We don’t speak as he drives down the main street, not at first. The sleepy little beach town has come to life now, and beachgoers crowd the sidewalks, heading down to the sand in their flip-flops and cover-ups, stuffed beach bags slung over their shoulders. I can feel him looking over at me every few seconds, and it takes all my focus not to make eye contact. Finally, when it seems like he’s drifted into his own thoughts, I glance at him out of the corner of my eye, try to take in the details. Blue board shorts, white T-shirt, flip-flops. No MedicAlert bracelet. All this surprises me, like there should be some outward sign.
He seems comfortable driving my car, and I try to be okay with it, but I’m not. I don’t think anyone else has driven it since Trent’s been gone, and it feels like if I closed my eyes right now, I could see him there. Sitting in that seat, with one hand on the wheel, the other on my knee, singing loud with the radio and getting the words wrong on purpose to make me laugh. Working my name into every song that came on.
But there is no music on now, and Colton Thomas is driving my car. A deep river of guilt runs through me, and as we drive, I try to come up with a new set of rules to deal with the situation I’ve created. I won’t ask him any questions, and I’ll answer as few as possible. I won’t mention where I’m from, or why I was in Shelter Cove, or who I am. Maybe I won’t even tell him my real name because—
“So, Quinn,” he says, keeping his eyes on the road. “Let’s start over.”
I look at him now, startled at my own name. Then I remember the note I just signed.
“I’m Colton,” he offers.
“I know.” It slips out before I can stop it.
“You do?” There’s a note of disappointment in his voice, one I don’t understand.
I nod. Swallow. Wish I were anywhere but here. “Yeah,” I say, too quickly. “I . . . you . . . your friend in the café said your name.”
I glance at him to see if he believes me, then realize he has no reason not to. He has no idea what I know. A wave of nausea—or guilt, it’s hard to say which—passes over me. I should just tell him the truth right now. Maybe he’d be so horrified he’d turn around and drive right back to his shop and get out, and that would be the end of it. I could leave and make sure our paths never crossed again. Close the door I shouldn’t have opened. I open my mouth to say the words, but they catch and collide in the back of my throat.
“So you were listening?” Colton asks, with a hint of a smile. “Enough to catch my name?”
I look straight out the windshield and tell the truth. “I was.”
“And you’re not from here?”
“I’m not.”
“You on vacation?”
I shake my head. “Just here for the day.” I don’t say from where.
“Alone?” His voice sounds hopeful.
“Yes.”
We stop at a red light. He’s quiet a moment, and I turn the word over in my mind. Alone. I’ve felt that way for so long. For four hundred days. Since the day Trent died, I’ve been alone and lonely. But right now, in this moment, I realize I’m not either one of those things.
I’ve imagined what it might be like to see Colton Thomas, wondered how it would feel to look from a distance at the person who received such a vital part of who Trent was. To look at a stranger’s chest and know what lies deep within it. Trent’s mom told me his grandmother was beside herself when she heard they had donated his heart. She didn’t take issue with any of the other organs, but the heart was different. The heart was everything that made a person who he was, and she thought he should’ve been buried with it. I hoped, after meeting the others, that seeing another person who was alive because of Trent would be a healing thing. The final healing thing. But I didn’t, at any of those times, imagine that when I did, I would somehow immediately feel less alone.
“That’s not a bad start,” Colton says, like he can hear my thoughts.
“Not a bad start for what?”
“A do-over,” he says simply.
CHAPTER FIVE
“The Greeks believed the spirit resided in the heart. In traditional Chinese medicine, the heart is believed to store the spirit, shen. The idea of the heart as an inner book, which contains a record of a person’s entire life—emotions, ideas, and memories—appears in early Christian theology, but may have ancient roots that go back to Egyptian culture.
“No other part of the human body has been so widely commemorated in poetry, so commonly used as a symbol for love and the soul.”
—Dr. Mimi Guarneri, The Heart Speaks: A Cardiologist Reveals the Secret Language of Healing
WE BOTH TENSE when the ER doors swish open, and as soon as we step through the doorway, it brings me back to reality. Colton’s reality, which, according to all his sister’s posts, was lived in and out of hospitals, with endless medications in constant need of adjustment, extended stays, and emergency trips—scares that drove him and his family through these same doors fearing the worst. The thought of it makes me want to take his hand in mine as we walk up to the check-in counter.
Behind it, a round woman in mint-green scrubs sits in front of a computer, clacking away at the keys. We stand there for a moment before she looks up and runs her eyes disinterestedly over my face. They land, for a brief second, on the bloodied napkins I’ve got wadded at my lip; then she grabs a clipboard from her organizer and slides it across the counter for me before turning back to her computer.
“Have a seat and fill those out,” she says without looking back at me. “We’ll be with you as soon as we can.”
Her voice is monotone, like she’s said those words a million times, and it makes me wonder what would have to come through the doorway for her not to sound that way. But I don’t have to wonder for long. “Thank you,” I say, and she looks up again, but this time she catches sight of Colton and does a double take.
“Colton, honey! I’m so sorry; I didn’t see you there!” She bolts up out of her chair and pushes through the door next to the counter, her hand on his arm in an instant. “Is everything okay? You need me to page Dr. Wilde?”
“No, no, I’m fine,” he says. “I’m great, in fact. It’s my friend here who needs to be seen. She’s got a pretty good cut on her lip. I think it needs a few stitches.”