Chapter Seventeen

chapter seventeen

A few days after we shared Twizzlers at the movies, Jeremiah announced, “I’m gonna teach Belly how to drive stick shift today.”

Steven shook his head and took a swig of orange juice from the carton on the table. “Do you want to die, man? Because Belly will kill you both, not to mention your clutch. Don’t do it. I’m telling you this as your friend.”

Steven snorted. “Good luck.” Then he frowned. “How long are you gonna be gone? I thought we were going to the driving range.”

Steven ignored me and said to Jeremiah, “You need to practice your swing, dude.”

I glanced at Jeremiah, who looked at me and hesitated. “I’ll be back by lunch. We can go after,” he said.

Steven rolled his eyes. “Fine.” I could tell he was annoyed and a little hurt, which made me feel both smug and sorry for him. He wasn’t used to being left out of things the way I was.

We went out to practice on the road that led down to the other side of the beach. It was quiet. There was no one else out on the road, just us. We listened to Jeremiah’s old Nevermind CD from a million years ago.

I put the car into first gear and eased my foot off the clutch. “I thought boys liked it when girls were helpless.”

He groaned and stuck his arm out the window. “Do you have to bring that up again?”

I hit him on the arm, hard. “You’re so gross,” I said. “And you’re also a liar. I know for a fact that you guys didn’t even get to second.”

He stopped laughing. “Okay, fine. We didn’t. But she was a good kisser. She tasted like Skittles.”

Taylor loved Skittles. She was always popping them into her mouth, like vitamins, like they were good for her. I wondered how I’d stacked up against Taylor, if he thought I’d been a good kisser too.

I sneaked a peek at him, and he must have seen it on my face, because he laughed and said, “But you, you were the best, Bells.”

I punched him on the arm, and even then he didn’t stop laughing. He just laughed harder. “Don’t take your foot off the clutch,” he said, gasping with laughter.

I was kind of surprised he even remembered. I mean, it had been memorable for me, but it had been my first kiss and it had been Jeremiah. But the fact that he remembered, that sort of made his laughing okay.

He looked away, embarrassed. “Yeah, I know.”

We stalled out then, and Jeremiah said, “Just put your foot on the clutch and put it in neutral.”

I offered him my pinky, and we shook on it.

I wondered if Turducken had been a better kisser than me too. She must have been, if she had taught Jeremiah.

We stalled out again. “This sucks. I quit.”

I sighed and started the car up again. Two hours later, I had it. Sort of. I still stalled out, but I was getting somewhere. I was driving. Jeremiah said I was a natural.

By the time we got back to the house, it was after four and Steven had left. I guessed he’d gotten tired of waiting and had gone to the driving range by himself. My mother and Susannah were watching old movies in Susannah’s room. It was dark, and they had the curtains drawn.

I stood outside their door a minute, listening to them laugh. I felt left out. I envied their relationship. They were exactly like copilots, in perfect balance. I didn’t have that kind of friendship, the forever kind of friendship that will last your whole life through, no matter what.

I walked into the room, and Susannah said, “Belly! Come watch movies with us.”

I crawled into bed in between the two of them. Lying on the bed in the semi-dark, it felt cozy, like we were in a cave. “Jeremiah’s been teaching me how to drive,” I told them.

I snuggled under the comforter. He was pretty great. It had been nice of him to take me out driving when no one else would. Just because I’d banged up the car a few times, it didn’t mean that I wasn’t going to end up being an excellent driver like everyone else. Thanks to him, I could drive stick now. I was going to be one of those confident girls, the kind who knows what she’s doing. When I got my license, I would drive up to Susannah’s house and take Jeremiah for a drive, to thank him.

chapter eighteen

AGE 14

After Taylor got out of the shower, she started rummaging through her duffel bag and I lay on my bed and watched her. She pulled out three different sundresses—one white eyelet, one Hawaiian print, and one black linen. “Which one should I wear tonight?” she asked me. She asked the question like it was a test.

I was tired of her tests and having to prove myself all the time. I said, “We’re just eating dinner, Taylor. We’re not going anywhere special.”

She shook her head at me, and the towel on her head bounced back and forth. “We’re going to the boardwalk tonight, though, remember? We have to look cute for that. There’ll be boys there. Let me pick out your outfit, okay?”

It used to be that when Taylor picked out my clothes, I felt like the nerdy girl transformed at the prom, in a good way. Now it felt like I was her clueless mom who didn’t know how to dress right.

I hadn’t brought any dresses with me. In fact, I never had. I never even thought to. I only had two dresses at home—one my grandmother bought me for Easter and one I had to buy for eighth-grade graduation. Nothing seemed to fit me right lately. Things were either too long in the crotch or too tight in the waist. I had never thought much about dresses, but looking at hers all laid out on the bed like that, I was jealous.

Taylor made a face, but she backed away from my closet and went back to her three sundresses. “Fine. Have it your way, grumpy. Now, which one should I wear?”

I sighed. “The black one,” I said, closing my eyes. “Now hurry up and put some clothes on.”

Dinner that night was scallops and asparagus. When my mother cooked, it was always some sort of seafood with lemon and olive oil and a vegetable. Every time. Susannah only cooked every once in a while, so besides the first night, which was always bouillabaisse, you never knew what you were going to get. She might spend the whole afternoon puttering around the kitchen, making something I’d never had before, like Moroccan chicken with figs. She’d pull out her spiral bound Junior League cookbook that had buttery pages and notes in the margins, the one my mother made fun of. Or she might make American cheese omelets with ketchup and toast. Us kids were supposedly in charge of one night a week too, and that usually meant hamburgers or frozen pizza. But most nights, we ate whatever we wanted, whenever we felt like eating. I loved that about the summer house. At home, we had dinner every night at six thirty, like clockwork. Here, it was like everything just kind of relaxed, even my mother.

Taylor leaned forward and said, “Laurel, what’s the craziest thing you and Susannah did when you were our age?” Taylor talked to people like she was at a slumber party, always. Adults, boys, the cafeteria lady, everyone.

My mother and Susannah looked at each other and smiled. They knew, but they weren’t telling. My mother wiped her mouth with her napkin and said, “We snuck onto the golf course one night and planted daisies.”

I knew that wasn’t the truth, but Steven and Jeremiah laughed. Steven said in his annoying know-it-all kind of way, “You guys were boring even when you were teenagers.”

Conrad, who I thought hadn’t even been listening, said, “You guys are lying. That wasn’t the craziest thing you ever did.”

Susannah put her hands up, like, I surrender. “Mothers get to have secrets too,” she said. “I don’t ask you boys about your secrets, now, do I?”

My mother said, “Yes, you would.”

Susannah glared at my mother. “I would never.” Then she looked at Conrad and Jeremiah sitting next to each other. “Fine, I might, but only Conrad’s. He’s so good at keeping everything locked inside, I never know what he’s thinking. But not you, Jeremiah. You, my baby boy, wear your heart right here.” She reached over and touched his sweatshirt sleeve.

That’s when Taylor said, “Sure you do, Jeremy,” in this really sickeningly flirtatious way.

He grinned at her, which made me want to choke on my asparagus.

That’s when I said, “Taylor and I are going to go to the boardwalk tonight. Will one of you guys drop us off?”

Before my mother or Susannah could answer, Jeremiah said, “Ooh, the boardwalk. I think we should go to the boardwalk too.” Turning to Conrad and Steven, he added, “Right, guys?” Normally I would have been thrilled that any of them wanted to go somewhere I was going, but not this time. I knew it wasn’t for me.

I looked at Taylor, who was suddenly busy cutting up her scallops into tiny bite-size pieces. She knew it was for her too.

Conrad said, “Not interested.”

Steven rolled his eyes. “No one invites anyone to the boardwalk. You just go. It’s a free country.”

Jeremiah ignored me and turned to Steven and Conrad. “Come on, guys,” he said. “It’ll be amazing.” Taylor had been calling everything amazing all day.

He shook his head, and Taylor made a face. “Fine. We’ll be sure to have lots of fun without you.”

