This is what game-over feels like.
This is what rock-bottom feels like.
“How much of that did you just hear?” Ellie asked, as I walked into the kitchen, chucking my keys onto the counter. I should have hurried to change my shirt, so I could return to work, but I couldn’t motivate myself to go do that.
“A lot,” I admitted. “Your brother’s fucking alive.”
Taking a couple breaths I tried to remain calm. But how could I?
Ellie’s face scrunched up. “Um. That was a different Ben I was on the phone with,” she tried to lie. But then, probably realizing she was a crap liar, she shook her head and said, “Fine, it was my brother. He’s alive.”
“How?” I choked out, unable to hide my disappointment.
“Jesus, Rhett,” Ellie groaned and pushed past me. She stomped into the living room. I followed. “Try to sound a little more enthused, would you?” she said sarcastically, plopping down on the couch.
I groaned. Of course this would turn into an argument with us. “I’m just trying to make sense of it. It’s not very often you find out someone whose funeral you attended, isn’t actually dead.”
“Well, I don’t have all the details. Ben’s acting strange enough as it is. He called me the first time about a month ago. Just to say, hey sis, I’m alive, surprise! Apparently, after the coast guard accident, he washed up on the beach in Malibu. Instead of calling the police or an ambulance, some rich old lady, ex-Hollywood type, took care of him and now he’s staying with her. It’s weird as hell, I know. He essentially faked his own death.”
This was weird as hell. “And you’re going to go visit him in November?”
“You heard that part too.” Ellie sighed, rubbing her hand across her forehead. It only occurred to me now how stressed she looked. Actually, she’d been acting a little off all month. This had to be why, this had to be weighing pretty heavily on her. “I convinced him to let me come visit. I’m going in November. He thinks I’m coming out there alone. But I’m bringing Noah and Georgie too—that’s my plan. I’m not supposed to tell anyone, he doesn’t want that. But what the fuck else am I supposed to do? I don’t care what goes wrong in a person’s life, you can’t just fake your own death, put your family through hell, and then live in sunny California in someone else’s beach house while the rest of the world moves on without you. Life doesn’t work that way. Shit, Georgie tried to commit suicide because of his stupidity. It’s fucked up.” Ellie sniffled, brushing away a tear from her cheek.
“So you’re taking Noah and Georgie out there…to what? Try to convince him to come home?”
“Something like that. I’ve slowly been planting the idea of a group vacation.”
I stepped over to Ellie, bent down, and tried to wrap my arms around her shoulders. She looked like she needed a hug. But immediately she pushed me away. “Gross,” she grunted. “You’re covered in something disgusting. Besides, I’m fine.”
“You don’t seem fine.”
“Well, I am. So back off. And please, please, please—you can’t tell anyone about this. It’s my family. It’s my shit. I need to deal with it in my own way.”
I threw my hands up in the air. “I won’t tell.”
“Thanks, Rhett. I appreciate it.”
Except, there was one person I couldn’t keep this from, one person I was going to have to tell. This wasn’t the way I wanted to see her again. But what had to be done was going to have to be done.
* * *
Luke University, with its massive stone buildings, lush green fields, picturesque sidewalks, and cliché groups of students walking around wearing backpacks—was like something out of a movie. A National Lampoon’s movie, that is. I’d never been on a college campus before, and I’d never felt more out of place. I grew up with a single mother who struggled to pay rent each month. Baseball was always supposed to be my ticket out of that. But if it would have landed me here, I wasn’t so sure that would have been the best thing for me. My skin itched. I felt like an imposter walking around this place.
Parking was a nightmare. I took the first open spot I could find, hoping I wouldn’t end up with a ticket, and started trekking across campus. Noah, who surprised us all when he decided to apply to college to be with Georgie at the end of this past summer, lived off campus. But Georgie lived on campus in the dorms. Miles Residence Hall—wherever that was. It was Friday, and I had plans to meet Noah at one of the dining halls for lunch in about an hour. And I was staying the night. We were supposed to be partying like freshman tonight. That had been my excuse for coming here. But I also knew that Georgie and Sydney lived in the same dorm, a detail Noah had casually mentioned, a detail that was my only clue to finding her.
