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He raises his eyebrows. “Uh, no. I found half a bottle of Everclear from last New Year’s Eve. Then I remembered last New Year’s Eve, and I decided that I didn’t need to see you dance naked and vomit for three hours straight. So, beer it is.”

I jump up, wrap my arm around Cohen’s shoulders, and shake him back and forth, then pop a brew for each of us and drag him to the still-warm sand.

“Cohen, you’ve always been here for me—”

“Dude, stop. Now. I can’t stand sappy Deo, and you didn’t even start drinking yet.” He takes a long pull of his beer, then gives me a guilty look from the corner of his eye. Because Cohen can never manage to be all tough around me. Not since we were kids.

He cried right at my side when I ripped my arm open, elbow to shoulder, back when I was first learning to skateboard. I needed thirty-two stitches, and he grit his teeth with every single prick of the needle. He toilet-papered Rosie Mazo’s house when she broke my heart and dumped me right before our eighth grade dinner dance. He got out of bed at 2 AM to surf with me on the morning after my eighteenth birthday, when it dawned on me that my loser father seriously wasn’t going to make it. He’s been by my side through it all.

“I just wanna say thanks, man. Other than my mom and my grandpa, you’re the only person on this motherfucking planet who believes in me. That’s rare as hell, and I appreciate it.” I take a long sip of beer and hold my hands up, surrender-style. “That’s all I’m saying.”

“This is about Whit.” It should be a question, but it isn’t, because Cohen knows the answer.

“No,” I lie.

“You called up her parents.” Another non-question, and this time, I can hear my friend’s frustration in the tight delivery of his words.

“Maybe.” My voice is nothing short of a grumble, because I’m sick of this shit. I’m sick of putting it out there and getting smacked upside the head.

“So, what about ‘that idea sucks’ didn’t make sense to you when we talked about that whole shenanigan-in-the-making?” Cohen finishes his bottle in a few gulps and crams it back in the cardboard holder, taking out a second before I’m half done. That’s not typical Cohen, but maybe I’m rattling his cage more than usual tonight.

I twist the bottle in my hand. “You know, it was big fight when we left. And then there were weeks of nothing. And I missed her like crazy. So I thought I’d come back with a bang, make shit right, get her attention.” I yank at the pulls on my hood and let out a long burst of breath. “But that worked like fucking shit.”

Cohen’s laugh is quiet around the lip of the bottle. “You’re such a fucking dick, man.”

“What?” I snap a look his way so fast it almost gives me whiplash, because I did not anticipate that reaction. “A dick? Why a dick? I put my heart out there for her, Cohen. I found the thing she needed, the thing she was afraid of, and I helped her face it. Explain how the fuck that makes me a dick?”

Cohen shakes his head and laughs again. “Alright. It makes you a dick, you fucking dick, because you were so busy solving all of Whit’s problems, like you’re the fucking great and powerful Oz, it never occurred to you that she needs to do it her own way? In her own time? Her brother got blown up in some goddamn sand trap because she threw a hissy fit about going to college. How do think that made her feel, man? No wonder she has night terrors. She’s at a low place, and I think your whole bogus-as-hell plan shoved that in her face.”

“So you think I should have done nothing?” I challenge, my temper really close to flaring.

“Nah.” Cohen looks me straight in the eye. “I think you should’ve spent some time working on your own bag of crazy. You’re twenty-two, you’ve got no real direction, no job, no place of your own. You’ve got a pile of treasure you’re hoarding under your bed like a little kid. If you want to make some big statement and win Whit back, take a look at your own catastrophe of a life, eh? Maybe, if you clean your shit up, it will inspire her. Because you’re looking like more and more of a lost cause every damn day, and it scares the shit out of me.”

My temper sizzles out.

Mainly because I just got schooled by Cohen, again, for the nine millionth time in our life together.

I let myself be pissed at him, though. Let myself think he’s an asshole and wrong and stupid as shit and doesn’t know his ass from his elbow. I drink through my first beer and half my second thinking that. By the time I’ve started my third, I know in my guts he’s right. I know he’s saying it because he cares about my inebriated, shallow, stupid ass.

I tilt my head back and look at the stars, so many they look almost murky in the midnight sky. “If you were me, what would you do?” I ask him.

