“She misses you, you know. She’d never admit it because she doesn’t like to show weakness, but I know her too well to fall for the charade.”
I heave a long sigh. I don’t want to talk about Sienna right now. “Cole is the only one who doesn’t hate me.” I feel a little pang, saying his name to Steven.
I look up at the sky. The dark clouds that have been rolling in all afternoon thicken, hanging closer and closer to land. “He’s different than he was when you were around. I didn’t even notice at first. He used to be more like you, you know? Laughing and joking and chasing girls. He’s quieter now, kind of intense.”
“He keeps trying to get me to talk to him, and it’s so hard to resist. I mean he looks at me, and it’s like, I could tell him everything. Everything, Steven. What am I supposed to do with that?”
I look down at the grass again, grass that makes it look as if he’s not there at all. It erases him, turns him into another piece of earth.
The landscapers must have mowed today because I can smell the grass every time the breeze picks up.
“I probably shouldn’t tell you this, huh? It’s not really fair. You told me your secrets, and I never had the chance to tell you mine; and now I want to tell them to him when it was supposed to be you. It was always you.”
Steven’s sandy hair—and light, playful eyes—are burned into my memory, where they never leave me alone. He was the sort of life of the party that everyone notices when it’s gone. Everything’s been quieter without him.
My eyes lose focus, and I let the blades of grass blur into one green blob. “What do I do? Should I trust Cole? Or should I just . . . I don’t know, find a way to make him hate me, like everyone else? Besides, it’s not fair to you if I let him in.” I look up and touch the granite. “I wish you could tell me if it’s okay to move on.”
I hear a dull thud behind me, so unexpected that I whirl around and end up falling backward, onto my butt, almost knocking my head into the granite.
Sienna’s standing there in dark blue jeans and a buttoned-up black peacoat, and the contrast between her dark clothes and pale skin is startling. She’s positively ashen as she stares at me, her jaw unhinged, her eyes wide and unblinking. Her platinum hair billows out around her in the breeze.
The thud must have been her dropping a bouquet of crimson roses, because they’re sitting there by her feet. Why didn’t she come on the anniversary of his death, like everyone else?
She clenches her hands at her side. “You . . . you . . .”
She can’t seem to speak, and I’m so thrown off I can’t get my limbs to move. We just sit there, frozen, the moment stretching on for all eternity. I finally blink and scramble to my feet.
“I’m sorry. I’ll go.” I rush past her, and that’s when she finds her voice.
“Wait.”
The bite in her voice makes me stop, but I don’t turn around. I just stare at the willow tree beyond the path and watch as the breeze picks up the leaves. They float away from us, silently landing among the granite headstones.
“How long have you . . .” Her voice cracks. She sounds nothing like her usual self. “How often do you come here?”
I swallow. Maybe I should have just kept walking.
“Look at me,” she says.
I close my eyes and seconds pass. I can’t decide how to respond, so I do as she says and turn around. I see a hundred things in her eyes, but the most frightening of all is the one thing missing: hostility.
“Tell me.”
I purse my lips and swallow. I could lie. I should lie. But the words slip out, so quietly I’m only half sure she’ll hear them. “Every day.”
Her eyes tear away from me, and she looks down at her black flats. Her chest is sort of heaving, as if she ran three miles to get here. She balls her hands into fists and then stares up at the dark, cloudfilled sky and lets loose with an animalistic scream. I’m so shocked she would let go of her precious control that I actually recoil.
For once, the pain is written all over her face. Pain she’s hidden so well for the last two years. And I know how much of it I caused.
When she finally looks up at me again, her eyes glisten and her perfect facade is gone. Suddenly, she’s the same girl I knew, the girl I left behind that day I slipped out the backdoor during my party. The only difference is that now she’s a little more broken.
My lungs climb into my throat, and my heart lands at my feet.
