The Valley and the Flood by Rebecca Mahoney (10 best books of all time TXT) 📗

Flood all around me since we left the Mockingbird’s. Right now we must be indistinguishable to Rudy.

“What happened with the Mockingbird . . .” I say slowly. “It won’t happen again.”

“Rose.” She twists a lock of hair around her finger. “I know I’ve asked a lot of you. I know grown-ass adults who would’ve buckled under the pressure we’ve put on you. But I can’t help you if you don’t tell me anything.”

The same thing Felix had said. It sounded so easy when you put it like that.

I fiddle with a Post-it note on his desk. And eventually, I start talking.

“I saw other memories besides mine,” I say. “Cassie’s, Alex’s, Felix’s. The Mockingbird says that’s what it’ll look like, when the Flood comes.”

“I heard,” Christie says.

I nod, eyes on my feet for a long moment. “She also told me that the Flood looked to me to answer a question,” I say. “That I gave it the wrong answer.”

Christie nods. “I heard that, too.”

My voice drops to a whisper. “I think that’s true.”

There’s a long silence. But she doesn’t look surprised. “Just because it’s the answer that brought you both here,” she says, “doesn’t mean it’s the final one. Answers change.”

I smile weakly. It’s not like Rudy’s with her for happy reasons. Maybe she’d get it.

“I think I’m different than I used to be,” I say. “I don’t . . . think I know myself so well anymore.”

She nods slowly, her jaw working. “Well,” she says softly, “I think that when we change, we carry our past selves with us, you know? For better and for worse.”

My heartbeat stutters. The adrenaline is still primed from before, right at the surface. “Like I said, it . . . won’t happen again.”

Christie’s smile eases into something rueful as she laughs. “God, you’re just like Cassie. Since when did I stop understanding girls your age? I didn’t think I was that old yet.”

It’s half to herself, like an offhand stray thought she’d happily let go. But I raise two questioning eyebrows.

“I love her like my own, you know?” she says. “My wife and I both. We’re not old enough to be parents. Not to a teenager. But we always . . .” However she wanted to end that thought, she shrugs it off. “But Cassie thinks of herself as a guest in our house. Her parents send money every month, a Christmas card every year. But she never sees them. They live on the edge of town, drive out to Dead Creek to do their shopping, do everything they can to avoid us. All I know is that she had a talk with them one day, when she was thirteen, and they decided it was best that they live apart. It was the most bloodless breakup of a family I’ve ever seen.”

She tips Alex’s coffee mug in a slow circle. Round and round.

“Cassie was right, wasn’t she?” I say. “Her parents didn’t commission the Mockingbird.”

She lets out a humorless snort. “They lost a child before Cassie. I thought that was as good a reason as any to call the Flood here. But Cassie said the only reason I was going was because I wanted to know why they sent her away.” Christie grimaces. “Right as usual. The little shit.”

“Do you think it was something to do with the Flood?” I say.

“Even now, they won’t say. Said they promised her.” She taps rhythmically at the edge of the mug. “Nice of them to start caring how she feels now.”

I hope this Post-it wasn’t anything important. It’s in shreds now.

“You know what I think?” Christie says.

Nothing good. But I ask anyway. “What?”

“I think that if she tells me, she expects me to make her leave, too.” A short breath, almost a laugh, punches out of her. “And who can blame her for that.”

I twist the ruined paper around and around my finger, already regretting what I’m about to say. But she looks so miserable that I say it anyway.

“There’s something else it could be,” I say.

I wait for her to ask. But she doesn’t rush me. She’s raised her eyes to me, narrowed her attention. And she lets me start when I’m ready to start.

“When you tell someone something painful,” I say. “Someone who loves you. You think of the worst-case scenarios first. That they won’t believe you, they’ll think you’re overreacting, or that they’ll react worse than you did. But what’s the best case? That this person who cares about you so much, who wants so much for you to be okay, finds out how bad it’s been, and that you never told them. And that you have to see that look on their face when they . . .”

I can feel my pulse in my fingertips, in my throat. But if Christie has any idea that I just danced much closer to the truth than I’ve gotten before, it doesn’t show on her face. She mostly looks thoughtful.

“That’s not the best-case scenario,” she says.

My mouth curls into a tight smile. “Then what is?”

“That you tell them,” she says. “And they understand.”

“Understand what?”

When I turn, Felix’s rueful smile greets me. He slouches against the doorway like it’s holding him up. It may well be. Alex hovers behind him, and Cassie even farther. Like she doesn’t want to risk eye contact with Christie.

“Sorry,” I say to Felix. “I’m in your chair.”

“I think after the day you’ve had, you deserve the chair.” He shifts his weight from foot to foot. “And, uh. After how certain people here spoke to you.”

“Certain people shouldn’t worry about it.” I smile slowly. “I can move.”

“Take mine.” Christie stands, hewing to the lengthening shadows as she crosses the room. “Rudy’s getting restless.”

I look down again. Sure enough, the shadows around her feet are still flickering. Unless it’s my imagination, Rudy’s stretching a little farther from her than he was before.

Felix crosses the room, but rather than sitting down himself, he rolls out the chair with a flourish. Alex shoots him a long, dubious look, but Felix’s grin never wavers. To my surprise, Alex gives in, sinking into