Some ten years ago, there'd been another girl like Jeanie.

Charity Abernathy, prom queen with a handsome boyfriend, perfect manners and the sweetest smile. Mary had never spoken to her, but even if she had, she'd never expected the teenager would ever remind her of Jeanie at all.

That is, until her parents came in the church offices one day, faces bowed in shame, their daughter trailing behind them, teary-eyed. She'd been caught reading inappropriate things, things that were hard to come by in their small Christian town, and her parents were worried for her eternal soul.

While they talked to Pastor Jeff, she'd taken the girl aside. "We all battle with those urges as teenagers," she'd told her, hoping it'd help her, hoping she could show her afflictions like that were totally normal. "What matters is what we choose to do with it." She'd offered a kind smile.

Charity had watched her, calculated, sitting there in her short skirt with her legs crossed, mascara smudges on her fingers. "You don't know anything about me," she'd said. "You don't know the things I've done. You can't even fathom them."

She'd considered it then. "I know far more than you think." She could've said it, but it felt wrong, false, like her and the girl she'd been were separate people, a life broken in two at seventeen years old. Instead, she'd bitten her tongue and kept quiet.

"You tell them if they try to put me in one of those stupid camps, I'll run away," Charity had said, a challenge. It was the thing Jeanie had once claimed when they'd talked about the fear of getting caught — but she shouldn't be thinking of that. Ever.

"Oh, really?" she'd scoffed. "You think you'd be happier that way? Out on your own, with no one to support you?"

She'd been irrationally angry, had been ready to scream at this girl, and it was only days later she'd realized why. Pastor Jeff had called her in, and there were Charity's parents, again with their heads bowed in shame, because Charity had done what she'd promised and rode the first available bus out of town. They were stunned, had never seen it coming, and Mary knew it then. Why she had been so furious, why she hadn't relayed the message.

The girl hadn't reminded her of Jeanie at all.

She'd reminded her of herself.

She reached into the back. The shoebox sat at the very bottom of the closet, coated in a layer of dust. She pulled it out, sat on the bed, and stared at it.

Jeanie's words had echoed through her mind since she left yesterday. She'd bravely collected herself, told everyone she didn't want to talk about it, and spent the rest of the night trying not to fall apart. Once George had started snoring, she'd cried herself to sleep, silently. Her pillow had still been wet when she woke up.

With trembling hands, she lifted the lid. The yellow sweater lay on top. She took it out, hesitated, then brought it up to her nose. It smelled like closet and old dust, nothing like its former owner.

A tear spilled from her eye, and she folded the sweater, setting it aside. Next, she removed the fake bottom from the box, revealing the jumble of pictures and letters underneath.

She picked one. Her mother had taken it, she remembered. They were dressed up for a play, grinning, Jeanie a ghost and she a housewife. She grimaced at the parallels with the future.

She looked at more of them. Always together, always identical moods. Shaking, she opened a small note.

Don't listen to Caroline. You're perfect! She stinks. Love, M.

She'd drawn hearts and falling stars around it. It seemed so pure.

"What're ya doing?"

Her actual heart flew out of her chest, and she dropped the box, pictures and letters falling to her feet. Georgie, who should've been at work, was standing in the doorway, frowning.

"Georgie! You scared me."

"Why?"

She couldn't explain, clutched the note to her chest. He couldn't see this, couldn't see anything of this. And yet, when he came in and gathered a picture from the carpet, she let him. Whatever was on it made him smile. "'s that you and Jean?" He tapped it.

They were older in this one, holding hands in the yard. Innocent behavior to bystanders, but they had no idea they'd been kissing a few hours before. She nodded.

"Sweet," he said. "Why you looking at all this?"

She straightened her shoulders, tried to collect herself, then realized she had no explanation that made her look good. "That's my business. You should've knocked before you came in." She snatched the pile from his hand and threw them back into the box.

"The door was open."

"What are you doing home?"

He sighed, sinking through his knees to collect the rest. "I don't wanna talk about it," he muttered, handing her some more.

"Georgie—"

"Ma," he said, "how 'bout you don't ask about my day, and I don't ask about all this?"

She was prepared to go against him, mouth already open, but thought the better of it. "Fine," she said. She'd rather forget about the whole thing anyway. Lord knew she wouldn't be able to handle one more thing on her plate.

