Boys of Summer (18 page)

“Fine!” I yell, and stalk back into the house, then slam the glass door behind me. I stomp all the way to the guest room. The first thing I do when I get there is stare in the mirror at the shorts I'm wearing.

What's wrong with these?
I think huffily.

I turn to the small overnight bag I packed when I snuck out of my grandparents' house. There's nothing in there but T-shirts and swim trunks and more shorts that look pretty much identical to these.

Which means that sometime between now and eight o'clock tonight, I'm going to have to do the one thing I hate doing more than anything else in the world.

Shop.

GRAYSON

W
hen my phone vibrates in my pocket, Harper and I are still kissing. I pull it out to ignore the call, assuming it's probably my mother again, but freeze when I see Mike's name on the screen.

My vision clouds over, and the inside of the boat starts to spin.

Does he know?

Did he see us?

Did someone
else
see us and tell him?

I knew it was a mistake to walk down Ocean Avenue with her. This town is far too tiny to make stupid mistakes like that.

I jump up from the bench seat. Harper looks insulted by my hasty retreat. That is, until she hears me answer the phone.

“Mike!” I say, too chirpy, too squeaky. I clear my throat. “What's up, man?”

I'm a terrible, terrible, shitty, shitty person.

“Hey,” he says. “I just wanted to let you know that we had to delay the job for a few days while we wait for the hardware store to get a part in.”

The roof? He called to talk to me about the roof?

Relief floods through me, followed by a quick chaser of wretchedness. “Oh, right. Cool. That's totally fine. Take as much time as you need.”

“Thanks, man. We should be back up and running by Friday. I taped the first invoice to your front door, if you want to just have your dad write me a check or whatever.”

“Of course,” I say uncomfortably. Mike and I have never actually had to talk about money before. It's admittedly weird.

There's an awkward pause on his end. It makes me squirm. “Where are you, anyway? Ian says you've been in and out all week.”

“He did?” I croak, feeling like there's a huge seashell lodged in my throat. “Right. Yeah. I'm just hanging out.”

I can almost hear Mike smile into the phone. “What's her name?”

My gaze whips to Harper, who opens her eyes wide.

I force out a laugh. “You know me too well, my friend. Her name is . . . is . . .”

Harper starts mouthing something that I can't understand. It almost looks like she's saying . . .

“Ebba,” I say into the phone. “Her name is Ebba.”

Harper rolls her eyes and shakes her head at me.

“Ebba?” Mike repeats. “What kind of name is that?”

“It's . . . French, I think.”

Harper throws up her hands in defeat. I need to shut this thing down.

“So, what's up with you?” I ask him, trying to make my voice light and airy.

“Nothing much. We just haven't seen you around here a lot. I guess now I know why.” There's a trace of mocking in his tone, and it feels like a punch in the stomach.

“Yeah, sorry about that. Hey, why don't we hang out
tonight? Just the three of us. We can catch up on
Crusade of Kings
, play our usual nipple drinking game.”

Mike hesitates. “Actually, I think Ian has a date tonight.”

This is a surprise. I haven't seen him leave the house in two weeks. How the hell did he meet someone? “With who?”

“Dunno,” Mike replies. “But he seems really into it. He just left to go shopping for something to wear.”

Ian, shop?

I laugh. “Must be some girl.”

“I know, right?” Mike chuckles too, and for just a moment we feel like ourselves again. Making jokes at each other's expense. Messing around. Laughing. For just a moment I'm able to fool myself into thinking that this is any other summer. When my mom isn't gone and my arm isn't killing me all the time and Ian isn't moping around and I'm not hooking up with my best friend's ex-girlfriend.

But then I peer around the inside of my father's boat and see Harper standing just a few feet away, her hair mussed from my hands, her clothes rumpled, and I'm back to feeling like shit.

“Well, anyway,” Mike goes on, “we should all hang out tomorrow for the Fourth. I'm off all day.”

“Great!” I say, but even I can hear how fake my enthusiasm is. “Let's meet at my house. I'll fire up the grill.”

“Great.”

“Great,” I say again, feeling like an idiot. “Okay, then. Bye.” I quickly hang up the phone, before my guilt literally makes me keel over.

“I said ‘Emma'!” Harper immediately attacks me. “Not ‘Ebba.' What kind of name is Ebba?”

“I don't know! I couldn't understand you. It looked like you were saying ‘Ebba.' ”

“I chose Emma because it's a popular name so it's harder to narrow down. I figured there's gotta be, like, ten of them on the island. There were two in my graduating class alone.” She stops ranting when she sees my tortured expression. “What? What happened? What did he say?”

I shake my head, running my fingers through my hair. “Nothing. But I think I should go home.”

“Why?” she asks, and I don't miss the hurt in her voice.

But I can't deal with that right now. I can't deal with anybody else's emotions. Not when mine are running so rampant.

I just lied to my best friend.

I lied like it was nothing.

I can't stand myself right now. And I definitely can't stand being here with Harper. But it's not like I can tell her that.

It's not like I can tell anyone anything. All of these secrets I've promised to keep. All of these things I've sworn to hide. They're all snowballing in my brain. I can't even keep them straight. I can't remember who or what or why I'm not supposed to tell.

