First There Was Forever Read Online Free

older.
    Hailey stepped into the hallway with her mom, and I could hear them arguing, but I couldn’t make out the words.
    “We have to clean the kitchen,” Hailey said when she came back in, and her eyes slid all over the room without meeting mine.
    The kitchen looked terrible, but I was a good cleaner, so it went fast. Hailey was super quiet while we did dishes.
    “Look at this fork!” I said, laughing. “There’s a Froot Loop stuck in it!”
    Hailey didn’t crack a smile. “I feel so fat,” was all she said.
    I sucked my lips between my teeth. I hated when Hailey was in a bad mood, and I felt guilty that it was partly my fault.
    “Your mom won’t stay mad, Hailey,” I offered quietly.
    “I don’t care about that,” she said. “I got, like, a million texts from Skyler asking me where I was. She’s pissed at me for not going to her party.”
    “She’ll get over it,” I said.
    “Maybe,” said Hailey.
    • • •
    I hadn’t smoked pot or been drunk since then. It wasn’t that I didn’t like how it had felt, but both times it left me feeling emptier than before. Like it dug something out of my insides and left a hollow, quarter-sized vortex behind.

chapter

six

    T he following Friday, Mom and I spent the afternoon making peach cobbler from scratch. Mom showed me how if you drop peaches in boiling water for thirty seconds and then take them out, their skin comes right off in your hands. Easy as taking off a piece of clothing.
    After we cleaned the kitchen, I went upstairs to pack. We were leaving the next day to go to Santa Barbara for my grandmother’s birthday. We’d pick Hailey up early on Saturday morning and head out before traffic. That’s how we always did it when we went to Nana’s.
    Outside my window the sky was a pale blue, but the moon had already appeared. It looked yellow and disproportionately big, like it had been painted onto the artificial backdrop of the sky.
    My phone lit up with a text message from Hailey.
    Can’t go to Santa Barbara. Sad face.
    I perched on the edge of my bed and called her.
    “What’s up?” I asked.
    “I’m so sorry, Li. I just really can’t go away this weekend,” she said.
    “Oh,” I said. “Okay. Why?”
    Hailey sighed. “I have so much homework. I have three quizzes on Monday, and I’m already behind in everything. It’s just, like, I have to stay.”
    “You can do homework at Nana’s,” I said. “I’m gonna bring mine.”
    Hailey paused. “Well, there’s also, like, this party at Skyler’s friend’s house from outside of school on Saturday.”
    My heart sank. That’s what this was about?
    After we got off the phone, the silence in my room felt loud. I gazed out the window at the fake-looking sky, trying to ignore the disappointment that spread through my chest like sand.

chapter

seven

    N ana lived with Dad’s sister, Caroline, in a huge, mustard-colored Spanish-style house overlooking the ocean in the prettiest part of Santa Barbara.
    “Come in, ladies,” Caroline greeted us. “And gentleman.”
    Caroline’s shoulder-length hair was white as powdered sugar. Light seemed to shoot through it, giving the impression that she was always standing in front of a lamp. My cousins were away at college, so I was the only kid around. I actually didn’t mind being alone with grown-ups. Sometimes I even preferred it to being with people my own age.
    Nana was sitting under an umbrella on a white canvas recliner by the pool when we came in. Every time we visited, Nana looked smaller. I must have been growing up at exactly the same rate that she was growing old, like we were sitting on opposite sides of a seesaw.
    “How are you, Nana?” I asked.
    Nana wrapped her fingers around mine and they clung tight, like claws.
    “I can’t complain,” she said. Even though Nana was old, she still always wore red lipstick and blue eye shadow. “How are you? Tell me about school.”
    Everyone always said I looked like Nana when she was young,