Things I Want to Say by Cyndi Myers Read Free Book Online Page B

with my class. Would I have married one of those men I’d just danced with? Would I have children now, and the deep friendships that come from years of shared experiences?
    Frannie would say no, that only by going away could we have made our lives better, that if we’d stayed we’d have been trapped and probably miserable, but I wasn’t so sure.
    When I returned to the pavilion, Alice found me. She was flushed, too, but she looked more exhausted than ecstatic. “Want to take a break from all this?” She waved a hand at the full dance floor.
    Not really, but something in Alice’s face—the anxiety in her eyes, or the tight lines across her brow—worried me. Without words, she was pleading for me to come with her. “Okay,” I said.
    I followed her to the parking lot and her car. “God, it’s hot out,” she said, turning the air conditioner up full blast as soon as she started the car. She glanced over to me. “Let me know if you get too cold. Since the chemo, my internal thermostat is all haywire.”
    I nodded. “Are you feeling all right?” I asked.
    “Yeah. I just needed to get away. I don’t handle crowds that well anymore.”
    She exited the park and pulled onto the highway. “Where are we going?” I asked.
    “Want to drive out to the bluffs? There’s a beautiful view up there this time of night.”
    “All right.” The suggestion made me only a little nervous. Back when we were in school, the bluffs were a popular make-out spot. Not that I’d personally ever been up there,but I’d heard stories. I hoped Alice wasn’t going to take me up there now and make a pass at me. She hadn’t struck me as a lesbian, but one thing I’d learned living in California was that you could never be sure.
    Turns out the bluffs these days were the parking lot of a shopping mall. Alice drove to the far end of the lot, which looked out over the river, with the lights of houses glowing like fireflies between the trees on the opposite bank. She shut off the engine and stared out the front windshield. “I come up here sometimes when I need to think,” she said.
    “What do you think about?” I asked.
    “Life. Love. Everything.” She glanced at me. “I know it’s a cliché, but having cancer made me reexamine everything. I had all that time lying in bed trying to recover from one round of chemo and bracing for the next. My head hurt too much to read. After a while you realize how inane ninety-nine percent of television is, so I ended up reviewing everything I’d ever done in my life and wondering what I would have—or should have—done differently.”
    A half smile flashed across her face, then was gone. “When I started wondering what I’d do differently in the future, I figured that was a sign I was going to live after all.”
    “I’m glad you made it,” I said. I meant it. I was glad Alice was a part of my life again. Finding her was like finding part of my childhood, a good part I didn’t want to give up.
    “Losing weight made me think about my past and my future, too,” I said. “Being fat isn’t the same as having cancer, but being normal size after all those years felt like I was getting a second chance.”
    “I’ve made some bad choices in my life.” Alice was looking out the windshield again, her hands gripping the steering wheel. “I’ve done some bad things.”
    My stomach knotted. What could Alice possibly have done that was so terrible? “We’ve all done things we regret,” I said.
    “Do you ever think about going back, making up for some of the badness?”
    I hesitated. “You mean…like restitution?”
    “Something like that.” She looked at me again. “Do you think about that?”
    I shook my head. “What’s done is done. You can’t take it back.”
    “But sometimes you can. Or at least ask forgiveness.”
    Could you really? I cleared my throat. “Anything in particular you have in mind?”
    She shrugged. “I don’t know. But it’s why I’m going back to Ojai. I’ve