“If I were Deo Beckett, what would I do?” He studies the bottle in his hand. “Well, I wouldn’t be a fucking bum, first of all. I’d crawl under my bed and pull out all those gold coins I’d been hoarding like Gollum—”

“Is this another
Lord of the Rings
reference?” I groan.

“If you’d read Tolkien, like I did, maybe you wouldn’t be the unmotivated loser you are today,” Cohen observes.

“Dude, you run your parents’ furniture store,” I point out.

“Hey, it’s gainful employment, and I’m in school for my business degree,” he argues. “Do you want my advice or not?”

“Sorry. You were talking about me being some freaky, ring-obsessed goblin.” I toast him with my beer and take another long sip to fortify me through this story.

“Gollum is not a goblin, by the way. Moving on, you are hoarding those coins because you think your dad’s coming back.” He pauses here, and I interject a laugh so sharp and angry, it startles me.

“Fuck that, man. I know that asshole is staying deep in the jungle where he disappeared. I’m not delusional, alright?” When Cohen meets my objection with silence, I feel the need to defend my stance, which is moronic, but I feel like Cohen’s just picking at an old wound to get a rise out of me. “It’s been years. He isn’t coming back. I’m not like my mother, hoping he’ll waltz the hell in and expect her to drop her damn life for him. I get who he is.”

“Yeah, you get him,” Cohen agrees. “You get him because you
are
him.”

“Fuck you!” I point at my friend, all the fury from before built to a sudden head. “Fuck you and your bullshit, Cohen! That’s some cold shit, right there.” He looks at me steady, no guilt in his eyes this time. “That’s a kick in the balls, you know that? Me? Like him? I’m nothing like him.” He doesn’t say a word, just watches me tantrum like an infant. “Okay, smartass, how exactly have I gone from being some goblin to my fucking loser father? Enlighten me.”

“Your dad doesn’t stick around for the hard shit. He’s always looking for the easier way.” Cohen shrugs like that explains me.

“Look, my dad’s a champion fuckwad, no doubt, but he works hard as hell. That guy has gone places and done things no normal human would go anywhere near.” My father’s medical records alone could fill a week’s worth of
World’s Scariest Injuries
marathons. The man has been everywhere from the top of icebergs to the rivers in caves thousands of feet underground. Adrenaline is more important than oxygen to him.

“I’m not talking about sticking around for work. I’m talking about people.” Cohen taps his beer bottle against his palm.

“I was there for Whit. That’s the reason I’m here,” I snarl, losing patience with my friend.

“No. You were looking for an easy way through all the shit, and that’s why you’re here.” He picks up his last beer and pops the cap. “You asked me what I’d do if I were you? I’d sell those coins, set up a surf shop, get my life in order, and show up at Whit’s door with my shit in control, ready to be her rock the minute she needs me. Because I think she was waiting for someone substantial enough to lean on. And that just wasn’t you, man. I think she wanted it to be you, but it wasn’t.” When he finishes talking, he takes a long sip and wipes his mouth with his hoodie sleeve.

We both sit and drink and watch the waves crash on the shore, over and over. Finally I ask, “And what if I just can’t my shit together? What if I crash and burn?”

“You wanna hit these while they’re good?” Cohen jumps up and points to the waves with his glass bottle.

“Answer my fucking question, asshole.” I jump to my feet and glare at him. “What if I crash and burn?”

He takes his board down and pulls off his hoodie. “Then I spend the next fifty years bringing you beers and listening to you cry about the girl who got away. Enough talking. I feel like I’m at my kid sister’s slumber party. Let’s get out there before we lose this.”

I follow him out, and for a few hours, it’s just Cohen and me and the waves crashing full force on the sand under the star-strewn sky. By the time we’re soaked, bone-weary, and stone-sober, the sun has been up for at least an hour.

“I’m going to be a zombie at work.” Cohen shakes his hair out and loads his board up.

I raise an eyebrow. “How with-it do you have to be to sell a couple of recliners and end tables?”

“What the hell would you know about selling furniture? Or buying it for that matter? When you sleep in a bed that doesn’t have a bunk, get back to me.” I laugh and he slaps me on the shoulder. “Seriously. When your little surf shack is the hottest place on the coast and you have all the mad dough, Rodriguez Home Furnishings will give you a deal on getting your new pad all set up.”

“Sounds good, man. Just tell them I’m not dealing with that shady-ass son of theirs.”