The first tear rolls down her cheek as her bottom lip trembles. “All this time I thought you were some cold, distant bitch. I thought you didn’t even care that he was gone. I blamed you because you were there when he died and you didn’t even seem to care. But you were just—” Her voice cuts off, and she looks back at his grave. “Did you love him?”
I don’t even know I’m crying until the first tear lands on my hand.
I nod.
“Damn it, Lexi! Why didn’t you tell me?” She’s screaming. Her air of control has completely disappeared.
“I’m sorry, okay! I thought it was easier if you just hated me!” I throw my hands up, struggling not to just scream the words like she did.
She steps closer to me, shaking her head. Every so often she opens her mouth to speak, but then she snaps it shut. Eventually, she musters up the words. “I would have understood.”
I shiver.
The silence between us stretches on for so long that the clouds open up. At last, she speaks, so quietly I can hardly hear her over the pitter patter of the rain. “Can we talk about this? Get out of here and get some coffee?”
Her voice is so hopeful I want to say yes. The girl standing in front of me right now is the girl who was my best friend, the one who knew all my secrets—except one.
But that one secret is enough to keep us apart forever.
I shake my head. “I have to go. I’m sorry. For everything, I mean.” I whirl around and hurry down the path, my ears straining to hear if she’s following me.
But there’s only the wind and the pounding of my heart.
Chapter Eleven
I spend the next afternoon at the ocean, walking the beach for the first time in months. I wade in the saltwater, and wait. For what, I don’t know. The sea took everything from me. Is it so wrong to hope that it might give something back? Some whisper of an answer?
The sun crosses the sky, and I know I have only two more hours, and I haven’t figured anything out. I lie down on the sand, and stare up at the clouds. They’re big, white, fluffy things that don’t reflect my mood. It’s low tide and the ocean is calm, quietly lapping away at the sandy beach. Seagulls waddle across the sand, picking at seaweed and shells that have been exposed by the ebb of the tide.
If only I could sleep, I bet I could take a nap, right here on the sand. I bet it would feel peaceful. Relaxing, maybe. It’s hard to remember what it felt like, before my sixteenth, back when I used to sleep. No wonder I’m such a wreck. I close my eyes anyway, even though I know nothing will happen, and listen to the give and take of the gentle waves, broken only by occasional screeches from the birds. I wouldn’t mind lying here forever, until the tide comes in and carries me away.
But then a shadow falls across me—I can tell even through my closed eyes. I pop them open.
“It’s peaceful down here, right?” Cole says quietly. He’s not looking at me; he’s looking at the ocean.
“What are you doing here?” I ask, as if the ocean belongs to me.
It sort of does. In some of the myths, it’s as if the sirens own the ocean. It’s as though they’re killing because you dare disturb their corner of the universe. The original sirens, in Greek mythology, were part human, part bird, given wings to search the seas for Persephone when she was abducted. They eventually gave up and settled on an island, singing their songs and luring ships to wreck upon the shores.
I know I’m not related to those sirens. That sounds nothing like me. And their song is supposedly about calling out to Persephone. I don’t real
ly know what I sing, but it doesn’t feel like I’m calling to some long-lost Greek goddess or anything.
There are a lot of myths, a lot of stories. None of them get it perfectly right, but each of them managed to get a little piece of it. Hans Christian Andersen’s The Little Mermaid describes the mermaid on land for the first time, and he says every step she takes is like walking on shattered glass. Just like I feel after I miss a night of swimming. The story also says mermaids are soulless, which I hope isn’t true.
I have a whole notebook crammed with research, but I’ve never found anything that describes how I am. Nothing that describes the way I sing. It’s like . . . an overwhelming loneliness that can’t be contained. When I sing, it’s as if I let a little piece of that go, let it float away. It soothes me in a way that nothing in the daylight ever has. But when it’s over, reality screeches back, and I hate myself for needing that.
“I live right there,” Cole says, pointing behind me. His words jolt me back to reality.
I sit up and twist around, then realize with a sinking heart he’s right. I’ve lain down right in front of his house. I’d been so deep in thought I hadn’t even realized I was so far away from where I’d parked my car and that there Cole’s house was, tucked away on the other side of the dunes and reed grass. I must have walked for an hour.
