One Moment in Time (5 page)

But Celia and Paige don't really think about things like that. They can hardly even fathom the idea they might get caught, and they figure that even if by some small chance they do, nothing will really happen. They think rules are just scare tactics.

I sigh. “Are we going to the beach or not?” They were bothering me to rush down here, and they're not even ready.

“Of course.” Celia hops off the bed. “Just let me pee real quick.”

She passes by us in a cloud of perfume.

Paige looks at me.

I shrug. “She's tipsy, yeah, but I don't think it's that
noticeable, as long as we don't stop to talk to anyone.”

“Okay.”

Celia emerges from the bathroom looking fresh as a daisy. Her hair is smooth, and she's wearing a pink-and-orange paisley bikini, with no cover-up.

“Aren't you going to wear something over that?” Paige asks.

“Why?” Celia twirls around and checks out her butt in the mirror. “Does it make me look fat?”

“No, but do you really want to be parading around in just a bikini?”

“Yes,” Celia says very adamantly. Then she giggles and hiccups. “I want to get tan all over. In fact, I wish I didn't even have to
wear
a bathing suit.”

Paige and I exchange a look. Celia wouldn't actually try to get naked on the beach, would she? If she did, there would really be no way to stop her. But we'd have to try. There's a difference between Celia doing her normal crazy stuff, and her getting nude in front of our whole class after she's had a few drinks. Although if I'm being completely honest, she doesn't seem like the alcohol is really affecting her that much. Drunk Celia isn't really that much different from Sober Celia.

“Come on, Mustang Sally,” I say, shaking my head. “Let's go.”

When we get down to the beach, my mood instantly
lightens. The sun is shining bright in the sky, the air is salty and humid, and the sand is cool against my feet. The water is blue and sparkling, the waves calm and soothing. It's gorgeous, and exactly what I need to relax my mind and focus my intentions.

I decide that after I put my towel down, I'll get to work composing an email to Genevieve in admissions. I thought about calling her, but then I decided an email is definitely better. I can make it sound very professional. And I can ask her when a good time would be to call her and discuss the appeals process for her decision. Maybe I should even put in a little dig about how since my application got lost, that maybe I really shouldn't be penalized, and that maybe a lot of well-qualified students had their applications go missing and how maybe the media might be interested in that story.

I'll bet some reporter somewhere would want to cover it. How my application got lost and so other less qualified applicants got in, thereby putting Stanford's pristine reputation in jeopardy? It's totally one of those stories that could go viral on BuzzFeed. I even have a bunch of pictures my mom took of me in a Stanford onesie when I was a baby. I could include those to give the story a good human interest angle.

I lie back on my towel and adjust the straw hat I'm wearing before slathering more sunscreen onto my legs. I have very fair skin, and I burn super easily. Sometimes if I'm even
just walking around outside for a few minutes, I get red.

Celia lies down next to me and immediately falls asleep. I can't tell if she's passed out from the beers, or just tired. I look at Paige, kind of like,
Should we wake her up?
But she just shrugs, and so I decide to let it go. How much trouble can Celia really get into if she's sleeping? And I
told
her to put sunscreen on, but she didn't listen. She said she wanted to get color. So if she gets burned, it's her own fault.

Paige pulls a bunch of magazines out of her bag and spreads them out on her blanket. I take one and pretend to be paging through it, but the whole time my mind is working on composing an email to Genevieve.

Finally I pull my phone out and surreptitiously type away, letting Genevieve know that I appreciate her decision and that I understand that my application was late, but that it was through no fault of my own, and that I don't think it's fair that people who are underqualified got in over me. (I decide to leave out the part about the media being interested in the story, because honestly I don't want to threaten her right away. If she gives me crap after this, then maybe I'll go there.)

I proofread the email, then hit send.

I take in a deep breath. There's a definite satisfaction that comes after you've done a task. I wish I'd made a to-do list and put “email Genevieve” on it. Then I could cross it right off.

