The Six Rules of Maybe

been afraid to hurt his feelings.
    Jitter was twenty-eight weeks old. He was two and a half pounds, and his head was likely down now, getting ready for the trip into the world. He could hiccup and blink and maybe even dream. He was doing all of these new things somewhere else, away from us. I missed Jitter, even if I didn’t miss Juliet.
    I could tell something was in the air, change—I could feel it. It wasn’t just the clouds, although they had stayed around and then got heavier, bringing cool air and occasional drizzles from the waters of the straits. You heard people shutting their windows. Clive Weaver had a sweater on when he went to check his mail; he stood out on the street for a long time before Ally Pete-Robbins reminded him that it was Sunday.
    There wasn’t any banging and clattering of moving and packing, but then again, he had come with very little. His boundless hope would have filled a thousand moving trucks, but Hayden’s actual belongings took up only the backpack that sat by the front door. The sonogram picture was missing from the refrigerator.
    “What’s happening,” I said when I saw it was gone.
    Mom sighed.
    “I want to know what’s happening.”
    “I think you know.”
    Hayden himself appeared then. “Scarlet,” he said.
    “You can’t leave.”
    “Come on and walk me out.” He slung his bag over his shoulder. He hugged my mom and thanked her.
    “This is wrong,” I said. I was getting more used to speaking my mind. I was ready for honesty in my life, because the lies had done no good. “Wrong.”
    “Come on,” he said to me.
    I walked outside with him. Zeus followed, as if this were a regular day and he was going off to work with Hayden at the docks. “You can’t do this,” I said.
    Hayden called Zeus, kept one hand on his collar, led him to the car where he jumped into the passenger seat. Hayden shut Zeus safely inside. “After what we just went through with him … You lose something important once, and you’re so afraid it’s going to happen again.”
    “We need you here,” I said. He came back around to his side of the truck. I stood in front of him. You could smell the rain coming again.
    “A person can’t just keep trying,” he said.
    “You’re supposed to have hope. Everyone knows that. You know that.”
    “I’m going to give you something,” he said. “Okay? It’s one of the most important things I have.”
    I didn’t want something. I wanted him. I wanted him not to go. Ever.
    He reached into his back pocket and took out his wallet. There, in a careful place, separated from the messy bills shoved inside, was a frail piece of lined white paper. He unfolded it carefully. He handed it to me.
    “It’s something my mother wrote a long time ago. It’s a good map, when you need one.”
    I saw the words, in Hayden’s mother’s own writing, not in his. If it was time for the truth, it was time for it all the way. “I saw this, Hayden. I saw it in a note you wrote to Juliet. The Five Rulesof Maybe. And it says it right here. It says to have hope, it says to persist .”
    “You saw that note? Oh God, I’m embarrassed.” He ran his hand through his hair. “Jesus.” He thought about this. “Look what I was doing! I didn’t even tell her the truth. See? I left off the most important one! I was trying to make her stay . Jesus,” he said again. “Look.”
    He pointed at the paper in my hand.
    The Six Rules of Maybe
1. Respect the power of hope and possibilities. Begin with belief. Hold on to it.
2. If you know where you want to go, you’re already halfway there. Know what you desire but, more importantly, why you desire it. Then go.
3. Hopes and dreams and heart’s desires require a clear path—get out of your own way.
4. Place hope carefully in your own hands and in the hands of others.
5. Persist, if necessary.
6. That said, most importantly—know when you’ve reached an end. Quit, give up, do it with courage. Giving up is not failing—it’s the chance to begin again.
    “Six rules?” I said.
    “My mother firmly believed that misguided persistence got us into more trouble than none at all.”
    “No,” I said.
    “Hope, for all its fine qualities, can be a serious problem.”
    “No,” I said again.
    “Maybe nice people don’t have to be doomed. Maybe they can save themselves.”
    “Hayden, please .”
    “Keep this for me,” he said.
    I closed it tight in my hand. He held my arms and looked at me, and then he brought me to him.