Jeremiah said, “Don’t worry about him. He’s gonna have lots of fun here, reading the Encyclopaedia Britannica.” Conrad ignored this, but Taylor giggled and tucked her hair behind her ears, which is when I knew that she liked Jeremiah now.

Then Susannah said, “Don’t leave without some money for ice cream.” I could tell she was happy we were all hanging out, except for Conrad, who seemed to prefer hanging out by himself this summer. Nothing made Susannah happier than thinking up activities for us kids to do. I think that she would have made a really good camp director.

In the car we waited for my mother and the boys to come out, and I whispered, “I thought you liked Conrad.”

Taylor rolled her eyes. “Blah. He’s boring. I think I’ll like Jeremy instead.”

She let out an impatient breath of air. “Belly, you’ve got to pick one. You can’t have them both.”

Taylor tugged at my T-shirt collar. “Well, maybe if you showed a little cleave …”

I shrugged her hand away. “I’m not showing any ‘cleave.’ And I told you I don’t like either of them. Not anymore.”

So I said, “If I told you I cared, would you stop?”

She thought for, like, a second. “Probably. If you really, really cared. But then I would just go after Conrad. I’m here to have fun, Belly.”

I sighed. At least she was honest. I wanted to say, I thought you were here to have fun with me. But I didn’t.

Taylor wiggled her eyebrows at me, her old trademark move. “Yay! It is soon.”

That’s when my mother and the boys came out, and for the first time there was no fight over shotgun. Jeremiah gave it over to Steven easily.

When we got to the boardwalk, Steven headed straight for the arcade and spent the whole night there. Jeremiah walked around with us, and he even rode the carousel, even though I knew he thought it was lame. He got all stretched out on the sleigh and pretended to take a nap while Taylor and I bounced up and down on horses, mine a blond palomino and hers a black stallion. (Black Beauty was still her favorite book, although she’d never admit it.) Then Taylor made him win her a stuffed Tweety Bird with the quarter toss. Jeremiah was a pro at the quarter toss. The Tweety Bird was huge, almost as tall as she was. He carried it for her.

I should never have gone along. I could have predicted the whole night, right down to how invisible I’d feel. All the time I wished I was at home, listening to Conrad play the guitar through my bedroom wall, or watching Woody Allen movies with Susannah and my mother. And I didn’t even like Woody Allen. I wondered if this was how the rest of the week was going to be. I’d forgotten that about Taylor, the way she got when she wanted something—driven, single-minded, and determined as all get-out. She’d just arrived, and already she’d forgotten about me.

chapter nineteen

We’d only just gotten there, and it was already time for Steven to go. He and our dad were going on their college road trip, and instead of coming back to Cousins after, he was going home. Supposedly to start studying for the SATs, but more likely, to hang out with his new girlfriend.

I went to his room to watch him pack up. He hadn’t brought much, just a duffel bag. I was suddenly sad to see him leave. Without Steven everything would be off balance—he was the buffer, the real life reminder that nothing really changes, that everything can stay the same. Because, Steven never changed. He was just obnoxious, insufferable Steven, my big brother, the bane of my existence. He was like our old flannel blanket that smelled like wet dog—smelly, comforting, a part of the infrastructure that made up my world. And with him there, everything would still be the same, three against one, boys against girls.

Steven zipped up his duffel bag. “I doubt I’ll have time. I’ll send you a text, though.”

I stuck my tongue out at him.

Steven left really early the next morning. Conrad and Jeremiah were going to drive him to the airport. I went down to say good-bye, but I didn’t try to go along because I knew he wouldn’t want me to. He wanted some time, just them, and for once I was going to let him have it without a fight.

When he hugged me good-bye, he gave me his trademark condescending look—sad eyes and a half grimace—and said, “Don’t do anything stupid, all right?” He said it in this really meaningful way, like he was trying to tell me something important, like I was supposed to understand.

But I didn’t. I said, “Don’t you do anything stupid either, butthead.”

He sighed and shook his head at me like I was a child.

I tried not to let it bother me. After all, he was leaving, and things wouldn’t be the same without him. At the very least I could send him off without getting into a petty argument. “Tell Dad I said hi,” I said.

I didn’t go back to bed right away. I stayed on the front porch awhile, feeling blue and a little teary—not that I would ever admit it to Steven.

In a lot of ways it was like the last summer. That fall, Conrad would start college. He was going to Brown. He might not come back next summer. He might have an internship, or summer school, or he might backpack across Europe with all his new dorm buddies. And Jeremiah, he might go to the football camp he was always talking about. There were a lot of things that could happen between now and then. It occurred to me that I was going to have to make the most of this summer, really make it count, in case there wasn’t another one quite like it. After all, I would be sixteen soon. I was getting older too. Things couldn’t stay the same forever.

chapter twenty

AGE 11

The four of us were lying on a big blanket in the sand. Conrad, Steven, Jeremiah, and then me on the edge. That was my spot. When they let me come along. This was one of those rare days.

It was already midafternoon, so hot my hair felt like it was on fire, and they were playing cards while I listened in.

Jeremiah said, “Would you rather be boiled in olive oil or skinned alive with a burning hot butter knife?”

Conrad squinted his eyes up at the sun and said, “Would you rather live one perfect day over and over or live your life with no perfect days but just decent ones?”

Jeremiah didn’t say anything for a minute. He loved this game. He loved to mull over the different possibilities. “With that one perfect day, would I know I was reliving it, like Groundhog Day?”

My mind raced around in circles as I tried to find the right answer. “Um. I’d take living my life with decent days. That way I could still hope for that one perfect day,” I said. “I wouldn’t want to have a life that’s just one day over and over.”

I shrugged. “But you might, deep down.”

I gave Steven a little shimmy. I couldn’t help myself. “See?” I said. “Conrad agrees with me.”

Steven mimicked, “Conrad agrees with me. Conrad loves me. Conrad’s awesome—”

He grinned and said, “My turn to ask a question. Belly, would you rather eat mayonnaise every day, or be flat-chested for the rest of your life?”

I turned on my side, grabbed a handful of sand, and threw it at Steven. He was in the middle of laughing, and a bunch got in his mouth and stuck to his wet cheeks. He screamed, “You’re dead, Belly!”

Then he lunged at me, and I rolled away from him. “Leave me alone,” I said defiantly. “You can’t hurt me or I’ll tell Mom.”

I tried to shake him off, but I only succeeded in kicking more sand into his face. Which of course only made him madder.

Conrad said, “Leave her alone, Steven. Let’s go swim.”

Steven hesitated. “Fine,” he said, spitting out sand. “But you’re still dead, Belly.” He pointed at me, and then made a cutting motion with his finger.

I gave him the finger and flipped over, but inside I was shaking. Conrad had defended me. Conrad cared whether or not I was dead.

Steven was mad at me the whole rest of the day, but it was worth it. It was also ironic, Steven teasing me about being flat-chested, because two summers later I had to wear a bra, but, like, for real.

chapter twenty-one

The night Steven left, I headed down to the pool for one of my midnight swims, and Conrad and Jeremiah and this neighbor guy Clay Bertolet were sitting on the lounge chairs drinking beer. Clay lived way down the street, and he’d been coming to Cousins Beach for almost as long as we had. He was a year older than Conrad. No one had even liked him much. He was just a person to hang out with, I guess.

Right away I stiffened and held my beach towel closer to my chest. I wondered if I should turn back. Clay had always made me nervous. I didn’t have to swim that night. I could do it the next night. But no, I had as much right to be out there as they did. More, even.

I walked over to them, pretend-confident. “Hey, guys,” I said. I didn’t let go of my towel. It felt funny to be standing there in a towel and a bikini when they were all wearing clothes.

Clay looked up at me, his eyes narrow. “Hey, Belly. Long time no see.” He patted the lounge chair. “Sit down.”

I hated when people said “long time no see.” It was such a dumb way to say hello. But I sat down anyway.

He leaned in and gave me a hug. He smelled like beer and Polo Sport. “So how’ve you been?” he asked.

Before I could answer, Conrad said, “She’s fine, and now it’s time for bed. Good night, Belly.”

I tried not to sound like a five-year-old when I said, “I’m not going to sleep yet, I’m swimming.”

