by Mila Gray
I heft my bag over my shoulder and start trudging toward the door, slowly, looking back a few times over my shoulder in the hope I’ll see Em running to catch up with me, but she doesn’t.
Jake
Looks like she’s not coming back,” Toby says.
“Not until I’ve gone, at least,” I answer, scowling after the disappearing dot on the horizon that is Em. “Maybe I should go after her,” I muse.
Toby pats me on the shoulder. “I’d take a harpoon gun for protection if you do,” he says.
I follow him back into the store. He hops up onto his stool behind the counter while I meander through the aisles, tidying up stock. So far my plan is failing miserably. Em has spent the whole day out on the water, ignoring me. I’m starting to think it was a big mistake coming back.
“You know,” Toby says now, cocking his head at me, “you look really familiar. I swear I’ve seen you somewhere.”
I clear my throat. “Oh yeah?”
“Yeah . . .”
I angle my face away from him. “So where are you from?” I ask, trying to change the subject.
“Well, originally I’m from Bend, Oregon, but I’m studying at Washington State.”
“What are you studying?”
“Architecture,” Toby answers, busily tapping away on the store’s computer. “You’re at Boston College, right?” he asks. “What’s your major?”
“Engineering with a minor in Environmental Studies.”
Toby nods, looking impressed.
“Hey,” I say, frowning as I realize what he just said. “How did you know I’m at Boston College?”
Toby swivels the laptop in my direction. Shit.
“Google,” he says with a grin. “It’s an amazing tool. What did people do before its invention?”
“Enjoy their privacy?”
“I knew I’d seen you somewhere,” Toby says triumphantly, slapping the counter.
I cringe as he flicks a tab and a picture pops up of me posing on a beach wearing just a pair of board shorts and some sunglasses. Two girls in bikinis are draped over me. I look like a total tool.
Without warning, Toby jumps off the stool and runs around to the magazine rack in front of the counter. Don’t do it! I want to yell out. Don’t do it.
He pulls out a copy of Snow & Skate.
I exhale loudly. Here we go.
“Yes!” Toby cries, and thrusts the magazine under my nose. It’s the same picture as on the screen, except this one is the glossy print version.
“It’s really you,” he says, staring between the picture and me.
I grimace. Yep, it’s me. It was my first fashion shoot for a major sportswear company. They signed me a couple of months ago after offering me stupid money to endorse their product and model for them. They flew me to Hawaii and made me stand around on a beach all day posing in swim shorts, holding a surfboard. The fact I’m an ice hockey player didn’t seem important. My teammates haven’t stopping teasing me about it. Everywhere I go on campus, I find that picture torn out of magazines and pinned up on walls, usually inventively graffitied.
I’ve had girls as young as twelve asking me at matches to sign copies of Snow & Skate and even Vogue.
“Did they make you wax or are you really that smooth?” Toby asks, frowning over the picture.
“Photoshop,” I say, turning my back and starting to hastily reorganize the T-shirts.
“Seriously?” Toby asks.
“Yeah. I look nothing like that in real life.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yeah. Pretty sure.”
“I think you need to prove it to me,” Toby says, resting one hand on his hip and offering me an arch smile.
I laugh. Nice try. Toby being gay was one of the best pieces of news I’d heard all day because it meant he couldn’t be Em’s boyfriend.
He sighs and goes back to the counter and starts typing into a search box. Oh man. I hate the Internet. After a minute, I hear him clear his throat.
“ ‘Jake McCallister, twenty-one, hails originally from Bainbridge Island, Washington. At six two and one hundred eighty-seven pounds, McCallister is the top-ranked NHL prospect.’ ”
I duck my head, embarrassed, wishing he’d shut up.
“ ‘McCallister is on a full athletic scholarship to Boston College,’ ” Toby continues, reading off from the article. “ ‘A gifted player and slick puck handler . . .’ ” Toby bursts out laughing. “Puck handler?”
I grimace at him.
“ ‘ . . . with excellent playmaking skills . . .’ ” He looks up. “Are they talking about ice hockey here or about something else?”