My phone rings then. Could Genevieve be calling already? I'm very good with the written word, but I didn't realize I was that good! Oh. It's not Genevieve. It's Neal. Probably calling with an updated argument on why I shouldn't send my parents a video of me opening up my nonexistent acceptance letter.

“Hello?”

“Hey,” he says. “What are you doing?”

“Lying on the beach, listening to the waves, relaxing . . . What are you doing?”

“Nothing, really.” Pause.

“Okay.” He still doesn't say anything. “Well, are you calling for a reason?”

“Of course I'm calling for a reason, Quinn. We just talked an hour ago. Why would I be calling you back already if I didn't have a reason?”

“Okay, so then what is it?” Seriously, you'd think for someone who has higher-than-average verbal skills, he'd be a little better at communicating.

“So something bad happened.” Wow. I guess higher-than-average verbal skills don't leave time for beating around the bush.

“Like what?”

“Like I went to get your acceptance letter, and it's gone.”

“What do you mean it's
gone
?” From next to me, Paige looks up from her magazine and gives me a quizzical look.
I roll my eyes and mouth “my crazy brother,” then get up and move away from her so she won't be able to overhear my conversation. I really do not want Paige finding out I got a letter from Stanford. Or Celia for that matter, even if she is passed out on her towel.

“Tell Neal I said hi!” Paige calls after me. “Tell him I miss him!” Paige has a huge crush on my brother, for reasons that are not completely clear to any sane person. Supposedly a lot of girls think my brother is a hottie. Which is another pitfall of having an older brother—your friends think they should be able to date him, which is ridiculous. I don't want my friends dating my brother. That's disturbing.

“Is that Paige?” my brother asks. “Tell her I said hi back.” My brother's not even remotely interested in Paige—he just likes the fact that she's interested in him, so he flirts with her constantly. Typical jerky guy.

I walk a few more yards down the beach.

“He says hi back,” I say to the ocean.

“What did she say?” he asks.

“She said she wants to have five babies with you,” I say. “She said she's going to stop taking her birth control pills right now, that she's going to—”

“Paige is on the pill?” Neal asks.

“Neal!” I say. “Can you please focus here? What do you mean, my letter is gone?”

“Well, I got the mail, right? And I put it on the table in
the foyer. Then after I talked to you, I went back to get it, but it was gone.”

“All the mail was
gone
?”

“Yes.”

“So someone moved it,” I say. “Go find it.”

“Yeah, Mom moved it into the kitchen,” he says. “But when I looked through the pile there, the letter wasn't in it.”

I'm close to the ocean now, and water sloshes over my bare feet. It's pretty cold, but I don't even notice. A feeling of dread is taking over my body. “So just ask Mom where the letter is,” I say. “And then tell her you're going to send it to me in Florida.”

“She went back to work,” he says. “And she's not answering her cell.”

At that moment, someone taps me on the shoulder. I'm so on edge that I almost shriek out loud. I turn around, half expecting to see my mom standing there, holding the letter out to me with a disapproving look on her face, demanding answers and explanations.

But it's not my mom.

It's a guy I've never seen before. He looks a couple of years older than me, maybe nineteen or so, with dirty-blond hair. He's wearing a pair of navy-blue board shorts and a soft-looking gray T-shirt.

“Hey there,” he says.

“Um, hi,” I say.

He gives me a smile, revealing a row of perfect white teeth. “How are ya?”

“I'm fine.”

“Who's that?” Neal demands.

“I'm not sure,” I say. “Just some random guy on the beach.”

“A random guy on the beach is hitting on you?” Neal asks. “I'll kill him.”

“Are you here with the school trip?” the guy asks.

“Yes,” I say, not sure if I should be admitting that. He looks like he's up to no good. He's probably friends with that vagrant who came by our room earlier and sold Paige and Celia beer. In fact, he might
be
the vagrant who came up to our room earlier and sold Paige and Celia beer.

“Sorry,” I say. “I'm not interested in any beer.”

“Beer?” the guy repeats, looking at me in shock. “At this time of day?”