Clay offered me his Corona. “Here,” he said, winking. He seemed drunk.

I hesitated, and Conrad snapped irritably, “Don’t give her that. She’s a kid, for God’s sake.”

I glared at him. “Quit acting like Steven.” For a second or two I considered taking Clay’s beer. It would be my first. But then I’d only be doing it to spite Conrad, and I wasn’t going to let him control what I did.

Conrad nodded imperceptibly. “Now go back to bed like a good girl.”

It felt just like when he and Steven and Jeremiah used to leave me out of things on purpose. I could feel my cheeks burning as I said, “I’m only two years younger than you.”

Clay laughed, and I could smell his yeasty breath. “Shit, my girlfriend was fifteen.” Then he looked at me. “Ex-girlfriend.”

I smiled weakly. Inside, I was shrinking away from him and his breath. But the way Conrad was watching us, well, I liked it. I liked taking his friend away from him, even if it was just for five minutes. “Isn’t that, like, illegal?” I asked Clay.

He laughed again. “You’re cute, Belly.”

I could feel myself blush. “So, um, why did you break up?” I asked, like I didn’t already know. They broke up because Clay’s a jerk, that was why. Clay had always been a jerk. He used to try to feed the seagulls Alka-Seltzer because he heard it made their stomachs blow up.

Clay scratched the back of his neck. “I don’t know. She had to go to horse camp or something. Long distance relationships are BS.”

Clay looked at me with his heavy-lidded, sleepy eyes and said, “Do you have a boyfriend?”

He nudged me with his knee. “Nice to meet you. I’m Clay.”

I laughed, even though it wasn’t funny. It just felt like the right thing to do. “Hi, I’m Belly.”

Conrad and Steven and Jeremiah went to the big Fourth of July bonfire every year. Clay had it at his house because there were a ton of fireworks on that end of the beach. His mom always put out stuff for s’mores. I once made Jeremiah bring one back for me, and he did. It was rubbery and burnt, but I still ate it, and I was still grateful to Jeremiah for it. It was like a little piece of the party. They never let me go with them, and I never tried to make them. I watched the show from our back porch, in my pajamas, with Susannah and my mother. They drank champagne and I drank Martinelli’s Sparkling Cider.

We exchanged a look, our look that meant, Why is Conrad such a freaking dad? Conrad flicked his cigarette into his half-empty can. “Do what you want,” he said.

In a low voice I heard Clay say, “Man, Cousins is starting to get old. I want to hurry up and get back.”

So Conrad was ready to leave. Even though a little part of me knew that already, it still hurt. I wanted to say, Then leave already. If you don’t want to be here, don’t be here. Just leave. But I wasn’t going to let Conrad bother me, not when things were finally looking up.

At last I was invited to Clay Bertolet’s Fourth of July bonfire. I was one of the big kids now. Life was good. Or it was getting there, anyway.

I thought about what I was going to wear all day. Since I’d never been, I had no idea what to wear. Probably it would get cold, but who wanted to bundle up at a bonfire? Not for my first one. I also didn’t want Conrad and Jeremiah to give me a hard time if I was too dressed up. I figured shorts, a tank top, and no shoes were the safe way to go.

When we got there, I saw that I had chosen wrong. The other girls were wearing sundresses and little skirts and Uggs. If I’d had girl friends at Cousins, I might have known that. “You didn’t tell me that girls got dressed up,” I hissed at Jeremiah.

I’d actually never seen a keg before in real life. Just in movies. I started to follow him, but Conrad grabbed my arm. “Don’t drink tonight,” he warned. “My mom will kill me if I let you drink.”

I shook him off. “You’re not ‘letting’ me do anything.”

Going to the bonfire was nice in theory, but actually being there was something else. Jeremiah was chatting up some girl in a red, white, and blue bikini top and a jean skirt, and Conrad was talking to Clay and some other guys I didn’t recognize. I thought after the way Clay had been flirty last night, he might at least come over to say hi. But he didn’t. He had his hand on some girl’s back.

I stood by the fire alone and pretended to warm my hands even though they weren’t cold. That’s when I saw him. He was standing alone too, drinking a bottle of water. It didn’t seem like he knew anybody either, since he was standing all by himself. He looked like he was my age. But there was something about him that seemed safe and comfortable, like he was younger than me even though he wasn’t. It took me a few glances to figure out what it was. When I finally figured it out, it was like, Aha!

It was his eyelashes. They were so long they practically hit his cheekbones. Granted, his cheekbones were high, but still. Also, he had a slight underbite, and his skin was clear and smooth, the color of toasted coconut flakes, the kind you put on ice cream. I touched my cheek and felt relieved that the sun had dried out the pimple from two days before. His skin was perfect. To my eyes, everything about him was pretty perfect.

He was tall, taller than Steven or Jeremiah, maybe even Conrad. He looked like he was maybe half-white, half-Japanese, or Korean maybe. He was so pretty I felt like I could draw his face, and I didn’t even know how to draw.

He caught me looking at him, and I looked away. Then I looked back over and he caught me again. He raised his hand and waved it, just slightly.

I could feel my cheeks flaming. There was nothing for me to say but, “Hi.” I walked over, stuck out my hand, and immediately regretted it. Who shook hands anymore?

He took my hand and shook it. He didn’t say anything at first. He just stared at me, like he was trying to figure something out. “You look familiar,” he said at last.

I tried not to smile. Wasn’t that what boys said to girls when they came on to them at bars? I wondered if he’d seen me on the beach in my new polka-dot bikini. I’d only had the nerve to wear it the one time, but maybe that was what had gotten me noticed by this guy. “Maybe you’ve seen me on the beach?”

He shook his head. “No. … That’s not it.”

So it hadn’t been the bikini, then. I tried again. “Maybe over at Scoops, the ice cream place?”

What in the world? “Um … yes.”

He nodded, satisfied. “So did I. In eighth grade, right?”

Suddenly giggles rose up in my chest like soda bubbles. It was kind of funny. “Salve. I’m Flavia. I mean, Belly. I mean, my name is Isabel, but everyone calls me Belly.”

He ignored the last part and said, “Why not Izzy, then? Or Belle?”

He nodded. “That’s what it means too. Beautiful.”

Cam said something in French, so fast I couldn’t understand him.

I sighed. “Because Cornelia was taken. Everyone wanted to be Cornelia.”

Cam laughed. “Eighth-grade boy humor isn’t very developed.”

I laughed too. Then I said, “So do you stay in a house around here?”

I was startled when he used my real name. It just rolled right off his tongue. It felt like the first day of school. But I liked it. “I don’t know,” I said. “I guess because Clay invited me.”

Everything that came out of my mouth sounded so generic. For some reason I wanted to impress this boy. I wanted him to like me. I could feel him judging me, judging the dumb things I said. I’m smart too, I wanted to tell him. I told myself it was fine, it didn’t matter if he thought I was smart or not. But it did.

He nodded. “I figured, the way your brother kept looking over here.”

I almost choked. “My brother? Who? Him?” I pointed at Conrad. He wasn’t looking at us. He was looking at a blond girl in a Red Sox cap, and she was looking right back. He was laughing, and he never laughed.

He cleared his throat like he was embarrassed. “Um, I was actually gonna go home and study.”

I hurried over to Conrad, walking so fast I kicked up sand behind me. “Hey, I’m gonna get a ride,” I said breathlessly.

The blond Red Sox girl looked me up and down. “Hello,” she said.

Conrad said, “With who?”

I pointed at Cam. “Him.”

He narrowed his eyes. “Sex what?”

I took a deep breath. I had to keep cool. I wasn’t going to let him goad me into being a baby, not in front of all these people. “No, thanks,” I said, trying to walk away again. But he didn’t let go.

I wanted so badly to throw a handful of sand in his face. I tried to twist out of his grip. “Let go of me! That hurts!”

He let go immediately, his face red. It didn’t really hurt, but I wanted to embarrass him the way he was embarrassing me. I said loudly, “I’d rather ride with a stranger than with someone who’s been drinking!”

