Giftchild (32 page)

When I trusted myself not to burst into tears, I whispered into Rodney's neck: "Is this what it feels like to be stupidly happy?"

Rodney laughed. "You wouldn't believe how much I've missed you."

"Mmmm," I said. "I think I have a pretty good idea."

"Oh," Rodney said. He leaned back, digging into his sweatshirt pocket. "I have something for you."

He reached for my hand, and I felt a cool metal chain coil into it, followed by something smooth and thin. I held it up to the moonlight. In my palm was a heart-shaped locket on a long silver chain. I held my palm under my nose, running my fingers over the etched surface. My thumbnail traced the groove in the side, and I slid it in, popping it open. There inside was the picture we'd taken of Gabriel. Rodney had trimmed off half of his hands to fit it inside, but I could still see the edges of them, wrapped around mine.

I was struck speechless. Tears welled up in my eyes. Our future was uncertain, but here he was, still taking care of me in just the right ways, not the stupid, damaging ways that I kept trying to take care of everyone else.

"I thought," he said, "that this way, you could always carry him with you."

I couldn't take my eyes off the tiny picture. "Thank you," I said.

"I've decided," he said, "that maybe doing kid portraits wouldn't be such a terrible thing, you know? We could still do art photos on the side."

I looked into Rodney's eyes. His face was serious; he wasn't speaking hypothetically. I saw it, then: the ways our future might unfold in front of us. We could have that future together, and we didn't have to wait. We didn't have to pretend that wasn't where we were headed. We could start building it now.

I'd never wanted anything so much. "Yes," I said. "Let's do it."

Rodney wrapped his arms around my shoulders, and I leaned my head on his shoulder, my forehead resting against his jaw. And then he did something he'd never done before. Another first for us.

He just held me. Before, I would have made out with him, or pulled away, or made a joke out of it. Anything to push back my nerves, to convince myself that it wasn't serious. But today I just relaxed against him, floating in his arms, and let him hold me.

I couldn't remember anything feeling as good.

Acknowledgments

As always, this book was not written in a vacuum. Many people read various drafts. Thank you to all of you, for your feedback and your support.

Many thanks to Lisa, Eddie, and Krystyna at JABberwocky, for their candid and honest critiques. Eddie—you put up with so much from me. Thank you.

Thanks to Carol, Tessa, Erin, Tara, Sandra, Kara, and Isaac, who loved the book even before I rewrote it from scratch, and gave me most excellent advice to help with that rewrite. Thanks also to Kathy, Theresa, Emily, and Megan, for their reads, feedback, and encouragement.

Thanks especially to the Seizure Ninjas—James, Sandra, Jenn, Heidi, Lee Ann, Cavan, Alex, and Heather—for their glowing praise and unrelenting criticism. Your critiques of this book can be summed up in five words—It's brilliant! Now rewrite it!—and I love you all for that. You guys give the best prescriptive feedback around, and all my books would be much worse without you. (You know; you've read them.)

Thanks to Isaac, for his fantastic design advice and his InDesign expertise. But most of all for his friendship and support over the years.

Thanks always to Brandon, who taught me everything, and continues to astound me with his generosity.

Thanks to my husband, who has heard me think aloud about this book for nearly four years, and has endless patience for my constant rounds of "what if…" Thanks also for not laughing at me when I finally figured out what this book was about four drafts in. Sometimes I'm special like that. And thanks to my daughter—I didn't even know toddlers could be so patient, but you are. Thanks for putting up with your working mom. I love you.

Thanks most of all to my amazing editor Kristina Kugler, who helped me turn a pretty good draft into a polished finished work, and the incomparable Melody Fender, whose beautiful design work you see on the cover. Thanks, both of you, for your kindness and patience with me. You are both amazingly good at what you do, but more than that, you're incredible people. I am honored to work with you.

Janci Patterson is the author of two other contemporary young adult novels:
Everything's Fine
, which won the Utah Arts Council award for Best Young Adult Novel in 2007, and
Chasing the Skip
, which was released by Christy Ottaviano books in 2012. For more about Janci, visit her online at jancipatterson.com.

Kira thought she knew everything about her best friend, Haylee. But when Haylee commits suicide immediately after her first date with her longtime crush, Bradley Johansen, Kira is left with nothing but questions, and a gaping hole in her life where Haylee used to be. 
Kira is sure that the answers to her questions must be written in Haylee's journal, but she's not the only one searching for it. The more Kira learns about Haylee's past, the more certain she is that other people grieving for Haylee are keeping secrets—especially Bradley, and Haylee's attractive older cousin Nick. Kira is desperate to get to Haylee's journal before anyone else finds it—to discover the truth about what happened to Haylee— 
And to hide the things that Haylee wrote down about her. 

Find
Everything's Fine
on Amazon

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