I shake my head, still grimacing.
“ ‘McCallister shows immense promise and has the potential to be a future hockey champion. The only issue he faces is a propensity to recklessness and risk-taking, which, though it’s paid off in these early years of his career, may land him in trouble when he hits the big leagues next year.’ ”
I scowl at the rows of T-shirts. My coach says the same thing about my risk-taking. Thing is I don’t know any other way to be anymore. Once upon a time I used to play with a lot more caution, but not lately—not for the last seven years, in fact.
“So how come you’re back here, in Bainbridge?” Toby asks, finally closing the laptop lid. “Aren’t you supposed to be training or something over the summer? Or do they let you have a break?”
I turn my back to him under the pretense of straightening up the water bottles. “It’s . . . uh . . . I’m on summer break.”
I’m grateful that for the moment there’s nothing about the real reason for my training break on the Internet. I guess it hasn’t leaked yet. Maybe it won’t. Here’s hoping.
“And you decide to come back to Bainbridge and take a job earning minimum wage even though you could earn millions standing around on a beach with an oiled torso.”
“It wasn’t that much,” I mumble.
“Don’t hockey players earn millions, though?”
I shrug awkwardly and turn away. He’s right. They do. Most players in the National Hockey League earn seven figures, and that’s before all the money they can earn from endorsements, but I’m not about to tell him that. He’s probably already Googled it anyway.
“So come on, then,” Toby says, breaking the silence. “Why does Emerson hate you so much? She won’t tell me.”
My back stiffens. I’m pleading the fifth. Sticking to silence.
“Did you guys used to date?” Toby presses.
“No,” I say with a frustrated sigh.
“But you had a thing?”
I turn and look at him, frowning. “What?”
“A thing. You know, a thing. It’s obvious. No one gets this mad at someone unless they had a thing. Love, hate. Thin line. The only people I ever experience total blind raging fury at are my dad and my ex-boyfriend.”
“Em and I didn’t have a thing,” I say. “We were just friends.”
“So you never kissed, then?”
He’s got me there. “Okay,” I admit. “We kissed. But just one time.”
“With tongues?”
I roll my eyes. “Yes. I don’t really remember. I was fourteen. It was my first kiss.” That’s a lie. I remember it like it happened yesterday.
“Wow,” says Toby, looking impressed. “I was eleven when I had my first kiss. Eliza Seltzer. She turned me gay. Or at least that’s what everyone went around saying when I came out two years later.”
I’ve lined the water bottles up in perfect formation. But now I start all over again. Out of the corner of my eye I notice that Toby has picked up the copy of Snow & Skate again and is idly flicking through it.
“What about Em?” I suddenly hear myself asking. “Has she . . . you know . . . got a . . .” I break off.
Toby glances up over the top of his magazine. “Boyfriend? Are you asking me if Emerson has a boyfriend?”
I shrug. “Maybe.”
He makes
a face at me. “Why don’t you just ask her?”
“Because, in case you hadn’t noticed, she’s not talking to me. Besides, I don’t want her thinking—”
“Thinking what?” Toby cuts in. “That you have a thing for her?”
“I don’t have a thing for her.”
Toby gives me a raised eyebrow. “Aha. Whatever you say, Slick.”
Slick? “So does she?” I ask, feeling frustrated but trying not to let it sneak into my voice.
Toby lays his magazine down. “Depends what you mean by ‘boyfriend.’ ”
I frown and open my mouth to ask him to clarify, but the door pings open before I can. I turn around and find myself face-to-face with Rob Walsh.
He does a double take when he sees me, his mouth falling open. He rams it shut. “Jake McCallister,” he says with a snide smile.
I’m two inches taller now, and I’ve probably got ten pounds on him too, but even so, my memories of Rob Walsh rise to the fore and I feel a momentary spurt of adrenaline before I quickly shake it off, laughing at myself. Rob Walsh no longer has any power over me. We’re not kids. There’s no pissing contest happening over a tree house.