I could feel tears starting to spark my eyelids. I looked over my shoulder to see if Cam was watching. He was. “You’re an asshole,” I said.

He looked me dead in the eyes and said, “And you’re a four-year-old.”

As I walked away, I heard the girl ask, “Is she your girlfriend?”

I whirled around, and we both said “No!” at the same time.

Confused, she said, “Well, is she your little sister?” like I wasn’t standing right there. Her perfume was heavy. It felt like it filled all the air around us, like we were breathing her in.

Conrad said, “Her mom is best friends with my mom.” So that was all I was to him? His mom’s friend’s daughter?

I took a deep breath, and without even thinking, I said to the girl, “I’ve known Conrad my whole life. So let me be the one to tell you you’re barking up the wrong tree. Conrad will never love anyone as much as he loves himself, if you know what I mean—” I lifted up my hand and wiggled my fingers.

Red Sox girl frowned. “What is she talking about, Conrad?”

To her I blurted out, “Oh, I’m sorry, do you not know what the idiom ‘barking up the wrong tree’ means?”

Her pretty face twisted. “You little skank,” she hissed.

I could feel myself shrinking. I wished I could take it back. I’d never gotten into a fight with a girl before, or with anyone for that matter.

Thankfully, Conrad broke in then and pointed to the bonfire. “Belly, go back over there, and wait for me to come get you,” he said harshly.

That’s when Jeremiah ambled over. “Hey, hey, what’s going on?” he asked, smiling in his easy, goofy way.

Jeremiah put his arm around me. He smelled like beer. “You guys play nice, you hear?”

I shrugged out of his hold and said, “I am playing nice. Tell your brother to play nice.”

Conrad said, “Don’t even think about leaving with that guy.”

He looked at me, and I pursed my lips and nodded. Then I gave Conrad the dirtiest look I could muster, and I shot one at the girl, too, when I was far enough away that she wouldn’t be able to reach out and grab me by the hair. I walked back to the bonfire, trying to keep my shoulders straight and high, when inside I felt like a kid who’d gotten yelled at at her own birthday party. It wasn’t fair, to be treated like I was a kid when I wasn’t. I bet me and that girl were the same age.

Cam said, “What was that all about?”

I was choking back tears as I said, “Let’s just go.”

He hesitated, glancing back over at Conrad. “I don’t think that’s such a good idea, Flavia. But I’ll stay here with you and hang out for a while. The whales can wait.”

I wanted to kiss him then. I wanted to forget I ever knew Conrad and just be there, existing in the bubble of that moment. The first firework went off, somewhere high above us. It sounded like a teakettle whistling loud and proud. It was gold, and it exploded into millions of gold flecks, like confetti over our heads.

We sat by the fire and he told me about whales and I told him about stupid things, like being secretary of French Club, and how my favorite food was pulled pork sandwiches. He said he was a vegetarian. We must have sat there for an hour. I could feel Conrad watching us the whole time, and I was so tempted to give him the finger—I hated it when he won.

When it started to get cold, I rubbed my arms, and Cam took off his hoodie and gave it to me. Which, was sort of my dream come true—getting cold and having a guy actually give you his hoodie instead of gloating over how smart he’d been to bring one.

Underneath, his T-shirt said STRAIGHT EDGE, with a picture of a razor blade, the kind a guy shaves with. “What does that mean?” I asked, zipping up his hoodie. It was warm and it smelled like boy, but in a good way.

I liked Dr Pepper too. I was glad I hadn’t been drinking. I didn’t want him to think badly of me. I wanted him to think I was cool, like the kind of girl who didn’t care what people thought, the kind of person he obviously was. I wanted to be his friend. I also wanted to kiss him.

Cam left when we left. He got up as soon as he saw Jeremiah coming over to get me. “So long, Flavia,” he said.

I started to unzip his hoodie, and he said, “That’s all right. You can give it to me later.”

Backing away, he put the phone into his pocket and said, “I would have found a way to get it back without your number. I’m smart, remember? First prize in oration.”

I tried not to smile as he walked away. “You’re not that smart,” I called out. It felt like fate that we’d met. It felt like the most romantic thing that had ever happened to me, and it was.

I watched Conrad say good-bye to Red Sox girl. She gave him a hug, and he hugged her back, but not really. I was glad I had ruined his night, if only a little bit.

On the way to the car a girl stopped me. She wore her blondish-brown hair in two pigtails, and she had on a pink low-cut shirt. “Do you like Cam?” the girl asked me casually. I wondered how she knew him—I thought he’d been a nobody just like me.

Conrad drove. He was completely sober, and I knew he had been all along. He checked out Cam’s hoodie, but he didn’t say anything. We didn’t speak to each other once. Jeremiah and I both sat in the backseat, and he tried to joke around, but nobody laughed. I was too busy thinking, remembering everything that had happened that night. I thought to myself, That might have been the best night of my life.

In my yearbook the year before, Sean Kirkpatrick wrote that I had “eyes so clear” he could “see right into my soul.” Sean was a drama geek, but so what. It still made me feel good. Taylor snickered when I showed it to her. She said only Sean Kirkpatrick would notice the color of my eyes when the rest of the guys were too busy looking at my chest. But this wasn’t Sean Kirkpatrick. This was Cam, a real guy who had noticed me even before I was pretty.

I was brushing my teeth in the upstairs bathroom when Jeremiah came in, shutting the door behind him. Reaching for his toothbrush, he said, “What’s going on with you and Con? Why are you guys so mad at each other?” He hopped up onto the sink.

Jeremiah hated it when people fought. It was part of why he always played the clown. He took it upon himself to bring levity to any situation. It was sweet but also kind of annoying.

Through a mouthful of toothpaste I said, “Um, because he’s a self-righteous neo-maxi-zoom-dweebie?”

We both laughed at that. It was one of our little inside jokes, a line from The Breakfast Club that we spent repeating to each other the summer I was eight and he was nine.

He cleared his throat. “Seriously, though, don’t be so hard on him. He’s going through some stuff.”

This was news to me. “What? What stuff?” I demanded.

Jeremiah hesitated. “It’s not up to me to tell you.”

He smiled. “I remember. But I still can’t tell you. It’s not my secret.”

Frowning, I turned the faucet on and said, “You always take his side.”

He reached out and turned the corners of my mouth up. It was one of his oldest tricks; no matter what, it made me smile. “No pouting, Bells, remember?”

No Pouting was a rule Conrad and Steven had made up one summer. I think I was eight or nine. The thing was, it only applied to me. They even put a sign up on my bedroom door. I tore it down, of course, and I ran and told Susannah and my mother. That night I got seconds on dessert, I remember. Anytime I acted the slightest bit sad or unhappy, one of the boys would start yelling, “No pouting. No pouting.” And, okay, maybe I did pout a lot, but it was the only way I could ever get my way. In some ways it was even harder being the only girl back then. In some ways not.

chapter twenty-two

That night I slept in Cam’s hoodie. It was stupid and kind of sappy, but I didn’t care. And the next day I wore it outside, even though it was blazing hot out. I loved how the sleeves were frayed, the way it felt lived in. It felt like a boy’s.

Cam was the first boy to pay attention to me like that, to be up front about the fact that he actually wanted to hang out with me. And not be, like, embarrassed about it.

When I woke up, I realized that I had given him the house number. I didn’t know why. I could have given him my cell phone number just as easily.

I kept waiting for the phone to ring. The phone never rang at the summer house. The only people who called the house phone were Susannah, trying to figure out what kind of fish we wanted for dinner, or my mother, calling to tell Steven to put the towels in the dryer, or to get the grill going.

I stayed on the deck, sunning and reading magazines with Cam’s hoodie balled up in my lap like a stuffed animal. Since we kept the windows open, I knew I’d hear if the phone rang.

I slathered myself with sunscreen first, and then two layers of tanning oil. I didn’t know if it was an oxymoron or what, but better safe than sorry was how I figured it. I set myself up with a little station of cherry Kool-Aid in an old water bottle, plus a radio, plus sunglasses, and magazines. The sunglasses were a pair that Susannah had bought me years ago. Susannah loved to buy presents. When she went off for errands, she’d come home with presents. Little things, like this pair of red heart sunglasses she said I just had to have. She knew just what I’d love, things I hadn’t even thought of, had certainly never thought of buying. Things like lavender foot lotion, or a silk quilted pouch for tissues.

