The next day, Wesley came to pick Audrey up for a trip to his bookstore.
Mom made me go too.
"Audie doesn't know those books well. You'll be there to remind her."
I looked at her. "As what, exactly?"
"As her sister, of course."
She said it like it was the most obvious thing in the world.
"It's your sister's first relationship. What's wrong with helping her out?"
Wesley stood in the doorway, caught the last line, and gave me a flat glance.
"It's best if she's willing to help."
"That way Nightide won't be stuck in the middle."
Audrey looped her arm through his and said sweetly, "My sister just talks tough. She loves me more than anyone."
I got put in the back seat.
The two of them laughed and chatted the whole way.
Wesley asked her which letter was her favorite.
Audrey paused, then turned to look at me.
I turned my face away, toward the window.
So she could only smile and say, "I love every one of them."
Wesley's smile dimmed a little.
"But you used to say you'd never forget the thirty-seventh, not for your whole life."
The car went quiet for a few seconds.
Audrey's eyes reddened fast.
"I'm just so nervous today, my head's all a mess."
Wesley softened his voice at once.
"It's fine. I'm not testing you."
He looked at me in the rearview mirror.
"As long as certain people don't put pressure on you."
My fingertips curled slightly.
He probably thought it was me in the back seat, making Audrey nervous.
At the bookstore, Wesley took us up to the second floor.
A whole row of blue-covered books sat by the window.
The one in the very center was the out-of-print copy of The Tide Book.
Seven years ago I'd written in a letter that I'd seen it once at a used-book stall but couldn't bring myself to buy it.
Wesley handed the book to Audrey.
"A gift for our meeting. Seven years late."
Audrey flipped through a couple of pages and smiled sweetly.
"I love it."
"Which line?" Wesley asked.
Her hand stopped.
I knew what Wesley wanted to hear.
There was a line in that book: the mountain waits for a tide that never comes, but with every retreat, the tide knows the mountain is still there.
That was why he was Everdawn and I was Nightide.
Audrey pointed at a line at random.
"This one. It's very romantic."
Wesley glanced at it and said nothing.
That line was about death.
At lunch, he ordered Audrey a fish chowder with no cilantro.
Audrey took one sip, frowned, and picked all the cilantro out of her own bowl into mine.
"Here, sis, you like it. Eat up."
Wesley's chopsticks stilled.
"Didn't Nightide never eat cilantro, even as a kid?"
Audrey went pale.
She had Mom's script memorized by now.
"I didn't before, but my taste changed after the surgery."
Wesley looked again at the little mound of cilantro piled in my bowl.
"Then what about her?"
Audrey smiled.
"My sister likes to copy me."
"Whatever I won't eat, she says she won't eat either."
The hesitation in Wesley's eyes turned to distaste in an instant.
"Rita."
"People aren't the same. Learning her habits doesn't make you her."
I lifted my head.
"You'd better remember that yourself."
He seemed not to have expected me to push back, and his brows drew tighter.
That afternoon, for the group photo, Audrey stood beside Wesley.
Both sets of parents were pulled into the frame.
The photographer asked, "And where does this young lady stand?"
Mom said, without thinking, "She'll take it for us."
I took the camera.
In the frame, the two families stood close together.
Wesley smoothed Audrey's hair, and Mom and Dad smiled wider than they ever did at Christmas.
Like they'd always been one family.
No one asked whether I wanted to be in the shot.
When it was done, Wesley came over to me.
"Rita, I don't care what problems you had with Nightide in the past."
"But she finally got through it, and today she's happy."
"Don't use those half-true little details to wreck her happiness."
I looked at him.
"And what if those details belonged to me in the first place?"
He gave a short laugh.
"Your sister already told me."
"You've been snatching her things since you were kids."
"Rita, don't make yourself look pathetic."
On the drive home, Audrey handed me her phone again.
Wesley had asked:
【In the thirty-seventh letter, there was a line I never sent. Do you still remember it?】
Audrey bit her lip.
"Sis, you can't refuse to help me this time, can you?"
I didn't take the phone.
Because the thirty-seventh letter was the first time Wesley confessed to me.
That line had never been written into any chat log anywhere.
Only I knew it.