“Oh. Right.”
I start to get up, but Cole puts a hand on my shoulder, and next thing I know, he’s sitting down next to me, kicking off his flip-flops and burrowing his toes in the sand.
I stifle another sigh and just stare out to the sea. Our sides are nearly touching, and if I sit very still, I can see the rise and fall of his shoulders. An odd sense of peace washes over me. There’s something calming about being near him, knowing he doesn’t blame me for what happened to Steven, even though I know he should.
I watch at least a dozen waves crash into the sand before he finally speaks. “I love the ocean,” he says.
I nod. I’m not so sure I do. My body loves it, but truth be told, most of the time I hate the ocean, the water, everything. The silence comes back.
Cole rolls up the sleeves of his button-down, exposing his forearms. Then he reaches down and picks up a handful of sand, lets it slip through his fingers. He’s not dressed for the beach. I’m surprised he even sat down in the sand. “Do you miss him?”
I watch the sand slip from his hands for a long moment. “More than anything.”
“He was going to ask you to homecoming.”
My stomach flips. “How do you know that?”
He smiles, picks up another handful of sand. “He told me. It was funny, really. He asked out girls all the time. But with you, it was different. He was nervous. He kept asking me if I thought you would say yes.”
I stare down at the sand between my feet. “I would have. Said yes, I mean.”
“I know. That’s what I told him.”
I chew on my lip for a second. I shouldn’t want to talk to him. I shouldn’t. But I do. “Why do you keep doing this?”
“Because I hate seeing you this way. I miss the girl you used to be. I miss that smile of yours.”
I shift in the sand, wishing he wouldn’t look at me so directly. “Do you think Sienna is going to be okay?”
He turns his attention back to the sand. “I don’t know. I hope so. It’s like . . . instead of dealing with losing him, she just blocks it out, so she’s never really gotten over it.”
I nod, swallow the lump growing in my throat. I will not cry in front of him again.
“Do you remember that barbeque, the summer before he died? With the croquet?”
I feel my lips curl, the tiniest ghost of a smile. “Yeah, and I was—”
“Terrible,” he says.
I try to look offended.
“Oh, come on, you know you were. But Sienna and Steven were laughing so hard it didn’t bother you.”
I nod. “And then they started moving all the little hoops, lining them up right in front of my ball, just so we could finish the game before it got dark.”
Cole gets a faraway look in his eyes, as if he can see the whole thing playing out again. “I had fun that day.”
“Me too,” I say, wishing I didn’t sound so wistful.
He looks over at me and for a fleeting second lets his hand rest on my knee. “Let me take you out. One night where you don’t worry about any of this.”
I close my eyes and concentrate on the feeling of his hand on my knee, remember what it felt like when he hugged me. When he sat by my side and let me cry. And I know I can’t resist him, not right now, not in this perfect moment. “Okay.”
The cell phone in Cole’s pocket chirps. I pull away from him, suddenly feeling sheepish.
“How about tomorrow? I can pick you up,” he says.
“No. Meet me at the theater. We can see a movie.” I get up, dusting the sand from my pants. “See you then,” I call over my shoulder, the soles of my shoes sinking into the sand as I rush away, fear and hope churning together in equal measure. I just agreed to a date. My first formal date, ever. I always dreamed it would be Steven, but instead it’s going to be Cole. What am I doing? All he had to do was ask, and I waved the white flag.
When I’m far enough down the coast that he won’t be able to see me, I wade into the surf, letting it lap at my calves. It’s cold. Too cold to be wading. But dusk is still an hour and a half away, and I never get this far into the ocean anymore. I avoid looking at it, being around it.
Too many people died in this ocean.
Steven’s not the only one. An hour down the coast, not far from our old home, is the marina where they found my mom’s body. And now, despite the risks, I’m letting Cole in, inch by inch.
