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"I believe in the ocean curing all bad moods. I believe in the waves wiping away worries. I believe in seashells bringing good luck. I believe in toes in the sand grounding my soul." ~Unknown
The Summer I Turned Pretty
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I never found out about what went down between Belly and Steven at that party, but thankfully they made up the next day easing the tension between them. That's one of the things the moms drilled into us growing up.
Always forgive.
You never know how much time you have left with someone. When Mom got cancer, Conrad, Jeremiah and I were always falling out, we bottled up our emotions not wanting to talk to anyone or admit how scared we were that we'd lose Mom. We swallowed them down so much that we were so tense around each other that one wrong move meant we'd explode.
Laurel stepped in when Dad left.
He'd been cheating on Mom, unable to bear the thought of losing her too. He dealt with it differently than us. Running away, leaving us kids alone. Laurel drove up to us as soon as she heard the news leaving Belly and Steven with their dad.
I remember when she pulled up outside. I was so relieved. She was my person to lean on, to open up to behind closed doors. I don't know how she managed the three of us when her best friend was in hospital.
Eventually, Mom got better and things returned to normal. Mostly.
Conrad continued to bottle things up, even Laurel couldn't break down his walls. He fell in with the wrong crowd, drinking and smoking, ignoring us. Until I found him struggling to breathe in the bathroom that night.
I tried to call Mom, she was busy cooking with Jeremiah, but Conrad told me to leave it.
I remember sitting down on the floor with him, holding him tight in my arms as he cried. I remember reading somewhere that you have to breathe loud enough that they can hear you so they have something to focus on. So there we sat on the floor both crying and breathing loudly.
So I lay, staring into the sky, breathing heavily as I remember.
The ocean lulled around me as the orange morning sky painted my face.
"You still alive?" Steven chuckled from next to me, resting his elbows on my board to hold himself up.
"Yup, just thinking," I smile, still staring up at the clouds.
"Just thinking?" He says, brushing his wet hair out of his face.
"Mhm, what about you? What were you thinking about?"
"How do you know I was thinking about anything?" He scrunches his eyebrows.
"You're right," I sigh, "It's wrong of me to presume that a single thought is able to run through that head of yours."
"Hey," He scoffs, tipping my board, making me fall off and roll into the water. "That was rude," He laughs when I resurface, gulping in air.