My mother and Susannah had left early that morning for one of their art gallery trips to Dyerstown, and Conrad, thank God, had left for work already. Jeremiah was still asleep. The house was mine.

The idea of tanning sounds so fun in theory. Laying out, soaking up sun and sipping on soda, falling asleep like a fat cat. But then the actual act of it is kind of tedious and boring. And hot. I would always rather be floating in an ocean, catching sun that way, than lying down sweating in the sun. They say you get tanner faster when you’re wet, anyhow.

But that morning I had no choice. In case Cam called, I mean. So I lay there, sweating and sizzling like a piece of chicken on a grill. It was boring, but it was a necessity.

Just after ten, the phone rang. I sprang up and ran into the kitchen. “Hello?” I said breathlessly.

He cleared his throat. “So, how’s it going down there?”

There was this long pause, and I scrambled to think of something to say.

I hung up the phone. Mr. Fisher hadn’t been down to Cousins once yet. He used to come the weekend after the Fourth, because it was easier getting away from work after the holiday. When he came, he’d fire up the barbecue all weekend long, and he’d wear his apron that said CHEF KNOWS BEST. I wondered if Susannah would be sad he wasn’t coming, if the boys would care.

I trudged back to my lounge chair, back to the sun. I fell asleep on my lounge chair, and I woke up to Jeremiah sprinkling Kool-Aid onto my stomach. “Quit it,” I said grouchily, sitting up. I was thirsty from my extra sweet Kool-Aid (I always made it with double sugar), and I felt dehydrated and sweaty.

He laughed and sat down on my lounge chair. “Is this what you’re doing all day?”

He hesitated. “Fine,” he said. “But you have to rinse off first. I don’t want you getting my seat all oily.”

I stood up, throwing my limp greasy hair into a high ponytail. “I’ll go right now. Just wait,” I said.

Jeremiah waited for me in the car, with the AC on full blast. He sat in the passenger seat. “Where are we going?” I asked, getting into the driver’s seat. I felt like an old pro. “Tennessee? New Mexico? We have to go far so I can get good practice.”

He closed his eyes and laid his head back. “Just take a left out of the driveway,” he told me.

He continued giving me directions, and then we pulled up to Go Kart City. “Are you serious?”

We waited in line for the cars, and when it was our turn, the guy told me to get in the blue one. I said, “Can I drive the red one instead?”

He winked at me and said, “You’re so pretty, I’d let you drive my car.”

I could feel myself blush, but I liked it. The guy was older than me, and he was actually paying me attention. It was kind of amazing. I’d seen him there the summer before, and he hadn’t looked at me once.

Getting into the car next to me, Jeremiah muttered, “What a freaking cheeseball. He needs to get a real job.”

Jeremiah scowled. “Just drive.”

Every time my car came back around the track, the guy waved at me. The third time he did it, I waved back.

We rode around the track a bunch of times, until it was time for Jeremiah to go to work.

I didn’t argue with him. He drove home fast, and dropped me off at the curb and headed to work. I stepped back into the house feeling very tired and tan. And also satisfied.

That’s when she looked at me, perplexed. “I don’t know. He wasn’t offering it. Who is he anyway?”

She didn’t press the issue. She never did. She at least could have gotten his number. If Susannah had been down here instead of her, she would have been singsongy and she would have teased and snooped until I told her everything. Which I would have, gladly.

My mother looked up again. “What did he say?”

She pursed her lips, but she didn’t say anything.

My mother was a terrible liar. Susannah had been spending a lot of time in her room, and there was a sadness to her that hadn’t been there before. I knew something was up. I just wasn’t completely sure what.

chapter twenty-three

Cam called again the next night, and the night after that. We talked on the phone twice before we met up again, for, like, four or five hours at a time. When we talked, I lay on one of the lounge chairs on the porch and stared up at the moon with my toes pointed toward the sky. I laughed so hard that Jeremiah yelled out his window for me to keep it down. We talked about everything, and I loved it, but the whole time I wondered when he was going to ask to see me again. He didn’t.

So I had to take matters into my own hands. I invited Cam to come over and play video games and maybe swim. I felt like some kind of liberated woman calling him up and inviting him over, like it was the kind of thing I did all the time. When really, I was only doing it because I knew no one was going to be at home. I didn’t want Jeremiah or Conrad or my mother or even Susannah to see him just yet. For now, he was just mine.

He laughed and said, “At freestyle?”

I didn’t have an answer for that, except to say that winning was fun, and anyway, who didn’t like to win? Growing up with Steven and spending my summers with Jeremiah and Conrad, winning was always important, and doubly so because I was a girl and was never expected to win anything. Victory is a thousand times sweeter when you’re the underdog.

Cam came over, and I watched from my bedroom window as he drove up. His car was navy blue and old and beat-up looking, like his hoodie that I was already planning on keeping. It looked like exactly the kind of car he’d drive.

He rang the doorbell, and I flew down the stairs to open the door. “Hi,” I said. I was wearing his hoodie.

We went out to the pool through the back screen door, down the porch steps. I threw off my shorts and T-shirt and his hoodie quickly, without even thinking—Jeremiah and I raced all the time in the pool. It didn’t occur to me to be self-conscious to be in a bikini in front of Cam. After all, we spent the whole summer in bathing suits in that house.

But he looked away quickly and took off his T-shirt. “Ready?” he said, standing by the edge.

I walked over next to him. “One full lap?” I asked, dipping my toe into the water.

I snorted. “Do you want a head start?”

I’d never heard a boy say “touché” before. Or anyone else, for that matter. Maybe my mother. But on him it looked good. It was different.

I won the first race easily. “You let me win,” I accused.

He won the next heat, and I won the last one. I wasn’t fully convinced that he didn’t just let me win—after all, he was so tall and long, his one stroke was worth two of mine. But I wanted to keep the hoodie, so I didn’t challenge the win. After all, a win was a win.

When he had to leave, I walked him to his car. He didn’t get in right away. There was this long pause, the first we’d had, if you can believe it. Cam cleared his throat and said, “So this guy I know, Kinsey, is having a party tomorrow night. Do you maybe want to come?”

I made the mistake of mentioning it at breakfast the next morning. My mother and Susannah were grocery shopping. It was just me and the boys, the way it had been for the most part this summer. “I’m going to a party tonight,” I said, partly just to say it out loud and partly to brag.

Conrad raised his eyebrows. “You?”

I put down my juice. “How’d you know?”

Jeremiah laughed and wagged his finger at me. “I know everybody in Cousins, Belly. I’m a lifeguard. That’s like being the mayor. Greg Kinsey works at that surf shop over by the mall.”

Frowning, Conrad said, “Doesn’t Greg Kinsey sell crystal meth out of his trunk?”

This was the second time Conrad was trying to tell me what to do, and I was sick of it. Who did he think he was? I had to go to this party. I didn’t care if there was crystal meth or not, I was going. “I’m telling you, Cam wouldn’t be friends with someone like that! He’s straight edge.”

Conrad and Jeremiah both snorted. In moments like these, they were a team. “He’s straight edge?” Jeremiah said, trying not to smile. “Neat.”

I glared at the both of them. First they didn’t want me hanging out with meth addicts, and then being straight edge wasn’t cool either. “He doesn’t do drugs, all right? Which is why I highly doubt he’d be friends with a drug dealer.”

Jeremiah scratched his cheek and said, “You know what, it might be Greg Rosenberg who’s the meth dealer. Greg Kinsey’s pretty cool. He has a pool table. I think I’ll check this party out too.”

I stood up. “You guys can’t come. You weren’t invited.”

Conrad leaned back in his chair and put his arms behind his head. “Don’t worry, Belly. We won’t bother you on your big date.”

Jeremiah ignored me. “Con, what are you gonna wear?”