Georgie paused, one picture left in his hand, the others already back where they belonged, back where they should've stayed. He frowned, eyes running up and down the image, and her stomach turned. She'd been positive there was nothing explicitly incriminating on these, else she wouldn't have kept them, but what if she'd missed something?

"That your boyfriend's truck?" he said, flipping the picture around. It showed Jeanie and her in the back of Uncle Carl's truck, smiling with their heads close together, smoke billowing from their cigarettes, a few empty beer bottles scattered around them. Again, her stomach turned, this time with a not so unpleasant whoop. "Skipping class together, like you told me about?"

There hadn't been a boyfriend, of course. She still wasn't quite sure why she'd told her son about that, why'd she'd used the word boyfriend when friend would've sufficed. For most of their lives, she'd purposefully avoided mentioning Jeanie to any of her kids, biting back her tongue any time a memory with her in it popped up.

"Yes," she lied, her heart racing. "Jeanie always tagged along."

He nodded. "Seems more like he was the one bein' tagged along," he said. "Looks like you and Jean were thick as thieves." He didn't mean anything by it. Georgie would be the last one to notice something like that — she was sure of it. "She was real good-lookin', wasn't she?"

She fumbled with the note in her hand, drawing in a deep breath. This was just the way her son made conversation about girls. Totally normal. And who wouldn't notice how beautiful Jeanie had been? How she still was? "Well, I suppose so," she said vaguely. "I don't know. She never did seem to catch the boys' fancy much."

Georgie smirked. "You don't say. Gee, wonder why that was." Though she should be horrified, she found herself laughing, burying her face in her hands.

Before she knew it, tears ran down her cheeks again, and she heaved, attempting to stop the crying, or laughing, or whatever was happening to her. Then, she felt something on her back, and she realized it was her son, who'd sat down next to her to comfort her.

"Y'know, Ma," he said, "who can even really blame her? If God didn't want her to love girls, he shouldn't have made them so pretty."

She dropped the box all over again.

Loneliness had never stung like this; it used to simmer, dulled by her children's smiles, her husband's embrace, her mother's jokes. Now, Jeanie was all she could think about. She consumed her thoughts, so much so the mother of Georgie's baby had asked her if she was okay — seeing she hadn't pestered them about marriage for a while.

Mary couldn't think about marriage. When she did, she thought about Jeanie, just as lonely, never allowed to tie herself down to whichever woman she loved, shunned by society. True to herself, and yet no better off. When she did, she thought of all the years with George, grinding, digging, hammering to make something out of it, and distracting herself with the love she had for her kids. Her flaws all hidden away, and yet, was she any better off?

She tried to counter the loneliness. Waved at the other women from bible study, practically ambushing them on the street — they scattered like chickens, all in different directions, ignoring her attempts at greeting them. She tried Brenda, but she said they shouldn't mix business with private life, as if the woman wasn't her neighbor too, not to mention all chummy with George. Of course, Rob still seemed to like her, despite his profession as a man of God, but she could hardly start spending more time with him, not after last time, drawing closer to each other on the couch while her stomach churned with nausea. Nothing had happened, and she didn't want anything to happen — still, that didn't seem like a better idea than Jeanie. In the end, she was stuck chatting with some bowling range customers, nervous and bored, and it dawned on her. Jeanie's been right. She'd never have a friend like her. It was futile to even try.

Two days after Jeanie had stormed out, she caught Georgie's gaze, and, reminded of his words, snatched up her keys and drove to the shops to buy a scrapbook. She sat down with it in the garage, somehow soothed by the presence of her son's possessions around her, and set to work.

When it was finished, she took it to her prayer garden and tried to state her intentions.

She didn't want Jeanie to be lonely, she explained.

And well, she didn't want to be lonely as well. She hoped He'd understand, even though she was certain He wouldn't.

She lit a cigarette, then browsed through the book, taking in each picture, the words she'd written besides them. She'd glued the You're perfect note to the title page, and she ran her thumb over it now, inhaling shakily. After all these years, she'd finally arranged all of her sins neatly in a flower print book, labeling them accurately and minutely, and instead of disgust, she felt exhaustion.

She stubbed her cigarette and remembered Charity Abernathy, and hoped that wherever she was, she was thriving.