I think of all the reasons why I want to be someplace new next year: how good it feels to be with Jess—of course. But it’s more than that. How important it feels to be far away from the memory of my dad; how it feels like relief to be in a place where no one knows me as the Kid Whose Dad Left, a place where people just know me as Ros. I feel a little guilty over potentially leaving my mom—not that she’s said yes yet—but not guilty enough to keep me there, at home. Home feels smothering, like a shirt I’ve long outgrown. But I think of explaining this all to Celia, and I feel suddenly exhausted.

“About Celia,” Jess says.

“Celia, who I’m done with,” I say, sweeping aggressively.

“I know, I know. It’s just—is it possible you’re being a little rash? Maybe there’s a way for the two of you to save something.”

“You sound like her,” I say. “Telling me not to rush.”

“Maybe that’s not such a bad thing,” Jess says softly.

My anger releases its hold slightly. If I’m being honest with myself, part of me loves Jess for telling me to think things through. She doesn’t just know how to rush—she knows how to pause, too. It occurs to me that the patience I love in Jess is something I love in Celia, too.

I’m so lost in thought that I knock over one of the terrariums. It shatters on the floor, a mess of soil and glass, like the picture window in miniature. I sweep it up and go to throw it away when Jess calls, “Wait!”

From the dustpan, she fishes out two succulents that were growing inside. She replants them in empty terra-cotta pots and sets them by the cash register, where they greet customers like old friends. Two happy, healthy green plants, rescued from the broken parts.

RETURN TO THE LILY PAD,
or the Hilarity of a Bologna Sandwich

I felt more normal waking up at home. So normal that I could have stayed at home forever. It was so tempting to slip into the old Celia like a costume, to go back to regularly scheduled programming: my to-do lists and color coding my bookshelf. That Celia had never thrown a pie through a glass window or let a bunch of healthy plants die on her watch. Beyond some run-of-the-mill name-calling, she’d never hurt or been hurt. Not in a way that stuck with you. Not in a way that transformed you.

But she’d also never met Oliver. She’d never split a precious last can of LaCroix with Phoebe. She’d never stayed up deliciously, deliriously late with her, spitballing ideas for a yeti costume while eating stale Twizzlers, and hid from Jacques when he was out for blood.