When You Were Young

Prudence hugged her, followed by Wendell, and even David patted her on the back. Rebecca stayed in her corner, saying nothing. Only later, after Samantha retreated to the cabin for the night, did Rebecca speak to her. She appeared in the doorway as Samantha tried in vain to sleep and said, "I want to go with you tomorrow."

"What? Why?"

Rebecca sat down at the edge of the bed, looking down at the floor. "There's no place for me here anymore. All the others are adults now, but I still feel like a kid." She reached out to pluck a throw pillow from the floor. "Molly used to sleep on this pillow when she came into the bed with me." She threw the pillow into the darkness. "Everything here reminds me of her and it hurts. I keep thinking she'll come through the door any moment and crawl into my lap the way she did when she was three. But she's gone and I'm still here."

Samantha crawled over to the end of the bed to cradle Rebecca's head in her hands. She knew the pain of losing a loved one all too well. Her parents, her aunt, Andre, and her unborn child had all been taken from her. "Leaving isn't going to make the pain go away," Samantha said. "It will follow you."

"I'm afraid of what will happen if I stay," Rebecca said, indicating the scratches on her wrists. "I don't think I can make it here, feeling her all around me."

"All right, come with me to Seabrooke tomorrow. We'll figure something out."

Rebecca thanked her and then spent the rest of the night sleeping next to Samantha in the bed. Flurries of sobbing punctuated Rebecca's snores throughout the night. Samantha didn't sleep at all, watching over her troubled friend.

By the morning, Rebecca seemed to have recovered. She whistled as she packed her few belongings and made Samantha a hearty breakfast of eggs and fresh bread. "I can't wait to get over there and see what it's like," Rebecca said. "Is it really so different from this place?"

"It's like a whole new world," Samantha said.

"Good," Rebecca said. Samantha saw on her friend's face the same look she'd worn all those years after leaving Andre at the prom, the mask of hope that a change of scenery-a fresh start-could erase the past. In time Rebecca would learn, as she had, that the pain would always remain with her, a stain that could never be washed away.

As for her own belongings, she had little to carry with her from Eternity except memories. A few clothes were all she carried in a knapsack to the beach. The entire town showed up to wish her and Rebecca farewell. Prudence and Wendell stood at their head so that they were first to embrace her.