“Yeah,” I say. “Isn't that why you're here? To ask me if I want to buy beer?”

“You think I look like the type of guy who comes up to random underage girls and asks them if they want to buy beer?”

I think about the question. He actually
does
kind of look like that guy. He has that beach slacker thing going on, like maybe he spends his days surfing and his nights trolling the island for women. Not that he probably has any trouble
finding women—he's very good-looking. Not my type, but still very good-looking. “Kind of,” I say honestly.

“Wow, I'm offended,” he says. But he doesn't seem offended. He's still smiling. He has a very nice smile. Very comforting. He probably uses it when he's out trolling for women. “What's your name?”

“Don't talk to him!” Neal instructs. “He's probably a murderer or a kidnapper. Like that guy who took Natalee Holloway.”

“Lulubell,” I say, because who gives their real name out to a random stranger? “What's yours?”

“Don. Don Donson.”

“Don Donson?” I repeat. “Your name's Don Donson?”

“Sounds like a fake name!” Neal yells. “Stay away from him, Quinn.”

“Yeah,” he says, and shrugs. “What's wrong with that name?”

“It sounds made up.”

“So does yours,” he counters.

“That's because mine
is
made up.”

“So is mine.”

“You gave me a fake name?”

“So? You did, too.”

I shake my head, wondering how the hell I got involved in a conversation with an obviously unstable person. “I'm sorry,” I say. “But what is it that you wanted?”

“I wanted to invite you to a party we're having tonight at the club where I work.” Aha! I knew I had him pegged—he
does
spend his days surfing and his nights working at some club where he trolls for women. He holds a hot-pink flyer out to me, and against my better judgment, I take it.

“A
party?
” Neal's asking. “Do not go to a
party
with him, Quinn. That's how girls go on class trips and come home statistics!”

“Thanks,” I say to the guy standing in front of me. “I'll try to make it.” Not.

His eyes meet mine, and a tiny little smile plays at the corner of his lips. He has nice lips, full but not so full they make him look feminine. In fact, he looks very manly—broad shoulders, chiseled jaw. The way he's looking at me makes me shiver. He doesn't say anything for a beat longer than necessary, then finally he says, “I hope you do.”

And then he turns around and starts down the beach. For some reason I turn and watch him go, admiring how relaxed he looks, how easily he stops to give out flyers, talking to complete strangers like it's nothing. A girl in a red bikini takes a flyer from him, leaning in close to hear what he's saying. He smiles at her the same way he smiled at me, and I'm surprised to realize I'm a little jealous.

“Hello?” my brother yells. “Are you there or not?”

“Yes, I'm here.” I shake my head and turn away from Fake Name Don. “Look,” I say. “Are you going to be able to
find the letter or not?”

“I just
told
you no. It's gone. Mom probably took it to work with her.”

“Can you go down there and get it?” I ask desperately.

“To her work? No, I can't go down to her work. Why do you care if she has it anyway?”

Because if she reads it, she's going to find out I didn't get in! I can feel myself inching toward becoming hysterical, and so I do my best to make sure my voice stays calm. “Oh, I wouldn't say I
care
exactly. I just kind of wanted to open it myself.”

“Are you sure that's all it is?” Neal asks suspiciously. “Because you're acting very strange.”

For a second I think about telling him the truth. I mean, why not confide in my brother? He can be a good listener when he wants to be, and he knows all about bureaucracy and red tape—he's always starting letter-writing campaigns, and he's even interned in a bunch of state senators' offices.

“Quinn?” Neal asks. His voice has changed now, from one of annoyance to one of concern. “Seriously, is everything okay?”

I open my mouth to tell him. But then I stop. How can I? Neal wouldn't understand. He wouldn't understand, because Neal has gotten everything he's ever wanted. He got into Stanford. He made the varsity basketball team when he was in ninth grade. He was valedictorian of his class. In
my family, if you work hard for something, you get it. And if you fail, it's not because you couldn't do it, it's because you haven't worked hard enough.