Lake Emerald Chronicles: The First Summer: A Reverse Harem Romance

by Melissa Adams

  I give her a big hug and tell her that any guy who got to know her would be a total idiot not to fall head over heels for her.

  ‘A total dickwad!’

  Confirms Brie with her usual tactfulness. I debate within myself if I should say something to Brie about Justin and Lucy but at this point, I doubt it would change her plans with Justin, I will see what Hazel thinks and then decide.

  I get into bed and my pillow smells of sandalwood and amber, it’s faint but it’s there and I fall asleep thinking that this morning I got my first kiss and then I also kissed Logan.

  I know one day soon I will have to pick one of them but for tonight, I dream of strong arms, soft lips and eyes that make my heart race: both boys have all of those things and choosing will be hard.

  6.

  Muses and mermaids

  I wake up early again and groan in frustration: I am on holiday and I would love to sleep in but my mind is totally awake and I know if I keep stirring around I will wake Hazel up and that’s one thing that will make my friend really grumpy since it’s only 7 am.

  I take a quick shower and head out determined to do my sketching of a tree that Austin assigned as a project to bring in for his next class tomorrow morning.

  I get my pad and pencils and head out to look for a good spot and for a nice tree to sketch.

  Normally when I was up this early, I would have started my day with a yoga class but since this year’s instructor made it clear that she dislikes me, I guess yoga is off my list of activities.

  I descend the stairs of my front porch and for a moment I stop to look around: everything is quiet and there’s nobody around but for an instant, I had the feeling that I was being watched.

  I shake my head to get rid of that ridiculous thought: apart from some of the kitchen and maintenance staff and the yoga people, everyone else is definitely still in bed, including my boys.

  I smile at the thought of Xander and Logan, I don’t know how they would react to be called “my boys”, probably they would be pissed that I was kissing both of them but I guess that until one of them asks me officially to be his girlfriend, I am dating? And one can date not exclusively, right?

  I see it in the movies all the time, so it must be a thing.

  I decide it’s a thing and tell myself that I have to get to know them better before I make a decision and that unless one of them mentions being exclusive, I am not really doing anything wrong, right...?

  I get deeper into Emerald Lake woods and find a clearing with a majestic oak tree in the middle of it: seriously this tree must be centuries old with its long, leafy branches providing shade and certainly shelter and plenty of acorns to some cute squirrels.

  Not far from the tree, there’s a big boulder which has an indentation on it that looks shaped almost like a seat, so I settle myself in it, take out my drawing material from my light rucksack and start sketching.

  The air is fresh, it’s quiet except for a few little birds chirping around. I keep sketching when I stop, pencil in midair because I feel observed again and then I spot him: a little brown, reddish squirrel, looking at me just a few yards away from me.

  I look around on the ground and see an acorn at my feet and I move really slowly to pick it up, not losing eye contact with the little creature.

  I take a tentative step towards it and he doesn’t look scared, he simply looks at me, its luscious tail moving once or twice, its little dark eyes watching me intently.

  I put the acorn on the palm of my hand and crouch down just a foot away from it and then whisper:

  ‘Do you want this yummy? I won’t hurt you, little one, I just want to be your friend...’

  ‘I would stay away from that thing, it probably has rabies!’

  Says a low, baritone voice.

  ‘Oh!’

  I jump, startled and the squirrel is spooked away.

  I turn and see Austin standing behind me with his own drawing material.

  ‘You scared the shit out of me...’

  He grins and it’s the first time I see him truly smile: his green eyes light up and a dimple appears on his left cheek, softening his gorgeous features.

  He’s wearing a white t-shirt with an abstract painting reproduced on it and a pair of black skater shorts.

  ‘Sorry, I didn’t mean to startle you. I was here to sketch, Mrs Taffar gave me directions to this tree, apparently it’s the oldest in the whole forest...’

  I tell him that I found it just by chance.

  ‘Do you mind if I sit here too? We can sketch together...’

  Well, I feel a bit self conscious now, in case my sketch totally sucks but I agree and he finds a spot on the boulder; we are sitting close but aren’t touching and for a few minutes, we just work quietly until I hear him whisper something so softly that for a second I think I am imagining it but I can make out the words, they are:

  ‘Tityre tu patulae recubans sub termine fagi, silvestrem tenui Musam meditaris avena...’

  I continue:

  ‘Nos patriae finis et dulcia linquimus arva, nos patriam fugimus, tu Tityre lentus in umbra...’

  (Translation: Titirus, you who rest under the shade of a wide beech tree, playing with your sweet flute a bucolic song. We leave the sweet fields, we flee our home country, you Titirus reclined in the shade...)