Things had been weird with me and Conrad and also with me and Jeremiah—an impossible thought crept its way into my head. Was it possible they didn’t want me with Cam? Because they, like, had feelings for me? Could that even be? I doubted it. I was like a little sister to them. Only, I wasn’t.

When I finished getting ready and it was almost time to go, I stopped by Susannah’s room to say good-bye. She and my mother were holed up in there sorting through old pictures. Susannah was all ready for bed, even though it was still pretty early. She had her pillows propped up around her, and she was wearing one of her silk robes that Mr. Fisher had bought her on a business trip to Hong Kong. It was poppy and cream, and when I got married, I wanted one just like it.

I wasn’t all that dressed up, but I wasn’t in shorts like the night of the bonfire. I was wearing a white sundress and flip-flops, and I’d put my hair in braids while it was still wet. I knew I’d probably take them out in about half an hour because they were so tight, but I didn’t care. They were cute.

My mother frowned and said, “Are Conrad and Jeremiah going to this party too?”

Susannah waved me off and said, “Have fun, Belly!”

I’d hoped that Conrad and Jeremiah had just been kidding around, that they weren’t really gonna try to come. But when I ran down the stairs to meet Cam’s car, Jeremiah called out, “Hey, Belly?”

He and Conrad were watching TV in the family room. I poked my head in the doorway. “What?” I snapped. “I’m kind of in a hurry.”

Jeremiah turned his head toward me and winked lazily. “See you soon.”

Conrad looked at me and said, “What’s with the perfume? It’s giving me a headache. And why are you wearing all that makeup?”

I wasn’t wearing that much makeup. I had some blush and mascara and a little lip gloss, that was it. It was just that he wasn’t used to me wearing any. And I’d sprayed my neck and wrists, that was all. Conrad sure hadn’t minded Red Sox girl’s perfume. He’d loved her perfume. Still, I took one last look at myself in the mirror in the hallway—and I rubbed a little of the blush off, also the perfume.

Then I slammed the door shut and ran down the driveway, where Cam was turning in. I’d been watching from my bedroom window so I’d know the exact moment he drove up, so he wouldn’t have to come inside and meet my mother.

I hopped into Cam’s car. “Hi,” I said.

Casually I asked, “Does he by any chance sell crystal meth?”

I relaxed. Now that the crystal meth stuff was out of the way, there was only one more thing. I twisted the charm bracelet on my wrist over and over and said, “So, you know those guys I was with at the bonfire? Jeremiah and Conrad?”

Did they?

Tucking my legs under my butt, I said, “Ms. Baskerville’s global studies class in ninth grade. We did a whole unit on Japan and Bushido. I was, like, obsessed with the idea of seppuku.”

I whistled—my whistle was something I was proud of. My brother, Steven, had taught me. “So you speak English, French, and Japanese? That’s pretty amazing. You’re like some kind of genius, huh,” I teased.

When we pulled up to this guy Kinsey’s house, I kind of didn’t want to get out of the car. I loved the feeling of talking and having somebody really listen to what I had to say. It was like a high or something. In this weird way, I felt powerful.

We parked in the cul-de-sac—there were a ton of cars. Some were halfway on the lawn. Cam walked quickly. His legs were so long that I had to hurry to keep up. “So how do you know this guy?” I asked him.

We walked right in without knocking. The music was so loud I could hear it from the driveway. It was karaoke music—there was a girl singing “Like a Virgin” at the top of her lungs and rolling around on the ground, her mike getting twisted up in her jeans. There were ten or so people in the living room, drinking beer and passing around a songbook. “Sing ‘Livin’ on a Prayer’ next,” some guy urged the girl on the floor.

A couple of guys I didn’t recognize were checking me out—I could feel their eyes on me, and I wondered if I really had worn too much makeup. It was a new thing to have guys looking at me, much less asking me on dates. It felt equal parts amazing and scary. I spotted the girl from the bonfire, the one who liked Cam. She looked at us, and then she looked away, sneaking glances every once in a while. I felt bad for her; I knew how that felt.

I also recognized our neighbor Jill, who spent weekends at Cousins—she waved at me, and it occurred to me that I’d never seen her outside of the neighborhood, our front yards. She was sitting next to the guy from the video store, the one who worked on Tuesdays and wore his name tag upside down. I’d never seen the lower half of his body before, he was always standing behind the counter. And then there was the waitress Katie from Jimmy’s Crab Shack without her red-and-white striped uniform. These were people I’d been seeing every summer for my whole life. So this is where they’d been all this time. Out, at parties, while I’d been left out, locked away in the summer house like Rapunzel, watching old movies with my mother and Susannah.

Cam seemed to know everybody. He said hi, shoulder-bumping guys and hugging girls. He introduced me. He called me his friend Flavia. “Meet my friend Flavia,” he said. “This is Kinsey. This is his house.”

Kinsey was sprawled out on the couch, and he wasn’t wearing a shirt. He had a scrawny bird chest. He didn’t look like a meth dealer. He looked like a paperboy.

He took a gulp of beer and said, “My name’s not really Kinsey. It’s Greg. Everybody just calls me Kinsey.”

Kinsey nodded like that actually made sense. “You guys want something to drink, there’s a cooler in the kitchen.”

Cam said, “Do you want something to drink?”

I wasn’t sure if I should say yes or not. On the one hand, yeah, I kind of did. I never drank. It would be, like, an experience. Further proof that this summer was special, important. On the other hand, would he be grossed out by me if I did? Would he judge me for it? I didn’t know what the straight edge rules were.

I decided against it. The last thing I needed was to smell like Clay had the other night. “I’ll have a Coke,” I told him.

Cam nodded, and I could tell he approved. We headed over to the kitchen. As we walked, I heard little snatches of conversation—“I heard Kelly got a DUI and that’s why she isn’t here this summer.” “I heard she got kicked out of school.” I wondered who Kelly was. I wondered if I’d recognize her if I saw her. It was all Steven and Jeremiah and Conrad’s fault—they never took me anywhere. That was why I didn’t know anybody.

All of the chairs in the kitchen had purses and jackets on them, so Cam moved over some empty beer bottles and made an empty space on the counter. I hopped up and sat on it.

He laughed like I had made a joke, which made me feel better. He opened up the cooler and pulled out a Coke. He opened it and handed it to me.

Cam said, “Just because I’m straight edge doesn’t mean you can’t drink. I mean, I’ll judge you for it, but you can still drink if you want to. That was a joke, by the way.”

I took a long sip of my Coke and burped. “Scuse me,” I said, unraveling one of my braids. They were already too tight, and my head felt sore.

I unraveled the other braid and hit him on the shoulder. In my head I heard Conrad go, Ooh, you’re hitting him now. Way to flirt, Belly, way to flirt. Even when he wasn’t there, he was there. And then he really was.

Out of nowhere, I heard Jeremiah’s signature yodel on the karaoke machine. I bit my lip. “They’re here,” I said.

We went back to the living room, and Jeremiah was center stage, falsetto and singing some song I’d never heard of. The girls were laughing and watching him, all googly-eyed. And Conrad, he was on the couch with a beer in his hand. Red Sox girl was perched on the armrest next to him, leaning in close and letting her hair fall in his face like a curtain that encased the two of them. I wondered if they’d picked her up, if he’d let her sit shotgun.

Jeremiah spotted me then, as he bowed at the end of his song. “Belly! This next song goes out to you.” He pointed at Cam. “What’s your name?”

Cam cleared his throat. “Cam. Cameron.”

Jeremiah said right into the mike, “Your name is Cam Cameron? Damn, that sucks, dude.” Everyone laughed, especially Conrad, when just a second ago he’d looked so bored.

It was like Conrad and Jeremiah had deemed him unworthy and so I had to too. It was funny how I’d felt so close to him just a few minutes before.

I wanted to kill him, but all I could do was shake my head at him and glare. It wasn’t like I could grab the mike out of his hand in front of all these people. Jeremiah just grinned at me and started to dance. One of the girls sitting on the floor jumped up and started dancing with him. She sang the Olivia Newton-John part, off-key. Conrad watched in his amused, condescending way. I heard someone say, “Who is that girl anyway?” She was looking right at me as she said it.