But this place was a damn maze. I didn’t know how all these kids were walking around, with so much purpose, like they all knew exactly where they were and where they were going. I had to ask four different people for directions. I finally found Miles Residence Hall—a plain brick building with lots of windows. One of those windows had to be hers. And now that I was here, now that I was this close, I felt my body start to shake.
The news that I had to tell her had my heart in a vice. I paced outside the building in the shade of a large oak tree. The leaves were changing and falling, the empty contents of my stomach churning, and the world around me starting to blur. How the hell was I going to do this without looking like a fucking stalker?
“Rhett?” came a voice from off in the distance.
Oh, shit.
It was Sydney. I hadn’t even noticed her approaching because she fit in here so seamlessly. She wore light jeans, a green sweater, and one of those damn backpacks. Seeing me, her pace increased. She left a couple girls she’d been walking with, stepped off the sidewalk, cut across the grass, and hurried over to me. Never before—which was a very hard thing to top—had she looked more beautiful. She wasn’t wearing makeup, at least not the stuff that covered her skin, and I could see her freckles, a spattering of gorgeous little dots across her cheeks and nose. Her hair seemed longer, all wind-blown, falling so perfecting down over her breasts, and I seriously had to catch my breath. It was more than her appearance though, she seemed happier somehow.
“Hey, sweetheart, how’s it going?” I casually said. The words started pouring out of me as I tried to mask my nervousness. “I’m here visiting Noah. We’re supposed to meet for lunch in about an hour. I figured I’d stop by and see you first. Well, I didn’t actually know if I’d find you, but I guess I got lucky.”
“It’s good to see you,” she said, brushing her hair out of her face and smiling. Quite the contrast to the last way we’d greeted each other. “What do you think of the campus?”
“It’s big and intimidating,” I answered honestly.
“I thought so too, at first. You get used it though. I love it here.” She bit her bottom lip, a smile still lingering on her face, and glanced down at the ground. “It’s really good to see you,” she repeated, turning shy on me.
“You already told me that.”
“I know. I needed to say it again.”
This fucking blew chunks! Why me? There was a spark between us. And not just the ‘I want to rip your clothes off’ spark, but one that meant a hell of a lot more to me. Something had changed since the last time we’d seen each other. A really good something, and now I had to bring up the one person I knew would immediately snuff that spark. If I were the type of person to believe in karma—then this would be it, right here right now, kicking me in the ass.
“There’s something important I came here to tell you.” My hands were trembling so hard that I had to cross my arms over my stomach to hide them. “My visit actually has nothing to do with Noah. That was just my excuse. I need you to trust that what I’m about to tell you isn’t something I’m saying out of cruelty or as part of some sick game. I’m simply relaying information. It’s the truth. And I need you to promise you’re going to trust me.”
That pretty smile of her
s disappeared. “You’re freaking me out.”
I was freaking myself out.
“Sit,” she commanded. She grabbed my wrist and plopped down in the grass, taking me with her. She tucked her knees under her body, reminded me of the way she’d sat to inspect my DVD collection. “You’re shaking.” She still held my arms. “What is it? Talk to me.”
Why did she have to be so damn sweet when she wanted to be?
“Ben’s alive,” I blurted out. No need to beat around the bush any longer. I shifted in the grass. Only college kids lounged around in the itchy grass, and I certainly wasn’t one of those. “I overheard Ellie on the phone talking to him.”
“Wait. What do you mean he’s alive?”
“I mean he didn’t drown, he washed up on shore, and he’s now living with some old lady out in Malibu. That’s what I mean,” I explained.
Gasping, she slapped her hand over her mouth. I couldn’t decide if she was merely shocked, angry, or excited by this news, so I kept talking. I told her every detail Ellie had already shared with me. Then I mentioned the ‘group vacation’ Ellie was in the middle of planning.
