PROLOGUE
Onthefirstdayof kindergarten, Maggie Babbitt stood in front of twenty-four of her peers and told them she was going to be an author. She didn’t use that word, author, because she didn’t know it yet, but she got her point across just the same when she said she wanted to write stories. Two dozen pairs of eyes looked on with confusion and approval until one little boy, with his bowl haircut and glare, said, “You can’t write stories. You can’t read.”
To her teacher’s horror, Maggie had used all of her rage to kick Grayson right in his bony shin. For a moment, she’d felt weightless, a grin curling the corners of her mouth. Then Grayson had cried loud, sloppy tears, and she’d thought about throwing up everything she’d eaten since she was born.
“Margaret Ann,” her mother had said in her you-are-in-trouble-young-lady voice when she picked her up from the nurse’s office, “what on earth has gotten into you?”
Maggie tried to pull air into her tight lungs, feeling pressure sit on her chest like a dumbbell. She crossed her skinny arms across her skinnier chest and sat in the backseat, barely able to hear her mother’s voice over the sound of water rushing through her ears. Spots danced in the corners of her vision. The stained backseat of her mother’s sedan faded into almost nothing. Then a pair of cool hands wrapped around her upper arms and dragged her from the car. Her mother held her tight, the heat from the driveway soaking into her skin, her mother’s pulse beating a pounding rhythm against her ear as her crisp voice helped Maggie list the colors of the mums lining the walkway.
“What happened, baby?” her mother asked, as Maggie’s lungs loosened fraction by fraction.
“He said I couldn’t be a writer.”
“Well sweetling,” Maggie’s mother said, cuddling her closer, “can he see the future? You’re the only one who knows if you can do that. Prove him wrong.”
CHAPTER ONE
Maggiehitsendonher email and listened to thewhooshas her first finished manuscript jettisoned into the ether and to her first round of readers. Since declaring her intentions at five, it had taken her twenty years, four months, and eighteen days to get to this point. Not that she’d been writing the same story that entire time, but this was the first full-length novel she’d completed, and tears had welled in her eyes as she’d typed the words “The End.”
For a moment after the email sent, she felt that same weightless euphoria she’d experienced after kicking a kindergarten bully. Then she pillowed her head on her hands, fine strands of ash-brown hair splayed across her pock-marked desk, and breathed through the nausea.
Oh god,she thought as the inhalations shook her narrow body.I did it. Now what?
The idea that strangers were going to open her draft and sift through her words tugged on the unraveling seams of her anxiety. No one had ever read Maggie’s stories before. They’d asked, demanded, pleaded, but Maggie had held firm. As long as no one read what she wrote, no one would know if it was good or terrible. Her publishing dreams were still there, in the distance, still her future. Not crushed under critique and criticism.
The only problem was if she wanted to publish her book, she had to let it out into the world. If Maggie’s weekly therapy appointments had taught her anything, it was that it was okay to protect herself, but that didn’t mean she could let her disorder rule her daily life. If her goal was to be an author, she had to do more than just write a book. She had to let people read it. Maggie and her therapist had worked up to this moment together—the moment when she sent the email—and they would no doubt talk again when the feedback started rolling in.
Head still down, Maggie’s hand reached for her phone. She found it between two piles of half-used notebooks and under a crumpled purple sticky note. If her novel was done, should she clean her desk? Probably not. There was a certain familiar safety in the chaos, and even if she took a day and organized her apartment like Marie Kondo, it would be back to its basic level of mess within 24 hours. At the most. The phone buzzed in her hand, and Maggie swiped her finger along the cracked glass to unlock it, wincing as the sharp edges snagged on her skin.
Audrey:
This is our agreed-upon check in to make sure you sent your book out. Since I have full faith that you did, drinks are on me tonight.
Maggie:
It's not a big deal. You don't have to go out of your way.
Itwasa big deal, actually. Maggie had been working up to this moment for almost six months, and it was so gratifying to hear praise for accomplishing one of her mini goals instead of another set of rolled eyes and questions about why these little steps mattered in the grand scheme of things. Maggie was all about the little steps. Her anxiety often made those little steps monumental, like she was standing at the base of a boulder without any climbing equipment, watching everyone else hop up and over with ease.
Audrey:
It's a huge deal, Maggie. I'll see you at 8.
***
Maggie should have guessed that “drinks” in Audrey’s world meant “party,” but the noise when she pushed open the front door almost flattened her to the refinished hardwoods. Her friend was nowhere to be seen in the crush of people packed into the small house’s living room. Red cups littered every available surface, and the walls pulsed with the bass line thundering out of the stereo.
The noise and the press of bodies had Maggie’s heart pounding against her ribs and sweat beading under her arms. She’d have preferred a few drinks and a board game or a movie marathon with her close friends. Smaller crowds and familiar faces put her more at ease, but she could handle a party for one night, especially when it was meant for her. Audrey always left her an escape route in the kitchen or out back—somewhere she could find a quiet corner when the sound and the crowd overwhelmed her. Maggie didn’t need it often, but it was nice to have the option.
“Audrey doesn’t need an excuse to party, she just prefers one,” she reminded herself before shouldering her way through the crowd to find a drink.
The kitchen was empty. No one seemed to venture towards the back of the house when the music and dancing were all at the front. Bottles of liquor covered the small counter space with a few stacks of cups and some napkins. A pile of pizza boxes from Sorento’s, down the street, listed sideways, in danger of toppling to the floor.
The dated kitchen still had its original dark brown cabinets with ornate brass pulls that reminded Maggie of her nana’s old home. Audrey’s boyfriend Cal and his brother Tyler had inherited the place from their grandmother about a year before. The men had switched the yellow countertops out for a newer Formica, and they’d laid vinyl tiles over the old orange paisley ones. They’d even added a small peninsula with a handful of mismatched stools. Cal and his brother left the original lace curtains hanging from the scalloped valance over the sink. Audrey had tried to replace the curtains when she moved in a few months later, assuming the men just didn’t know what to pick, and Tyler had almost thrown her out, citing sentimental value.
Maggie peeked under the open lid of one of the pizza boxes. A few leftover slices overlapped inside, grease creating a dark, expanding ring against the cardboard. They were all pepperoni. Not a good choice for a vegetarian. Maggie had eaten a sandwich a few hours earlier at the store, but if she was going to drink, she needed more food in her belly. Cal would eat cereal for three meals a day, if Audrey would let him, so it wouldn’t be too much trouble to source a bowl of Cocoa Puffs before heading back to the party.
“There’s some plain pizza in the fridge.” The voice startled her like a cattle prod to the rear and Maggie jolted, a hand pressing to the center of her chest. She hadn’t seen him standing there, too distracted by the mess, the memories, and the throb of the music. Tyler’s back faced Maggie as he rinsed out one side of the double sink.