He jabs me in the ribs and gets in his truck, rolling down the window to catch the cool morning air. He leans out and yells as he’s leaving, “Get her back, man. Next time we hang out, more surfing, less whining.”

“Fuck you!” I yell back, but he knows that it means ‘thank you.’

It would be cool if I just got my shit together all at once. Like, in the course of one great movie-montage song, I drove home, got up the balls to trade in those coins, found some sweet property, and started doing my thing in a real way.

But years of slacking have made slacking my norm, so I basically sit around eating pistachios with my grandfather and think about what Cohen says while I wait for Whit to possibly call, which never happens.

But my mom calls. A lot. And there are lots of vague, cheery voicemails, which I listen to to make sure she’s okay. But I don’t call her back. I just don’t want to get into it with her about Whit and how I should take advantage of what’s right in front of me and all that.

So, I’m not all that surprised when she shows up at grandpa’s house, a big box of something that actually smells edible in her hands.

“Marigold.” Grandpa gets up and takes her in his arms. “You look gorgeous as always, baby. Did you bake us something?” Even my grandpa, who’s half in love with my mother, can’t do a good job of faking enthusiasm.

“Nope. And that look of relief on your faces says it all guys! These are creampuffs from Colletti’s.” She opens and the box, and Grandpa runs like a kid to the dessert table to get plates set out so we can eat like normal people. Mom bustles to the kitchen and puts on the teapot so we can have tea.

Yes, it may be slightly ridiculous to be scarfing down creampuffs and sipping tea with my mom and grandpa like we’re a couple of duchesses. But Colletti’s is owned by baker/magicians, and if I have to play Pretty Pretty Princess to get to eat their wares, I will.

“Sorry I haven’t returned your calls—Ow! What the hell, old timer!” I just nosedived into my dessert because my grandfather wailed me in the back of the head.

He shakes his plate at me. “You call your goddamn mother back. I swear to God, I don’t know how this saint of a woman wound up surrounded by the shittiest men on the earth.”

Mom blushes. “Oh, Johnny! If you’d been single when I was seeing your son, I’m telling you right now, he would have had a run for his money.” My mom brings Grandpa a mug of tea and kisses his cheek. He takes an extra second to squeeze her around the waist. Suddenly she gets even redder and starts messing with her hair and twirling her bangles, classic guilty Mom maneuvers.

I take a big bite of creampuff, sip my tea, and send a suspicious glare her way. Or, I send as suspicious a glare as is humanly possibly while chewing a fluffy mouthful of pastry. “It was really sweet of you to come over like this,” I say leadingly.

“Yeah, well…no one returns my calls…” She clears her throat, fidgets with her earrings, and, after about two minutes, the pressure is too much for her. “I have to tell you both something!”

Grandpa and I look at each other and put down our treats. The last time Mom told us “something,” she’d used the money she inherited when my great-aunt died to buy her little hippie-dippy store. Mom had been struggling with this long bout of ‘what it all means’ crap as a legal secretary, but it was good money and health benefits. Grandpa and I were both pretty sure the beach-shack-essential-oils thing would tank and burn, but she made a huge success of it. Because my mom has work ethic like a mule.

“Tell us, Marigold.” Grandpa’s voice is soft and kinda old-man-sad. He has that Spidey-sense geezers sometimes acquire, where he knows when some bad shit is going down. And his voice sounds pretty prepared-for-doom.

Mom slides the big silver ring my dad sent her from the Ivory Coast off her left ring finger, where she’s always worn it like a holding place wedding band, and she shows us a small, bright ring of purple flowers tattooed on her skin. “They’re tiny irises. My favorite flower.” Mom stops talking while we all wait.

“Nice ink. Was that the big news?” I’m totally confused because my mother has a huge lotus flower thing down her spine among a bunch of other smaller designs, so she’s not exactly new to ink. What’s with all the guilt and creampuffs?

“Don’t be a complete idiot all your life, Deo,” my grandpa snaps. He gets up and gives my mother a tight hug. “Who’s the lucky guy?” he asks gruffly.

“Rocko,” she says softly.

“Rocko what?” I ask, my mind clicking the pieces together way too slowly. My grandpa slaps the back of my head again, and my mother twists her silver-ringed hands around each other.

“Rocko proposed, Deo.” She sucks in a deep breath, exhales, and announces, “And I said ‘yes.’”