“The Los Angeles vacation,” she repeated. “Georgina invited me. I already paid for my ticket. So it’s not really a vacation—but a trip to see Ben? To do what…bring him home?”
Noah had invited me along on this so-called ‘vacation’ as well. I still hadn’t decided if I wanted to go or not. “I have no idea. Noah and Georgie don’t know any of this. They think it’s a real vacation. Ellie made me promise not to tell anyone.”
“And here you are? Telling me?”
“Here I am.”
For a few long minutes we both sat there in silence. I didn’t know what to say, and I figured she needed some time to let this sink in. She kept making these funny—and honestly, kind of cute, despite the heaviness of this moment—little breaths into her hands. Then at one point, she started to cry. I desperately wanted to hug her when that happened, but I didn’t. I couldn’t. I had my own emotional wellbeing to preserve. Telling her this…this already meant I was losing her forever. Touching her in this moment would have been like a knife through my already wounded heart.
A second later, she brushed the tears from her eyes and stood up. I stood up too.
“I don’t know what to say,” she told me.
“You don’t have to say anything. But I’ve got to get going.”
Her big, green, tear-filled eyes stared up at me. “So soon?”
If I stayed a moment longer then I undoubtedly would find myself doing something stupid. Like blurting out how much I loved her. Which was beyond ridiculous. She’d never been mine. She was never going to be mine. This was over before it had even started. Time for me to man the fuck up and move on. “Bye, Sydney. Please don’t tell Georgie or Noah this. Ellie wants to be the one to tell them.”
And I walked off. The hardest thing I’d ever had to do in my life, but I did it.
CHAPTER 11:
SYDNEY
Here I was with five other people, all crammed into one very tight Honda Accord, all on our way to the airport. It was a two hour drive from Luke University to Charlotte. Once we made it to the airport we had a five hour flight to LA ahead of us. I was here. I was doing this. I was going to see Ben again. But dammit, if this wasn’t already turning into the day from hell.
“Just drink one more. Noah, please,” Ellie begged from the driver’s seat. “I know you better than I know myself. You worry too much. If you could be cleaning something right now, you probably would be. It’ll help you relax, so we all can relax.”
Noah had ‘OCD.’ Or at least that was what everyone else called it. The more I got to know him, the more I saw that it was something he struggled with daily. But I think textbook OCD wasn’t actually what he had, more like general anxiety. He worried about lots of different things. The cleaning aspect just seemed to be something he did to help calm himself down when the worrying got out of control. Georgina also seemed to help that a lot.
Since we were on our way to airport, with Noah about to take his first ride on an airplane ever, Ellie had decided that he needed to take a few shots of whiskey to help him relax a little. But the thing was, with Georgina curled up against his side, he didn’t seem the least bit anxious today. Hell, I was more freaked out than he was.
That was why I’d secretly taken the two shots Ellie thought he’d already taken. He’d handed them to me when I gestured for them. Which was case-in-point, why the three of us had become such close friends over this past school year. They were cool with whatever. They never judged some of my more questionable decisions and they never pressured me one way or the other with Rhett. Even though I knew they were both close with him too.
Speaking of Rhett. He sat in the passenger’s seat, up front with Ellie, with a girl named Luce sitting on his lap. There hadn’t been enough room in the car for all of us, so she’d volunteered to sit on his lap. Splendid. I hadn’t even known he was coming along on this trip until today. I guess he’d made a last minute decision. And he’d brought this random girl along too. Luce. She worked with him as a bartender at Chancy’s Claw. Apparently, she and Rhett were close. Apparently, I’d already met her once—the night Rhett and I slept together. But, honestly, I couldn’t remember her.
Georgie said she was nice, so I had to trust that, but…really…what the hell was Rhett thinking? Coming along and bringing her. As if this trip weren’t going to be hard enough already.
