Page 6 of Remain

Tenacious, like her.

Her favorite mug sits by the sink, turned slightly toward the window, the faint chip on the rim she always meant to fix. I bought it for her one Christmas. It was part of a collection from a coffee shop we used to frequent together. I would have travelled the world to get her every single one if I could have. If I had just had more time.

It hasn’t been packed, like it was waiting for me.

I press my fingers into the counter, grounding myself, breathing until the ache dulls enough to let me stand upright again.

“I am here for paperwork.” I repeat it like an affirmation.

A shield. A lie I almost believe.

Sign the papers.

Close the door.

Let the boxes go.

I stare at the unlabeled pile across the room, the things waiting for me, and then at the SOLD sign through the living room window, swaying slightly in the breeze like it’s already loosening its claim.

Can I do this?

The thought comes sharp and panicked.

I don’t know if I can do this.

The house doesn’t argue. It just holds everything that’salready been sorted, everything that’s already been boxed up and leaves the hardest parts for me.

I’m backin my car, driving toward the town square, a much smaller one mind you, because staying in the house any longer than I need to feels like drowning in familiar air.

I’ve spent the last twenty-four hours hiding, which is usually how I get through my time in Pineview. First it was the motel off Route 9, the one with the flickering vacancy sign and a carpet that smelled like industrial cleaner and I don’t even want to guess what else. That lasted all of twenty minutes, until my Aunt Carol found out and decided it was absolutely not happening.

Since then, I’ve been shacked up in the one decent rental Pineview has to offer. Exposed brick. Soft lighting. A chalkboard sign by the door that readsWelcome Home, like it’s in on some kind of joke.

Spoiler alert: it’s not.

I avoid the town square most times I’ve been back since everything happened.

I always do, because the square is where people run into each other. Where there’s nowhere to disappear to. Where faces come with history attached and names carry weight. It’s where people look at you a second too long, trying to place you not as you are, but as you were before.

Seeing people does something to me now. It drags grief up from wherever I’ve managed to shove it down and sets it right in the open, raw and insistent, stampeding over any and every emotion in its path. Every familiar face feels like a question I don’t have the energy to answer and every smile feels like it comes with an expectation.

Tonight, though, my car drives me here anyway, because silly drunk me is reckless, sentimental and apparently incapable of respecting boundaries I spent years building. Drunk me decided signing up for The Christmas Toy Drive was a good idea, the one thing I swore I would never do again after the last time it nearly broke me.

I don’t even remember signing up for it. Just a hazy recollection of a late night, probably too much wine, my mother’s name sitting heavy in my heart, and a sign-up form that felt like penance. Or nostalgia. Or self-sabotage.

Again, probably all three.

Sober me is now dealing with the consequences. A story I know all too well.

The square is where The Christmas Kindness Drive begins. Where the community center doors open. Where people gather and remember and expect you to feel something you’re not sure you can survive feeling, because grief doesn’t stay quiet in places like this.

The square is already alive when I pull in. Strings of white lights arc overhead, casting a soft glow over the ice rink where kids wobble and fall and laugh in uneven circles. Parents cluster near the edges, steaming mugs in hand, faces flushed from the cold and the quiet joy of watching something uncomplicated unfold. Christmas music hums from speakers strung between lampposts, the notes weaving through the crisp night air.

This is where everything used to begin. My stomach contorts into knots as soon as I step out of the car.

Someone bumps into me immediately.

“Oh…Savannah? Oh my God.”