The sailing gene must have skipped Taylor because she doesn’t understand the physics of wind and water. She forgets everything during the winter, so when summer rolls around, she feels ignorant and left out. Even worse, sometimes she gets seasick. Taylor prefers land-based sports, especially volleyball. She played on the varsity team all four years of high school, and the volleyball court was the one place she didn’t feel like a freak. Objectively, she knows she’s not actually a freak—the US Olympic volleyball team is loaded with women over six feet tall—but Taylor is glad she finally topped out at six one.

Her growth spurt in fifth grade had been particularly rough. Almost overnight she went from tall to tallest, towering over her mother, her teacher, and all the boys in her class. Jared Fantozzi started calling her Hagrid—until Finley threatened to punch him in the face. Finley was sent home from school for bullying another student, but that kind of loyalty was what drove Taylor to save her farm stand earnings to help pay for a boat even when she didn’t really enjoy sailing. She sanded, varnished, and painted because Finley was worth it. And even after she died, Taylor was bound by a promise she had no intention of breaking. Not like Willa, who bailed almost immediately.

Everyone was returning to their cars after the inurnment ceremony at the cemetery when Willa and Taylor met up in front of Finley’s little vault. Taylor couldn’t even look at it without welling up. She hated the idea of Finley being all by herself in a cold, dark marble box. She wished the Donoghues had added some of Finley’s favorite things, like the one-eyed teddy bear she swore she didn’t sleep with anymore. Or her pink cardigan with the rhinestone buttons. Or the pictures from the bulletin board in her bedroom. That day, it made sense that ancient Egyptians buried their pharaohs with all their possessions. Forever is such a long time to be alone.

“This sucks.” Willa tugged her black jacket a little tighter around her body and shivered. Even though it was April, there were still small mounds of unmelted snow on the grass. As if spring didn’t want to bloom in a world without Finley Donoghue.

Finley had kept a list of things she wanted at her funeral, like a bonfire on the beach with music and fireworks. She’d wanted her ashes planted in a living urn that grew into a tree or launched into space to become a shooting star. The one thing Finley had not wanted was for her family and friends to stand around the beige common room at church, eating dry ham sandwiches with plain yellow mustard and talking about how she was in a better place. Taylor knew funerals were meant for the living, but Finley deserved fireworks. “We have to go to Key West.”