ALWAYS CHLOE AND OTHER STORIES Catherine Ryan Hyde “Tender, amazingly hopeful.” –Kirkus Reviews, of Becoming Chloe “Vibrant and heartbreaking.” –Publishers Weekly, of Becoming Chloe By the bestselling author of Don’t Let Me Go and Pay It Forward, this captivating short story collection features ALWAYS CHLOE, the long-awaited novella sequel to Becoming Chloe, Hyde’s award-winning novel. Jordy and Chloe are living above a restaurant in Morro Bay, the first place they landed after their trip down the Big Sur Coast. But Jordy has a boyfriend now, an old flame who’s come back into his life in a big way. Chloe stretches herself as far as she can go to give them her blessing, but her issues about living—or even sleeping—alone turn this happy reunion into a potential disaster. Chloe stops eating, stops sleeping, stops paddling her beloved and battered blue kayak in the bay. No one knows how to help her. When her friend Old Ben, the man who runs the fuel dock nearby, gives her some advice, his words could either save the day or send her out to sea forever, depending on her unique mind’s understanding of them. A heart-wrenching stand-alone novella, and an answer to the many readers who asked for a sequel to Becoming Chloe, ALWAYS CHLOE is ultimately about the struggle to balance others’ needs with our own—and exactly how expansive and forgiving the human heart can be. This collection also includes four previously published short stories, including Breakage, which won honors in the Tobias Wolff award, and The Lion Lottery, which was cited in Best American Short Stories. For my faithful reader Misty, who said just the right thing, in just the right way, at just the right time, to help me see that Jordy and Chloe needed more story. Author’s Note: The only piece in this collection that has never been published in any form is the novella Always Chloe, which is a sequel to my 2006 Knopf novel Becoming Chloe. So many people expressed interest in what happened to Jordan and Chloe that I made the singular decision to return to their story. I hope those who have read Becoming Chloe will enjoy this continuation of their journey, but I’ve done my best to make this a stand-alone piece, one that doesn’t require much—if any —previous knowledge of the characters. The story “Breakage” won second place in the Tobias Wolff award, and was published in the Bellingham Review. “Pet Care, Tarot Readings, Maid Service” appeared in the Worcester Review, and “Fortunate Son” was first published in Eureka Literary Magazine. “The Lion Lottery” was published in High Plains Literary Review and cited in Best American Short Stories in 1999, under the title “Castration Humor.” I changed the title because it made the subject matter sound so very much worse than it is. Table of Contents ALWAYS CHLOE PART ONE: This Is My Right Now Chapter 1 — FLUKE PART TWO: This Is Just a Couple Months Back Chapter 2 — EARTH TIME | Chapter 3 — BLUE BOAT | Chapter 4 — OLD BEN | Chapter 5 — GOD, THE DEVIL, AND RABBITS | Chapter 6 — DRIVER CLASS | Chapter 7 — CHLOE’S CHOICE | Chapter 8 — HAPPINESS PART THREE: This Is Back to My Right Now Chapter 9 — LIGHT | Chapter 10 — BEAUTIFUL OTHER SHORT STORIES THE LION LOTTERY | PET CARE, TAROT READINGS, MAID SERVICE | BREAKAGE | FORTUNATE SON EARTHQUAKE WEATHER AND OTHER STORIES ABOUT CATHERINE RYAN HYDE ALSO BY CATHERINE RYAN HYDE ALWAYS CHLOE PART ONE: This Is My Right Now. FLUKE I push off from the dock. Paddle away. Amazing. I’m really doing this thing. I don’t even know if I’m scared. Probably I’m scared. Probably I just don’t know. I can hear Ethel barking at me. And barking. And barking. I’m scared she’ll wake up Jordy and Kevin. I’m hoping Jordy’ll just yell at her to be quiet, and then he’ll go back to sleep again. I’ve never heard Ethel all panicked like that. I thought she could take anything. She’s been through a lot. Like me. So I figured she could roll with just about anything by now. But I was wrong. She wants to come along. Or maybe she doesn’t want to go. Maybe she just wants me not to. I don’t look back. I couldn’t stand to look back and see Ethel’s face in the window. She can get along without me. She’s done stuff like that before. I wave at Old Ben on my way by his fuel dock. He waves back. He calls out to me. “Chloe! Good to see you back on the water!” It hits me by surprise how much I’m going to miss Old Ben. I didn’t know that. I knew Jordy was just about everything in the world, and I knew I would miss Ethel, but I didn’t know Old Ben got so important. I wonder when that happened. And why I didn’t know. It doesn’t matter now. I don’t need to try to figure everything out anymore. I look again at Ben’s quote. That’s what he calls it. A quote. I would just call it a little poem. I’m still not quite sure what a quote is, even though I think he tried to explain it to me. I only know he painted it onto the wood that’s boarding up the windows in the shop next door to his. The neighbors think the other guy painted it, before he closed up his shop and ran away. But I know it was Old Ben. It says: All men should strive to learn before they die What they are running from, and to, and why. —Thurber Ben told me what a Thurber is, but now I forget. He also told me that women count the same as men for a thing like that. I don’t think I know any of those “from” and “to” and “why” things. I guess I didn’t learn them. And I guess I should have. But it’s too late to fix that now. Old Ben keeps looking and looking after I go by. I keep turning to see him over my shoulder, and he’s still watching me. Maybe I’m wearing something about this day, about this plan, like a sign on my forehead that anybody can read. Or maybe it’s just because I’m paddling my little blue kayak out farther than the sign. The sign that warns about little boats near the breakwater. How waves can break inside the breakwater and get small boats in trouble. I guess Old Ben must know by now that I never paddle out farther than the sign. I turn one more time and wave at him. All happy and fun. So he’ll figure I