Next to me, Cam was laughing. I couldn’t believe it. I was dying of embarrassment and he was laughing. “Smile, Flavia,” he said, poking me in the side.

When someone tells me to smile, I can’t help it. I always do.

Midway through Jeremiah’s song, Cam and I walked out—without even looking, I knew Conrad was watching us.

Cam and I sat on the staircase and talked. He sat on the step above me. He was nice to talk to, not intimidating at all. I loved the way he laughed so easily—not like with Conrad. With Conrad you had to work hard for every smile. Nothing ever came easy with Conrad.

The way Cam was leaning into me, I thought he might try to kiss me. I was pretty sure I’d let him. But he’d lean in and scratch his ankle, or tug at his sock, and then shift away, and then he’d do it again.

When he was in the middle of a lean in, I heard pissed off, belligerent voices coming from the deck outside. One of them was definitely Conrad’s pissed off, belligerent voice. I jumped up. “Something’s going on out there.”

Conrad and some guy with a barbed wire tattoo on his forearm were arguing. The guy was shorter than Conrad, but stockier. He was packing some serious muscle, and he looked like he was, like, twenty-five. Jeremiah watched, bemused, but I could tell he was alert, ready to jump in if he needed to.

To Jeremiah I whispered, “What are they fighting about?”

He shrugged. “Conrad’s wasted. Don’t worry about it. They’re just showing off.”

I glanced at him. I’d almost forgotten he was standing next to me. “I’m not leaving,” I said. Not that I could do anything to stop a fight from happening. But it wouldn’t be right to just leave him there.

Conrad stepped up close to the tattoo guy, who shoved him away easily, and Conrad laughed. I could feel an actual fight brewing, like a thunderstorm. Just like the way the water got really still before the sky broke open.

But he didn’t believe it, and neither did I. Conrad didn’t seem fine at all. He didn’t seem like the Conrad Fisher I knew, all wild and out of control. What if he got himself hurt? What then? I had to help, I just had to.

I started walking over to them, and I waved off Jeremiah when he tried to stop me. When I got there, I realized I had no idea what to say. I had never tried to break up a fight before.

Conrad pushed me out of the way. “Get the hell out of here, Belly.”

I realized how drunk he was when he swayed a little as he tried to swat me off. “Don’t leave. Things are just getting fun. See, I’m about to kick this guy’s ass.” I’d never seen him like this before. His intensity scared me. I wondered where Red Sox girl had gone. I kind of wished she was here to handle Conrad and not me. I didn’t know what I was supposed to do.

The guy laughed, but I could tell he wanted a fight just about as much as I did. He looked tired, like all he wanted was to head home and watch TV in his boxers. Whereas Conrad was running on all cylinders. Conrad was like a soda bottle that had been shaken up; he was about to explode on somebody. It didn’t matter who it was. It didn’t matter that this guy was bigger than him. It wouldn’t have mattered if he was twenty feet tall and built like a brick. Conrad was looking for a fight. He wouldn’t be satisfied until he got one. And this guy, he could kill Conrad.

The guy kept looking at Conrad and then back at me. Shaking his head, he said, “Belly, you better get this little boy home.”

I put my hand on Conrad’s chest. I had never done that before. It felt solid and warm; I could feel his heart beating fast and out of control. “Can we please just go home,” I pleaded. But it was like Conrad didn’t even see me standing there, or feel my hand on his chest.

Then I looked back at Jeremiah helplessly, and he ambled over. He whispered something in Conrad’s ear, and Conrad shook him off. But Jeremiah kept talking to him in his low voice, and when they looked at me, I realized it was about me. Conrad hesitated, and then he finally nodded. Then he half jokingly made like he was going to hit the guy, and the guy rolled his eyes. “Good night, douche,” he said to the guy.

The guy waved him off with one hand. I let out a big breath.

As we walked back to the car, Cam grabbed my arm. “Are you okay to go home with these guys?” he asked me.

Conrad whirled around and said, “Who is this guy?”

I shook my head at Cam and said, “I’ll be fine. Don’t worry. I’ll call you.”

He looked worried. “Who’s driving?”

I was embarrassed, and I could tell Cam was bothered, but he just nodded. Quickly I hugged him, and he felt stiff. I wanted to make things okay. “Thanks for tonight,” I said.

I watched him walk away, and I felt a stab of resentment—Conrad and his stupid temper had ruined my first real date. It wasn’t fair.

Jeremiah said, “You guys get in the car; I left my hat inside. I’ll be right back.”

Conrad and I got in the car silently. It felt eerily quiet, and even though it was only just past one, it felt like it was four in the morning and the whole world had gone to sleep. He lay down in the backseat, all of his energy from before gone. I sat in the front seat with my bare feet on the dashboard, leaning back far in the seat. Neither of us spoke. It had been frightening back there. I didn’t recognize him, the way he’d acted. I suddenly felt very tired.

My hair was hanging low, and from the backseat, all of a sudden, I felt Conrad touching it, running his fingers through the bottom. I think I stopped breathing. We were sitting in perfect silence, and Conrad Fisher was playing with my hair.

I didn’t say anything. I didn’t even look at him. I didn’t want to scare him off. It was like the time I had a really high fever, and everything felt gauzy and dizzy and unreal, it felt just like that. All I knew was, I didn’t want him to stop.

But he finally did. I watched him in the visor mirror. He closed his eyes and sighed. I did too.

Just as suddenly, everything in me was alert. The sleepy feeling was gone; every part of my body was awake now. I was holding my breath, waiting for what he would say. I didn’t answer him. I didn’t want to break the spell.

That’s when Jeremiah came back, opened the door, slammed it shut. This moment between us, fragile and tenuous, snapped in half. It was over. It would do no good to wonder what he was going to say. Moments, when lost, can’t be found again. They’re just gone.

Jeremiah looked at me funny. I could tell he knew that he’d walked in on something. I shrugged at him, and he turned away and started the car.

I reached over to the radio and turned it on, loud.

The whole way home, there was this strange tension, everyone keeping quiet—Conrad passed out in the backseat, Jeremiah and me not looking at each other in the front seat. Until we pulled up the driveway, when Jeremiah said to Conrad, in what was a harsh tone for him, “Don’t let Mom see you like this.”

Which was when I realized, remembered, that Conrad really had been drunk, that he couldn’t really have been responsible for anything he’d said or done that night. He probably wouldn’t remember it tomorrow. It would be like it had never happened.

As soon as we got inside, I ran up to my room. I wanted to forget what had happened in the car and only remember the way Cam had looked at me, on the stairs with his arm touching my shoulder.

chapter twenty-four

The next day, nothing. It wasn’t that he ignored me, because that would have been something. Some kind of proof that it had happened, that something had changed. But no, he treated me the same. Like I was still little Belly, the girl with the messy flyaway ponytail and the bony knees, running after them on the beach. I should have known better.

The thing was, whether he was pushing me away or pulling me toward him, I was still going in the same direction. Toward Conrad.

Cam didn’t call me for a few days. Not that I blamed him. I didn’t call him either—although I thought about it. I just didn’t know what to say.

When he finally called, he didn’t bring up the party. He asked me to go to the drive-in. I said yes. Right away I worried, though—did going to the drive-in mean we were going to have to make out? Like, crazy make out, steamed windows and seats all the way back?

Because that was what people did at the drive-in. There were the families, and then there were the hot and heavy couples toward the back of the lot. I’d never been part of a couple before. I’d gone as a family, with Susannah and my mother and everyone, and I’d gone with the boys, but never as a couple, like on a date.

Once, Jeremiah and Steven and I went and spied on Conrad on one of his dates. Susannah let Jeremiah drive us, even though he only had a permit. The drive-in was three miles away, and at Cousins, everyone drove, even kids on their parents’ laps. Conrad had been furious when he’d caught us spying on him. He’d been on his way to the concession stand when he saw us. It had been pretty funny—his hair was all messed up as he yelled at us, and his lips were rosy and they had a glossy sheen. Jeremiah cracked up the whole time.

I wished Steven and Jeremiah were out there in the dark somewhere, spying on us and cracking up. It would make me feel comforted somehow. Safer.

