“What is it, what’s the matter?” Gage asked, even though he was pretty sure he knew the answer to that question. He had a feeling he and Fiona had the same reaction.
“Nothing, nothing, it’s just…she’s so normal. Healthy,” Fiona muttered, her voice low, like she couldn’t bring herself to talk any louder in the presence of the diary. “Such a sweet kid.”
“I found Abby’s diary once,” Gage blurted out, the words leaving his mouth before he even knew that he was going to say them. “I still have it, actually. But I’ve never read it.”
Fiona turned to look at him then, her eyes wide and sad and full of emotion that had the potential to shake Gage to his core. “Why not?” she asked in a small voice.
Gage shrugged, even though he already knew the answer. It felt stupid, saying it out loud. “I know she wouldn’t want me to read it, you know, if she was still here.”
Fiona frowned, her eyebrows scrunched up together. “What’s the difference between Abby’s diary and Tori’s? Do you think we’re…do you think we’re violating her by doing this?” Fiona was clearly trying to keep her voice as casual and light as possible, but Gage could detect the fear hidden between her words. She doesn’t want to do anything to hurt anybody, Gage thought. Same old Fiona, same old beautiful kind loving Fiona.
“It’s different,” Gage began, “because Tori is still alive. She can still forgive us for doing it. But Abby…Abby will never be able to do that.”
Fiona was quiet a moment, tapping her fingers on the top of the table as she thought. “I think she’d forgive you,” Fiona said softly. “I really think she would. It would just be…it’d be you trying to speak to her one last time. That’s not so bad.”
Gage didn’t know what to say to that. Sometimes, especially now that Fiona was gone, he’d take out the diary from its hiding place, late at night, and run his hands over the brightly decorated covers, dragging his fingers over his sister’s writing, where she’d scrawled, “PROPERTY OF ABIGAIL. STAY. OUT” on the front. What could he do, except respect his sister’s last message to him? Wasn’t that the best thing to do, after all?
But he didn’t want to argue with Fiona, not now, not when she just got here. “Maybe,” he said instead of the flood of thoughts that had invaded his brain.
“It’s just a thought,” Fiona said, returning her attention to Tori’s diary and flipping to the back page. There were tons of empty pages, lots of room where she hadn’t written anything yet. Fiona flipped back until she found writing again, landing on Tori’s last entry.
“Maybe we should head to bed, get an early start tomorrow,” Gage suggested, tearing Fiona’s gaze away from the diary. He honestly felt exhausted, like he’d run a bunch of miles and swam across an entire lake or something like that, even if he knew it was only because he’d thought of Abby.
But Fiona frowned and shook her head. “You can go ahead. I’m going to stay up a little while longer and read the last few entries here. Maybe she mentioned something that could come in handy. You never know…” She ducked her head, flipping a few pages back to some earlier entries, and resumed reading.
Gage stared down at her for a long moment, conflicted. This was the ultimate contradiction with Fiona: on one hand, she could be quite fragile, falling apart at the slightest reminder of what had happened to her as a teenager. But at the same time, she was so much stronger than him. A mere mention of Abby could cause him to crumble into pieces, which he’d have to reassemble by himself, piece by piece by piece. If Fiona weren’t here, he’d probably go to his room and simmer in his feelings or otherwise, head out to the clubhouse of his MC, where he spent most of his time now that Fiona was gone. But even after having a panic attack, here Fiona was, struggling away at the work like she needed to solve the case to survive. Hell, maybe she did. Maybe that’s why she was such a fighter, because she knew how weak she was underneath it all.
Gage finally sat down, next to her rather than across from her this time, so he could read along while Fiona’s finger scanned its way down the pages of Tori’s diary. After a few minutes of reading basic banal details like her schoolwork, her soccer games, and her friends’ teenager drama, Fiona suddenly cleared her throat and began reading aloud again: “Today I met a boy! Well, he’s not really a boy. He’s more of a man. But he’s in college and works at the sunglasses store in the mall, right next to my favorite shop. He asked me and Vanessa if we wanted to buy something and when we said we were broke, he gave me a free pair! Vanessa was FUMING. She was so jealous, it made me laugh really hard. But not really. I kept it in because I don’t want to piss her off because we’re best friends.” Fiona paused to take another sip of her scotch, sighing loudly as she downed the thick liquid. “But anyway, I gave him my number, but I forgot to get his name! How stupid am I? I have to go back and try to look and see if he has a nametag because it’s going to be so awkward and embarrassing if I have to ask now. He hasn’t texted me yet, though, so maybe nothing will happen. I’ll let you know!”