The truth about my mom.

The truth about my arm.

The truth about my uncertain future.

The truth about Harper.

I suddenly feel anxious and alone and desperately in need of something I fear I may never find. And worse, something I may never even identify.

“I don't know,” I mumble miserably as I stuff my phone back into my pocket and hurry to the stairs of the hatch. “I just . . . can't be here right now.”

I don't wait around for Harper's response. I know she's not happy with me right now. She can join the club. I pound up the stairs, leap onto the dock, and start running.

Always, always running.

From what?

I can't even keep track anymore.

For how long?

I wish I knew.

To where?

Well, there's the biggest question of them all.

MIKE

W
hen I arrive at the outdoor playground of the kids' camp, I'm attacked by two simultaneous human darts. Bam! Bam! Jake is hanging from my left arm while Jasper is attached to my waist.

“Mike! Mike!” they scream in unison. I've been bringing them here every day for the past two weeks. The doctor told my dad that if he wants any chance of going back to work by the end of the summer, then he has to completely stay off his leg during the day. And that means that chasing a pair of six-year-old monsters around the house is out. Julie swore it was no big deal for the twins to be here, so now my dad is holed up on the couch watching cooking-competition shows all day.

“Come see my tie-dye shirt!” Jake begs, swinging back and forth.

“No! That's stupid and hippie!” Jasper says, tugging on my shirt. “Come see the bottle rocket I made.”

“Bottle rocket?” I ask, trying to walk with my extra “limbs.”

Julie appears from behind a tree, laughing at my attempts. “Don't worry. It's fake,” she whispers behind her hand. “Full of sand.”

I quickly get to work detaching each child.

“It is not fake!” Jasper insists, frowning at her. “It really works.”

“He didn't want to do any of the normal arts and crafts,” she tells me.

“Why am I not surprised?”

Once I'm free of dangling children, I'm able to get a good look at Julie. She's wearing her usual khaki shorts, but her polo shirt is gone. Instead she has a simple black one-piece bathing suit on, which, admittedly, she looks incredibly sexy in.

“Oh,” she says, glancing down at her top. “Right. I had to take off the polo. It got covered in tie-dye.”

My gaze rockets back up. I feel like a total idiot for blatantly staring at her chest. Not to mention, my face is probably bright red right now. The twins, having evidently grown bored of this conversation, wander off to the swing set, where they immediately start fighting over which swing goes higher.

“I wasn't . . . ,” I try to say, but stop myself. It's a lost cause. She clearly knows I was checking her out. “Sorry to hear about the shirt. You seem to be having a hard time wearing clothes lately.”

She tilts her head, confused. And then I hear my words repeated in my head. “No, no,” I amend quickly. “I mean, because every time I see you, you're covered in seawater, paint, or . . . You know what? Never mind. Can I start over?”

I walk out of the gate and then back in. When I do, Julie is grinning from ear to ear.

“Hi!” I say, overly bubbly. “How's it going? Long time no see!”

She laughs. “You're pretty adorable, you know that?”

“What? This old thing?” I ask, pointing to my face.

She giggles again. The sound of her laugh is kind of awesome. So openmouthed and uninhibited. Like she doesn't care who hears or what they think.

“Are you here to pick the boys up early?” she asks.

“Actually, no.” I hesitate, feeling my throat constrict. “I came by to see you.”

Her grin broadens. If that's even possible. “Here I am.”

“Yes,” I say, breathing out. “Here you are.”

I can feel my heart start to thud in my chest.

The truth is, I've been trying to work up the nerve to ask her out for the past week, but the timing never seems to be right. I'm always working or running home to make dinner for the twins. But now I guess I have no more excuses. I have absolutely nowhere to be for the next twenty-four hours.

But can I really do this? Can I really just
ask
her out? I've never asked a girl out in my life. With Harper it was always assumed. We were just together, from the moment we shared our first kiss at the bottom of the beach club pool. After that there were no questions. No date requests. We were just Harper and Mike for the next six years.

I try to remind myself that I'm not really asking Julie out. She already did that part when she asked me to give her a tour of the island. I'm just finally committing to a time, which technically should be easier. After all, I already know she wants to go. That much has been established.

So then why are my palms sweating?

I rub my hands on my jeans.

“Didn't you say you're working a roofing job?” she asks, and I immediately wonder how much time has passed since I last spoke. Was it a normal amount of time? Or have I just been standing here staring at her like a moron?

“Yes. Right. The roofing job.” That puts me back on track. “There's been a delay while we wait for some parts to be delivered. Which means I'm free this afternoon, and so I was wondering if maybe you want to do that island tour? Or not. I mean, if you're busy, I completely—”

“Oh, that's perfect!” she exclaims. “The boss just told me that a bunch of kids are leaving early today because of the holiday, so I'm off this afternoon too. Can we go to the basket museum? I've been hearing such amazing things about it.”

“Oh, um,” I begin awkwardly. The basket museum really wasn't what I had in mind. It's so cheesy and packed with tourists, but looking into her big round eyes, there's really nothing else I can say but “Sure, sounds fun!”