Free Arms Wide Open: a Novella by Juli Caldwell Page B

and go. As these memories
fade a little bit every day.
    “I saw him tonight.”
    “Him?” She raises her eyebrows at me and
licks the back of her spoon before scraping the inside of the carton for
another bite.
    I nod and load my spoon again too. “The
one I never talk about. Grant.”
    “He was there? As in, doing to 5 in 5
thing?” She sit upright and turns to face me, a look of incredulity on her
face. “Was he one of your dates?”
    “Yup. Round four.”
    She buries her face in her hands while
trying to keep the spoon out of her hair. “Lauren, I am so sorry! This is all
my fault!”
    I laugh. “Come on, Harlow. Think about
it. How could you possibly have known that the guy I never told you about,
whose existence you didn’t know of until about ten seconds ago, would be at a
dating event you dragged me to? You have nothing to be sorry for. And like I
said,” I tell her as I lean further to rest my head against the back of the
couch, “It’s all good. I had epiphanies and stuff.”
    She leans back with me. “Epiphanies and
stuff,” she repeats, sounding dubious. “So tell me, then, what epiphanies can a
girl have while speed dating with socially awkward freak shows and long lost
boyfriends?”
    “I have to live the best life I can to
honor my sister. I keep her alive through me.”
    Harlow shakes her head. “This is what
you get from socially awkward freaks? Impressive! I should take you every week
so we can find solutions to world hunger and a cure for cancer.”
    I laugh. “Not really, no, although the
eyeball guy has a lot more to him than I ever would’ve imagined. He’s living
proof of why it’s never a good idea to judge a book by its cover. Most people would
burn that book after the first page.” I scrape my spoon around the outside of
the ice cream lump we’ve created in the middle of the carton, wanting to get
the soft, melty goods for myself.
    “Quit taking the best part,” she
protests, trying to grab the carton from me.
    I let her take it. “We should order some
Sharky’s. I didn’t eat dinner tonight, although I came close to eating. An
amorous hipster did smear some food on my face and hands in a pathetic attempt
at wooing me.”
    Harlow shakes her head and gets up to
put the carton back in the freezer. “Um, ew.” She sets down the carton. “I
agree. If I keep eating this, I’ll get sick. Order me a Caesar salad with
dressing on the side while I change. Should we pick up or have it delivered?”
    “Delivery,” I say. “I’m not getting
dressed again. It’s pajama time for me.”
    “And then I’m gonna need to hear about
these weirdos you picked up tonight,” she says as she disappears down the hall
and into her room.
    I find the menu stuck to the side of our
fridge with a magnet and call Sharky’s, ordering her salad and a turkey avocado
on a croissant for me. Harlow returns in her own sweats, hair piled into a wild
and loose bun on top of her head, gorgeous green eyes now hidden behind the
coke bottle lenses in her glasses.
    “It’ll be here in a half hour,” I inform
her as we sit back on the couch to kill some time.
    “So your sister...Coral? How did you
arrive at your conclusion about living life for her based on what happened to
you tonight?”
    “I don’t know. I was one breath away from
another panic attack all night long...and then I saw Grant. He was everything
that was good and decent and stable in my life for a long time. Don’t get me
wrong, my parents are great, but he was the one I trusted above all others.
Sadly, he’s the one I treated the worst.”
    “Isn’t that the way it always is?”
Harlow asks, looking thoughtful. “There are times I want to kill my mom, but
I’d kill for her, you know? We have the biggest fights sometimes but no matter
what, she’s the one who will always be there for me. I always call her first,
good news, bad news, bad hair day, broken nail day. Whatever. She’s my rock.”
    “I saw another guy tonight,