home, Mom kept saying how great I was. When we got back to our house, Dad looked at us like we were aliens, but the cool thing is, he decided to play along. Instead of getting all weird, he kept calling us his supermodels, and asked us to do the show for him in our living room, which we did. We were laughing so much. And that was it. The day ended. I’m not sure Mom’s worn makeup since. And it’s not like I turned out to be a supermodel. But that day reminds me of this one. Because it was a break from everything, wasn’t it?”
“It sounds like it,” I tell her.
“I can’t believe I just told you that.”
“Why?”
“Because. I don’t know. It just sounds so silly.”
“No, it sounds like a good day.”
“How about you?” she asks.
“I was never in a mother-daughter fashion show,” I joke. Even though, as a matter of fact, I’ve been in a few.
She hits me lightly on the shoulder. “No. Tell me about another day like this one.”
I access Justin and find out he moved to town when he was twelve. So anything before that is fair game, because Rhiannon won’t have been there. I could try to find one of Justin’s memories to share, but I don’t want to do that. I want to give Rhiannon something of my own.
“There was this one day when I was eleven.” I try to remember the name of the boy whose body I was in, but it’s lost to me. “I was playing hide-and-seek with my friends. I mean, the brutal, tackle kind of hide-and-seek. We were in the woods, and for some reason I decided that what I had to do was climb a tree. I don’t think I’d ever climbed a tree before. But I found one with some low branches and just started moving. Up and up. It was as natural as walking. In my memory, that tree was hundreds of feet tall. Thousands. At some point, I crossed the tree line. I was still climbing, but there weren’t any other trees around. I was all by myself, clinging to the trunk of this tree, a long way from the ground.”
I can see shimmers of it now. The height. The town below me.
“It was magical,” I say. “There’s no other word to describe it. I could hear my friends yelling as they were caught, as the game played out. But I was in a completely different place. I was seeing the world from above, which is an extraordinary thing when it happens for the first time. I’d never flown in a plane. I’m not even sure I’d been in a tall building. So there I was, hovering above everything I knew. I had made it somewhere special, and I’d gotten there all on my own. Nobody had given it to me. Nobody had told me to do it. I’d climbed and climbed and climbed, and this was my reward. To watch over the world, and to be alone