CHAPTER TWENTY
HOME AT LAST
Everwood Cove looks exactly the way I remember it, as though the past three years have simply slipped by without leaving even the smallest dent in the quiet rhythm of the town. As Diane drives slowly down the familiar street where both of our homes sit only a few houses apart, a sudden wave of nostalgia rises in my chest so fiercely that it almost steals the air from my lungs. The sidewalks are the same uneven slabs of concrete we used to ride our bikes over as kids, the trees still lean lazily over the road as though trying to eavesdrop on the lives passing beneath them, and the houses carry that same sleepy charm that had once made this place feel like the safest corner of the world.
My mother bursts into tears the moment she pulls me into a hug, her arms w
