Free Since She Went Away by David Bell Page A

the country club, more time traveling to places I could never afford to go. Barcelona. Costa Rica. I’d love to visit those places, don’t get me wrong.”
    “But a nurse who’s a single mom can’t just jet off to Spain.”
    “Exactly.” Jenna tried to find the right words to describe what had changed between her and Celia. It wasn’t anything big. It wasn’t the kind of shift that ends a friendship or even fundamentally alters it. There were just times when they’d see each other or talk that they seemed to be speaking different dialects of the same language. How could Jenna compete with stories of seaside dining in Saint-Tropez? “There was a little barrier between us the last few years. Not a wall. Not even a curtain. Maybe I’d describe it as mesh. Something sheer and see-through, but I was still aware it was there. And I think Celia felt it too.”
    “Friendships, even the best ones, can go up and down.”
    “Yeah.” Jenna looked around the room. Her house. Her space. Pictures of Jared from all stages of his life. A framed college diploma. She’d made a life, and she hated that sometimes, like an insecure teenager, she still held it up next to others to see how it compared. She thought she’d made her peace, way back in high school, with the fact that she’d never measure up to Celia in certain departments: looks, money, decorum, boyfriend. But she had other things. She knew she did. She had a life she’d built mostly by herself. “We used to sneak out all the time in high school. Weekdays, weekends, it didn’t matter. We’d sneak out after our parents went to bed, usuallyaround midnight, and we’d meet at Caldwell Park. Sometimes there’d be boys or other friends to meet up with. Sometimes we’d just talk and wander around on our own.”
    “And that’s what you were doing that night? Reliving your wild, single girl years?”
    “It sounds idiotic.”
    “Not really. It sounds like fun.”
    “I was thinking about Celia that night. I heard a stupid song on the radio, one we used to dance to when we were kids. ‘Girls Just Want to Have Fun’? It’s a Cyndi Lauper song.”
    “I’m not that old, girlfriend.”
    “Sorry. I sat here in the house thinking of Celia and that stupid sheer curtain, and I decided it didn’t have to be there. We could just rip it down by acting like we used to act. So I texted her and said, ‘Want to meet in the park at twelve?’ I expected her to say no, but she said yes. One word. ‘Yes!’ So we were on. We would be kids again.”
    Jenna took another drink of wine. She remembered the night so well. It was warm, Indian summer. And as she’d dressed she felt a flutter of excitement in her belly she hadn’t felt in years. Once she was ready, she told Jared where she was going and that she wouldn’t be gone long. He was reading a novel, something with a creepy clown’s face on the cover, and she made him promise to keep the doors locked and to text her if he needed anything. She expected to get a grunting response, something that indicated an utter lack of interest in his mother’s activities, even if the timing of her departure was a little strange.
    But then she saw the bottle on his desk. Jim Beam. She never knew him to take a drink, never knew him to show any interest in the stuff, although she also knew that day would come soon enough. She went into full mom mode, asking a ton of questions about where it came from and who it belonged to.
    She decided not to go, to call Celia and cancel the plans.
    But Jared told her to go, that they could work it all out. He dumped the booze down the sink right in front of her.
    And she didn’t want to cancel. Didn’t want to let her friend down again.
    “So I was late,” Jenna said. “I was always late. But that night I never heard from her. She didn’t show up. I texted and texted but didn’t hear back. I figured something came up. Hell, something came up with my son. I figured maybe it was Celia’s daughter,