I was wearing Cam’s hoodie, and I kept it zipped all the way to my neck. I sat with my arms crossed, like I was shivering. Even though I liked Cam, even though I wanted to be there, I had the sudden urge to jump out of the car and walk home. I’d only ever kissed one boy, and that hadn’t been for real. Taylor called me the nun. Maybe I was one, at heart. Maybe I should have joined a convent. I didn’t even know if this was an actual date. Maybe he’d been so turned off by me the other night that all he wanted was to be my friend.

Cam tuned the radio until he found the right station. Drumming his hands on the steering wheel, he said, “Do you want any popcorn or anything?”

I kind of did, but I didn’t want it to get stuck in my teeth, so I said no, thanks.

He was pretty into the movie, the way he leaned up close to the windshield to get a closer look sometimes. It was an old horror movie, one that Cam told me was really famous, but I’d never heard of it. I was barely paying attention anyway—I felt like I was watching him way more than I was watching the movie. He licked his lips a lot. He didn’t look over and laugh with me during the funny parts the way Jeremiah did. He just sat on his side of the car, leaned up against the door, as far away from me as possible.

When the movie was over, he started the car up. “Ready?” he said.

I felt a wave of disappointment. He was taking me home already. He wasn’t going to take me to Scoops for an ice cream cone, or a hot fudge sundae to share. The date, if you could even call it that, had been a failure. He didn’t try to make out with me once. Not that I knew if I’d even have let him, but still. He could’ve at least tried.

We drove home in silence. He parked the car in front of the house—I held my breath a little, my hand on the door handle, waiting to see if he’d turn off the ignition or if I should hop out. But he turned it off and leaned his head back against the headrest a second.

It was a question so out of nowhere that it took me a little while to figure out what he was talking about.

I laughed. In the car, it sounded really loud. “Yeah, right. Nice try, Sextus.”

He shook his head, lips tight. He was offended that I didn’t believe him. I hadn’t meant to hurt his feelings. I just didn’t see how it could be true. It was almost mean of him to lie about it. I knew what I looked like back then, and I wasn’t the prettiest girl anybody had ever seen, not with my thick glasses and chubby cheeks and little-girl body.

Cam looked me in the eyes then. “The first day, you wore a blue dress. It was, like, corduroy or something. It made your eyes look really blue.”

Which was why I wore it. It was my favorite. I wondered where it was now. Probably packed up in the attic back home, with all my winter clothes. It was too small now anyway.

He looked so sweet, the way he watched me, waiting for my reaction. His cheeks were flushed peach. I swallowed hard and said, “Why didn’t you come up to me?”

He shrugged. “You were always with your friends. I watched you that whole week, trying to get up the nerve. I couldn’t believe it when I saw you at the bonfire that night. Pretty bizarre, huh?” Cam laughed, but he sounded embarrassed.

That’s when he dipped his head low and kissed me. I didn’t let go of the door handle. All I could think was, I wish this had been my first kiss.

chapter twenty-five

When I went into the house, I was walking on cotton candy and clouds, replaying everything that had just happened—until I heard my mother and Susannah arguing in the living room. Fear seized up inside of me; it felt like a fist clenched tight around my heart. They never fought, not really. I’d only ever seen them fight one time. It was last summer. The three of us had gone shopping to this fancy mall an hour away from Cousins. It was an outdoor mall, the kind where people bring their pocket-size dogs on fancy leashes. I saw this dress—it was a purpley plum chiffon, with little off the shoulder straps, way too old for me. I loved it. Susannah said I should try it on, just for fun, so I did. She took one look at me and said I had to have it. My mother shook her head right away. She said, “She’s fourteen. Where will she wear a dress like that?” Susannah said it didn’t matter, that it was made for me. I knew we couldn’t afford it, my mother was newly divorced, after all, but I still pleaded with her. I begged. They got into an argument right there in the boutique, in front of people. Susannah wanted to buy it for me, and my mother wouldn’t let her. I told them never mind, I didn’t want it, even though I did. I knew my mother was right, I’d never wear it.

When we got back from Cousins at the end of summer, I found the dress in my suitcase, wrapped in paper and packed neatly on top like it had always been there. Susannah had gone back and bought it for me. It was so like her to do that. Later, my mother must have seen it hanging up in my closet, but she never said anything.

Standing there in the foyer, listening, I felt like the spy Steven was always accusing me of being. But I couldn’t help it.

I heard Susannah say, “Laurel, I’m a big girl now. I need you to stop trying to manage my life. I’m the one who gets to decide how I want to live it.”

I didn’t wait for my mother’s response. I walked right in and said, “What’s going on?” I looked at my mother when I said it, and I knew I sounded like I was blaming her, but I didn’t care.

My mother walked away from us, and I could see from the stiffness of her shoulders that everything was not fine, that she was still upset. But because I wanted to stay with Susannah, where everything really was fine, I didn’t follow her. My mother was the kind of person who would rather be alone anyway. Just ask my father.

I should have kept pressing her, should have tried to figure out what had really happened between the two of them, but my worry was already fading away. I wanted to tell her everything about Cam, everything. Susannah had that way about her, where you wanted to tell her all your secrets and everything in between.

She sat on the couch and patted her lap. I sat down next to her and put my head in her lap and she smoothed my hair away from my forehead. Everything felt safe and cozy, like that fight hadn’t happened. And maybe it hadn’t even been a fight, maybe I’d misread the whole thing. “Well, he’s different from anyone I’ve ever met,” I began.

Susannah shook her head. “Oh, please. Of course he should pay you attention. You’re so lovely, darling. You’ve really blossomed this summer. People can’t help but pay you attention.”

I didn’t want to talk about my mother anymore. I wanted to talk about Cam. “You’ll never believe what Cam said to me tonight,” I began.

chapter twenty-six

Just like that, July turned into August. I guessed summer went by a lot faster when you had someone to spend it with. For me, that someone was Cam. Cam Cameron.

Mr. Fisher always came the first week of August. He’d bring Susannah’s favorites from the city, almond croissants and lavender chocolates. And flowers, he always brought flowers. Susannah loved flowers. She said she needed them like air, to breathe. She had more vases than I could count, tall ones and fat ones and glass ones. They were all over the house, flowers in vases in every room. Her favorites were peonies. She kept them on her nightstand in her bedroom, so they were the first thing she saw in the morning.

Shells, too. She loved shells. She kept them in hurricane glasses. When she’d come back from a walk on the beach, she’d always come back with a handful of shells. She’d arrange them on the kitchen table, admire them first, say things like, “Doesn’t this one look just like an ear?” Or, “Isn’t this one the perfect shade of pink?” Then she’d put them in order from biggest to smallest. It was one of her rituals, something I loved to watch her do.

That week, right around when Mr. Fisher usually came, Susannah mentioned that he couldn’t get away from work. There had been some sort of emergency at the bank. It would just be the five of us finishing out the summer. It would be the first year without Mr. Fisher and my brother.

After she went to bed, early, Conrad said to me, conversationally, “They’re getting a divorce.”

Jeremiah glared at him. “Shut up, Conrad.”

Conrad shrugged. “Why? You know it’s true. Belly’s not surprised, are you, Belly?”

I was. I was really surprised. I said, to both of them, “I thought they seemed like they were really in love.”

Whatever love was, I was sure they had it. I thought they had it a million times over. The way they gazed at each other at the dinner table, how excited Susannah got when he came to the summer house. I didn’t think people like that got divorced. People like my parents got divorced. Not Susannah and Mr. Fisher.

As Conrad left, Jeremiah said to me, “Before we left, our dad had been sleeping in the guest room for weeks. He’s already moved out most of his clothes. Did they seriously think we wouldn't notice?” His voice cracked at the last part.

I grabbed his hand and squeezed it. He was really hurting. I guessed maybe Conrad was too, even if he didn’t show it. It all made sense, when I thought about it. The way Conrad had been acting, so different, so lost. So un-Conrad-like. He was suffering. And then there was Susannah. The way she’d been spending so much time in bed, the way she seemed so sad. She was hurting too.