No.
“What are you talking about?” Cheryl questioned, confused. She laughed nervously. “Come on. You’re not separating. That’s ridiculous.”
“Well, it’s been a long time coming actually,” Mama explained with a shaky voice. “And now that Maggie has been able to leave the house, we just think it’s time.”
“It’s the best thing, really. For all of us,” Daddy lied through his teeth.
I knew he was lying, too. Because if he were telling the truth, his eyes wouldn’t have looked so sad.
After dinner, Cheryl came into my room, where I was lying on my bed, listenin
g to music on my iPhone. She lay down beside me and took one of my earbuds so she could listen, too.
“I’m twenty-seven years old, and somehow I feel like I want to become my angsty teenager self again, crawl into my closet, and listen to Ashlee Simpson’s Autobiography album over and over again, because my parents are splitting up.”
I’m twenty-eight and feel the same.
“How’s Brooks?” she asked, tilting her head in my direction.
I shrugged. He said he needed space, to be alone.
She nodded. “I get that. When you asked him for space, he gave it to you…so I understand you feeling as if you need to give him the same.”
We kept listening to the music, and Cheryl chuckled. “Remember when we were kids, and I said to you. ‘I don’t know what I’m doing with my life,’ or something?” She started giggling. “Ten years later, and the words still ring true.”
Even though the thought was depressing, we couldn’t stop laughing at it. Sometimes all a person needed to relax their troubled mind was their sister and some laughter.
Within seconds, we were listening to “Pieces of Me,” by Ashlee Simpson, rocking our heads back and forth. We listened to the album a few times, until our minds were back in our childhood days.
Whenever the song “LaLa” came on, we’d stand up and dance with one another. Even though I was proud of Cheryl for traveling the world, I would’ve been lying if I said I wasn’t happy she came home.
Even though Brooks asked for his space, I needed to remind him the same way he always reminded me that he wasn’t alone. I’d send him a text message each morning.
Maggie: You okay today, Brooks Tyler?
Brooks: I’m okay, Maggie May.
Then, a message each night.
Maggie: You okay tonight, Brooks Tyler?
Brooks: I’m okay, Maggie May.
Even though it wasn’t enough to make me stop worrying, it was enough to help me sleep sometimes.
The town of Messa was tiny. The lake took up most of the area. There wasn’t much to the place except a grocery store, a high school, one gas station, and a library, which were all lined up on the coast of the lake. It was all on the opposite side of Mrs. Boone’s cabin, though, which was even nicer. It kept me feeling more alone. I’d only traveled into town for food, then I came back to the cabin.
The only other place I’d found worth visiting was right on the outskirts of Messa—a bar.
It was a hole in the wall.
No one knew it existed, which made it perfect for me. It had whiskey, and pain, and loneliness wrapped up in its quiet walls.
I hadn’t stopped reading forums online about me. I hadn’t stopped watching fans turn against me, tagging me as a drug addict, calling me a liar and a cheater. They believed every lie the tabloids fed to them, turning their backs on me as if I hadn’t given them my all in the past ten years.
As if I were truly every negative word written about me.
I knew I should’ve stopped reading, but I couldn’t put down my phone or the whiskey. The comments from those who claimed to once love me stung more than they should’ve.