“Walsh,” I say, appraising him in the same coolly disdainful way he’s appraising me.
He’s still flying the jock flag, wearing a varsity football shirt and his sunglasses pushed up high onto his head. His dirty blond hair is crew cut just like it was in school. He’s still built, but I’m not intimidated by him anymore, because I know I’m stronger. And faster. You don’t make it into the college hockey leagues and to the top of the draft prospect list by sitting around drinking beer. I train three or four hours a day. Hard. The realization that I’m more than a match for Rob Walsh is something of a revelation. A happy one.
“What are you doing back?” he asks, frowning.
“Thought it was about time,” I say.
I can see Rob’s having a few revelations of his own. He licks his lips dryly, eyeing me. My back straightens under his gaze. I stare back at him, unflinching. The last time he saw me I was an underdeveloped fourteen-year-old and he was an overdeveloped seventeen-year-old. People used to wonder if he was taking steroids. He was the only kid in school who was shaving a full beard by tenth grade. I barely reached his navel back then. It’s somewhat satisfying to see him recalibrating me in his mind. Do that, I think to myself as I stare him down.
“You still playing hockey?” he asks.
I nod. “You still playing football?”
His face contorts into a scowl. “Nah,” he grimaces. “Tore a ligament in my knee, second semester of freshman year.” He shakes his head. “Game over.”
“I’m sorry,” I say. And I mean it. It’s an athlete’s worst nightmare. That or being busted for something really stupid and getting thrown off the team.
He nods. “I’m going through the police academy, actually. In the fall.” He lifts his chin as he speaks, his back straightening.
My eyebrows shoot up and I have to stop myself from laughing out loud. Rob Walsh is going to be a police officer? That’s one of the funniest things I think I’ve ever heard. He spent most of his teenage years smoking weed and beating people up. Then I remember his father is the chief of police here in Bainbridge. I guess it figures he’d follow in his footsteps.
The door pings again. It’s Em this time. She’s wearing her wet suit zipped all the way to her chin, but all it does is accentuate every curve. Even Rob notices. His eyes drop the length of her, and I feel an overwhelming urge to push him into the rack of skates.
The minute Em sees Rob, she freezes, her eyes going wide like a rabbit caught in the crosshairs, and I have to resist the instinct to step between her and Rob.
Em glances at me—is that a nervous flicker in her eyes?—and swallows before quickly ducking her head and trying to move past us.
Rob grabs her wrist and yanks her toward him, sliding his arm around her waist and pulling her roughly against his side. I open my mouth ready to yell at him to take his goddamn hands off her, but the words get stuck in my throat when I notice that Em isn’t protesting.
With his eyes fixed on me, Rob lifts Em’s chin up with his free hand and plants a loud kiss on her lips, his other hand grabbing her ass.
“Hey, babe,” Rob says. “I missed you.”
Babe? The ground rocks beneath my feet. I look between them. They’ve got to be joking. This cannot be true. Rob Walsh and Em? She hates his guts. I blink, trying to clear my vision, convinced I’ve got to be seeing things, hallucinating. Why is his hand on her ass? Why isn’t she telling him to get the hell off her? Why isn’t she kneeing him in the balls?
Em wriggles out of Rob’s hold and pushes him away. “Get off me, Rob,” she says. Finally.
Relief rolls off me in powerful waves. They aren’t together, then. Of course they aren’t. I almost laugh out loud. But seriously . . . the guy needs a talking-to. I’m about to suggest we take it outside, in fact, because if she won’t call him out on his behavior, I will, but then I see Rob is scowling at Em.
“What’s up with you?” he grunts.
Em strides past us both without even looking at me. “Nothing’s up with me,” she hisses.
“You weren’t complaining last time I kissed you!” Rob yells at her departing back.
Em walks into the storeroom and slams the door shut behind her.
“Women,” Rob mutters under his breath, seemingly for my benefit.
I turn slowly back around to face him, feeling as if I’m dreaming. He smiles at me, the glint of triumph brightening his eyes.