Finally we reached the airport. So far, I’d managed to completely avoid speaking to Rhett. I hadn’t even made eye contact with him yet. And vice versa. He seemed to be avoiding me, too. We all unloaded our bags, checked in at the ticket counter, and made it easily past security. It was almost fun watching Noah pretend to be drunk through all of this. He used his fake intoxication as an excuse for some extra PDA with Georgie. Meanwhile, I had a nice buzz going, which almost made being so close to Rhett and his new girl bearable. But, seriously, I couldn’t get past my anger.
Because the honest truth was—I was jealous. Which had to be the most absurd thing, but knowing how much Rhett slept around with everyone, I had to assume he and this Luce girl had been together. Maybe recently, maybe not— regardless, it rubbed me the wrong way.
When he came to visit me a little over a month ago, to tell me Ben was still alive, I’d been genuinely happy to see him. I don’t know what it was that had changed inside me, but seeing him again I felt giddy and excited like never before. If he’d come that day to ask me out, I would have said yes. Instead, it was like the second he found out about Ben, he automatically gave up on me.
“Hey, Sydney, come with me to the bathroom before we board?” Georgina urged. “Please.”
“Sure,” I answered, and we split up from the rest of the group to head toward the ladies room.
Georgina was the prettiest girl—inside and out—that I’d ever known. She was kind, thoughtful, and fun. Gorgeous brown hair. Bright blue eyes. Flawless tan skin. Plus, she was the type of person that was infectious to be around, that brought life to any situation. All four years of high school we’d lived on opposite ends of the social pool, never once speaking. But take high school out of the equation, and we had a chance to become friends. Actually, the thing that really bonded us was Ben—losing Ben. She struggled with that in her own way, and I in mine. But together, in the last few months we’d been at school, we’d really helped each other come to terms with his death.
Only, I now knew something she didn’t. That Ben wasn’t actually dead. Knowing it terrified me to the core. Because what would happen when she found out I’d known for all this time and kept that information from her? Would she hate me for not telling? I hoped not. I prayed not. Her friendship had become so important to me. More important than whatever weird limbo-thing I’d once shared with Ben.
“How are you holding up?” she asked me as soon as we entered the bathroom, safely away from the others. “Has Rhett even spoken to you?”
> “Not a word,” I replied, dropping my bag on the ground and heading for the sinks to wash my hands. “Not even hello.”
“I don’t get it,” she said, using the sink beside mine. “If he likes you so much, why bring Luce?”
“Maybe because he doesn’t like me that much.”
“No. Trust me. He does. Sometimes, if your name is ever brought up in conversation, he gets this look on his face…like he can’t breathe or something. It’s painfully obvious how much he still cares for you. So painful that my stomach hurts for him. Noah told me…” She trailed off, clearly knowing something I didn’t.
“What? Tell me.”
She grimaced. “Noah told me that he and Luce used to be casual. His word, not mine.”
“Casual…as in they slept together regularly? Perfect. Just perfect.” Now my stomach hurt—like I’d swallowed a gallon of cement, that sort of hurt. Grabbing a paper towel, I dried my hands a little too forcefully. Then I flung my heavy-ass bag over my shoulder.
“I don’t think they still do it but—I’m sorry.” Georgina squeezed her arms around me. “This trip was supposed to be fun. I hope it’s not ruined already.”
“It’s not,” I said confidently. This trip was about Ben, not Rhett. About figuring out my feelings—both past and present—for Ben, not trying to make sense of this weird thing I shared with Rhett. Rhett could go to hell for all I cared. “I’m over it. He could at least say hi, maybe be a little friendly, but if that’s too hard for him then whatever. Let’s go join the others before he thinks we’re in here talking about him. Him thinking I care—that’s about the last thing I want right now.”
“Yes!” Georgina said, excited all at once. “Screw him. Maybe you’re about to meet some Hollywood celebrity on this flight anyway.”
“Trust me, I already have enough to handle.”
“Well, you never know.”
We left the bathroom and started heading across the airport toward our gate. Noah approached us through the crowd, saying, “Our flight’s boarding. You girls ready?”
Kill Devil Hills: A Complete Beach Romance Series (4-Book Box Set) Page 46
