Lucky Girl by Jamie Pacton (novels for beginners txt) 📕

Is this what it will be like forever if I cash the ticket? Racing to get away? Not sure who to trust?

I take a long sip of water and look around. I’m farther down the trail than I’ve ever been. My phone just barely has cell service out here.

BRAN: Jane. Are you okay? Checking on you again.

I can’t leave him hanging. I could disappear entirely from the rest of the world (well, except for maybe Grandma—I’d send her a postcard), but I can’t just vanish on Bran. I take another long swig of water and reply to his text.

JANE: I’m taking a day to think. Heading into nature for a while.

BRAN: You know I hate when you do this, right?

Disappearing into nature is my favorite coping strategy when life gets to be too much or when I just need to think. Before I got the job at Bran’s family’s pumpkin farm, I’d walk the fields and woods by my house for hours, putting miles under my feet, not coming home until it was nearly full dark. Bran has given me many lectures about how ill-advised all this wandering is, but part of me still needs to move through outdoor spaces to make sense of the chaos in my head.

JANE: You know I’m going to be an oceanographer and will be off the grid for weeks at a time?

BRAN: That’s different. You’ll have a boat and a crew, not just be wandering the woods in the wilds of southern Wisconsin.

JANE: I swear, I’m fine. Don’t worry.

BRAN: Can you hear my long-suffering sigh from there? At least tell me where you are generally, so I can send out a search party if I don’t hear from you tonight.

JANE: Why are you the best? Seriously. Thank you for worrying. I’m headed east on the bike trail. I’ll text you when I get home later tonight.

BRAN: Be safe. And don’t worry about this lotto ticket mess. We’ll figure it out.

JANE: Not so sure about that, but if you see Holden, please feel free to shove him into a trash can or something.

BRAN: Will do.

I put away my phone, and that’s it, my last contact with another human for a while. Slipping my phone into my backpack, I climb back onto my bike. Not sure where I’m going, but with miles of path before me, I’ll figure it out.

Eventually, by the time the sun is almost overhead, I stop. I’ve been biking for what feels like hours, and my legs ache. Plus, I have to pee. I steer my bike toward a small state park that’s directly off the trail. It’s not much, just some picnic tables, a bathroom, a small playground, and a collection of fields for people to play in.

At the playground, a family sits around a picnic table, eating sandwiches. It’s a mom, dad, and a toddler. The little girl runs back and forth between her parents and the playground, giggling as she tosses leaves onto their heads and then runs away. I remember doing exactly the same thing with my parents when I was younger. My dad would make a huge leaf pile from the old oaks in our backyard in Nashville. Then I’d go down the slide on my play set and land in the leaf pile with a whoosh. I can still hear Mom laughing as she and Dad chased each other around the yard, flinging piles of crinkling leaves in the air. I ran up behind them to add to the leaves, and then Dad swooped Mom off her feet and into the pile. He tumbled in after her, and I jumped in too. Laughter, the crunch of leaves, my parents’ arms around me. All the feelings of home.

I turn away from the happy, laughing family before they see me. No reason to creep them out by staring.

As I walk through the park, missing my family is a bone-deep ache inside me. It’s a tangible feeling that the wind can’t whip away. That nothing can fix. I might have won the lotto, but there’s no amount of money to bring back what we had.

That kills me.

I wander the park until my hands are blocks of ice and the wind finds its way into my layers. After a quick trip to the park restroom, I return to the picnic area and playground. The family is long gone, and I bend over one of the fire pits, shoving the sweatshirt from Holden into it. I add a few sheets of papers and then light it with the lighter I brought from home.

The wind takes the first few sparks, and the flame sputters, like it doesn’t want to burn. I cup my hands around it until flame bites into the hood, the sleeves, and lastly the Whale Watcher logo. I have to turn away as the hungry flames devour everything that Holden and I could’ve been.

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

WHEN I GET BACK HOME, THE SUN IS SETTING. MOM’S TRUCK IS IN the driveway, and smoke rises from the backyard. I can hear Mom out there, singing along to the country music on the radio. Which means she’s drunk, because that’s the only time she lets music fill her up so much that she’ll sing anything. I walk around the house, careful not to impale myself on any of the rusty toys or playground equipment.

Mom stands on one side of the firepit. She’s wearing a jacket that belonged to Dad and dancing to the music. Her best friend, Doris, sits in a lawn chair next to the fire, drinking straight from a bottle of whiskey.

“Jane!” Mom calls, gesturing me over. I’m too tired to hang out, especially with Mom and Doris, but I walk over to Mom anyway.

“How’s it going?” I ask. Doris offers me a sip of whiskey, and I take it. It burns all the way down.

“Happy almost-birthday, baby girl,” Mom says, raising a beer bottle. “I can’t