Emerson
What the hell is Rob doing here? Damn. I told him to leave me alone, but he never takes me seriously. This is my own stupid fault. If I stopped yo-yo-ing back and forth with him and actually told him once and for all that it was over, I wouldn’t be in this situation.
Jake is out there and he thinks there’s something going on between Rob and me.
And what does it matter if he does think that?
I tell myself I don’t care, but I do. Just picturing Jake’s face when he saw Rob kiss me . . . I bury my head in my hands as shame drenches me.
Jake hates Rob. Rob hates him right back. Maybe I shouldn’t leave them outside together. I move to the door before stopping myself. No. They’re both adults. I’m sure they’re okay. And why would Jake even care about who I’m dating or not dating? I bet he has thousands of girls throwing themselves at him. I mean, women are paid to drape themselves over him like tinsel on a Christmas tree, after all.
I make a point of never Googling Jake. I don’t have Facebook or Instagram accounts and stay off social media. But Shay sometimes lets something slip in conversation about what he’s up to and how well he’s doing, and when the pictures of Jake came out in Vogue, Shay bought a copy. I took a quick look, saw him sandwiched between two girls wearing thong bikinis, and then tossed it into the trash. And then, because I couldn’t stop glancing at the trash can, I took it out and fed the entire magazine through the shredder.
I press my ear to the storeroom door but can’t hear anything. Are they still out there? Are they talking? No. Don’t be stupid. What on earth would they be talking about? The only thing they have in common is a Y chromosome. As I’m trying to listen, my gaze lands on the shiny new lock attached to the door.
That wasn’t there this morning.
Goddamn it. It’s got Jake written all over it. . . .
When we were building the tree house, he’d always do things like this, surprising me with small details he’d thought up: a cup holder he’d screwed into the railing to stop our Coke cans rolling off the deck, a hidden compartment beneath the floorboards where we could hide notes for each other and sticks of gum.
Slowly, I run my fingers over the lock, sliding the bolt into the catch and then back again. Goddamn him.
* * *
I take a scalding shower, and when I slip out of the bathroom, thankfully I find only Toby inside the store, serving a custome
r. He nods at me and I walk to the door and peer out.
Rob has left—his truck’s nowhere to be seen—and Jake is down by the shore, bailing water out of the kayaks. He looks mad. His face is set, his lips pursed, the muscles of his shoulders and forearms are working furiously beneath his skin. I’ve never seen him mad before. He was always so chill as a kid.
I fight the urge to go to him and explain about Rob. Why should I have to? He never gave me the same courtesy. He just up and left town the day after we kissed, the day after it happened, and I never heard from him again. I owe him nothing.
“Toby?” I say, when he’s finished with the customer. “Are you okay if I take off for a while? I’ll be back to close up.”
Toby nods. “Sure. Are you going to talk to Slick out there?”
“Slick?” I ask, frowning at him.
Toby laughs and points at Jake, who is still outside, scrubbing down the kayaks now, scowling.
“No,” I say, turning away. “I’m going to see Rob.”
Jake
Ifinish cleaning the kayaks and drag them up the shore. I saw Em take off on her bike about thirty minutes ago. Toby told me she’s gone to see Rob, and the thought of it, of her and him in the same sentence let alone the same room, doing whatever it is they’re doing, makes me slam the lock down so hard on the chain that it catches my thumb.
“Shit!” I yell, shaking out my hand and cursing some more under my breath. I kick the nearest kayak, forgetting I’m barefoot. “Shit,” I say, hopping now on one foot while waving my hand in the air.
“Don’t take it out on the kayak. It’s not the kayak’s fault Emerson has terrible taste in men.”
I turn around. Toby is leaning against the door, watching me.
“Sorry,” I grumble. Then I shake my head. “I don’t know what I was thinking—taking this job. It was stupid.”
Toby doesn’t say anything—he probably agrees with me.
I take a deep breath, glancing at the water, back at the kayaks, at the sign on the door saying LOWE KAYAKING CO., and then I take hold of the bottom of my T-shirt and strip it off over my head. “I’m done,” I say.