And the scary thing is, this time I know what could happen.
Chapter Twelve
The rain has returned. It’s sprinkling, darkening the sidewalks and streets. I stand under the overhang at the movie theater in town, my hands crammed into the small pockets of my fleece jacket.
I almost didn’t show up. But I just . . . couldn’t seem to force myself to stay home. So, here I am, wearing my best-fitting jeans and a soft cream-colored turtleneck beneath my fleece. I even left my hair down today, falling in waves around my shoulders.
When a familiar black Range Rover pulls into the lot, all sparkle and shine, my nerves begin to dissipate. To my surprise, I calm down as I see him emerge from his car. And by the time he’s walking up to me, I feel my lips curl upward into a grin.
He smiles back at me and reaches out for my hand. “Ah. See, you always did have a devastating smile,” he says.
My cheeks flush, and I break eye contact, looking down at the toe of my scuffed black flats. He gives my hand a squeeze, and then we walk toward the entrance, where he buys two tickets to the comedy playing on the only screen in the place. He orders a huge tub of popcorn and some M&M’s and a soda, and we find a pair of seats in the darkened back corner of the theater. It’s nearly empty, except an older couple toward the front and two girls on the opposite corner.
I settle into my chair near the curtained walls and lean back. Our shoulders bump as the previews roll on-screen. Cole sets the big Coke in the cup holder between us.
“Thanks for showing up,” Cole says, leaning on an elbow as I sink further into my seat.
I nod. “Of course,” I say, as if I hadn’t even considered the idea of standing him up.
“I have to admit, I thought you’d be a no-show.” He grins, and there’s a tinge of nervousness to it.
I turn to him and raise an eyebrow as if I’m surprised, but I don’t think he buys it. “Okay, fine. Maybe I almost stayed home.”
He tips his head to the side, the faintest of smiles playing at the corners of his lips. “I’ll try to pretend that doesn’t kill my ego.”
And then I’m grinning again. Every logical shred of me knows this will never end with a happily ever after, but I can’t bring myself to acknowledge that when all I want to do is
sit here forever under the heat of his gaze.
Pop music blasts from the speakers, and I tear my eyes away from Cole to see an overarching shot of the Hollywood Hills. The camera slowly zooms in on a blue convertible with a pretty blonde at the wheel, her hair flying out around her.
Cole reaches out and takes my hand. He seems so confident, and I wonder if I should be, too.
I smile again and sink even further into my chair, silencing the doubts screaming in the back of my mind. I nestle closer to him, wondering how I ever could have thought of missing this.
The movie is longer than I expected. It’s past seven by the time we walk out. I picked an early showing so that I could be up at my lake in time to swim.
Cole reaches out, links his pinky with mine. It’s good that he does, because I think I might float away without him to anchor me.
It’s almost dusk. It’s not sprinkling anymore, and the clouds have lifted a little bit, but the concrete still gleams with rain. Cole pulls me in the opposite direction of the parking lot. “Let’s go for a walk.”
I guess he doesn’t want this evening to end either. I meet his eyes and smile. I can’t remember the last time I felt this happy, this content. I’d follow him anywhere.
But I go about five steps before I realize where we’re heading. The ocean. My heart plummets. It’s so close to night—the sun is nearly touching the horizon. I can’t possibly be anywhere near the ocean with him. I jerk to a stop, but he’s still holding my pinky, so I end up sort of shuffling and tripping, until he stops, too.
“Something wrong?”
“I have to go home,” I say. “I can’t—I can’t leave my grandmother for too long.” I don’t look at him. He’ll know something is going on if I meet his eyes. Instead, I stare at my brown Toyota, raindrops sparkling under the streetlamp.
“Are you sure? I thought we could go for a walk on the beach. . . ”
“No,” I say, too loud, too short. I hate this, hate that tonight can’t be a simple high school date like it would be for anyone else. I want what he is trying to give me: a beautiful date that will live forever in my heart, the closest thing I’ll ever get to a real romance.
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