  Our eyes meet and his smile surfaces again:

  ‘Wow, you can quote Virgil? I thought you were in high school...’

  I blush, I am such a nerd and now I am totally busted.

  ‘Well, yes, I am going to be a junior in the fall but I go to this fancy prep school and last year I took my first AP Latin class. My mom made me take Latin with a private tutor since middle school. She says it will help if I decide to follow in her footsteps and become a lawyer or if I wanted to be a doctor...’

  His smile widens.

  ‘And what would you like to be?’

  ‘A writer or a screenplay writer or both... What about you, how do you know Virgil?’

  He explains that he’s just just graduated from Stanford and he’s majored in arts and minored in Latin literature. He wants to be an artist of some kind, he dabbles in painting, sculpture and in his free time he’s in the drama department too...

  We chat about college and theatre and he comes clean to the fact that he got this job because he hopes Mrs. Angela will help him get a recommendation to get accepted into the theatre graduate programme at Stanford.

  Emerald Lake Camp is very unique: all the kids who come here from all over the country are from privileged, quite wealthy backgrounds. The camp is owned by Mrs. Angela, it was her father’s retirement dream but she was a Supreme Court judge and a Yale Alumna and when she retired herself she took it over. She got some of her friends investing in the camp and basically it’s owned by Alumni from the most prestigious Ivy League colleges in the country and they have started to send their kids and grandkids here for the summer and after they graduate high school, to work here for the summers and in return, they get all sorts of introductions and recommendation letters into the colleges and schools of their dreams. This is how my ultra strict mom has agreed to send me here, because her father, another Supreme Court judge, owns shares in the camp.

  We are still talking about theatre when my eyes fall to Austin’s pad and he quiets down when he notices that I have seen that he wasn’t sketching the oak tree but he was drawing me.

  ‘Is that...?’

  He nods, his eyes suddenly intense.

  ‘Yes, I am sorry, I should have asked you.’

  I take his pad from him and check out the drawing more carefully: it’s like a study of me. There’s a close up of my face, one of my profile, a detail of my eye and an unfinished one of my lips.

  I lift the page and I see the one before is still me in the clothes I wore yesterday.

  He takes the pad back from me and blushes slightly, which looks very out of character since he’s usually very confident, and then says:

  ‘I am not a creep,
I promise. I know how this must look to you but in my defence...Since I saw you, two days ago, I have been trying to draw you. It’s not just because you are gorgeous, you inspire me, like a muse... Like Amaryllis with Tityrus...’

  I smile softly, flattered and embarrassed at the same time and I can’t find anything better to say than:

  ‘Well, she was more of a nymph...’

  His confidence returns with a small smile, just the upper corner of his lip lifting slightly up.

  ‘Well you can be a nymph and a muse at the same time...’

  I roll my eyes and say that Amaryllis was insanely gorgeous and I am just a frumpy teenager.

  He puts two fingers under my chin, lifting my face to his and forcing me to look into his intense green eyes.

  ‘You are perfect and your beauty isn’t just in your gorgeous looks but in the fact that you don’t make your exterior appearance everything like some other girls...’

  I give him a small smile, suddenly nervous because his gaze has become more intense and as he draws closer, I pick up his scent of leather and berries.

  His eyes drift to my lips and I know now that’s because he wants to kiss me: every time Xander and Logan have tried to kiss me, it would always start with them looking at my lips like he’s doing now.

  Maybe I should stop to think about what I’m doing but the truth is that I want him to kiss me, so I don’t move and I let him come closer to me until his lips touch mine ever so softly.

  When he’s sure that I am not going to move away, his lips come in full contact with mine and start moving softly but confidently against mine, mouth slightly open, waiting for me to allow him in.

  I open my mouth with a sigh and when his tongue swipes at mine, I get the most delicious taste of pineapple and strawberries.

  He deepens the kiss and his hands leave my face to settle around my hips while my arms go around his neck: we are still sitting on the boulder, our bodies now closer, our kiss now deep and steady.

  He stops kissing me but keeps his mouth still on mine saying against my lips, warm breath tickling my sensitive skin:

  ‘Clary...’

  ‘Hmm?’

  I say unable to shake off the feeling of his kiss, my senses full of his scent, my eyes now open and lost in the deep jade colour.

  ‘There’s that bonfire tomorrow night, to celebrate the official beginning of the summer season. I will have to help out a little bit, we are all being put to work but find me later on? Tomorrow there’s no curfew, so we can talk a little more, maybe dance?’

  I agree with a smile and then get a bit embarrassed when my stomach growls and he laughs:

  ‘I guess you skipped breakfast?’

  I nod, redness spreading across my cheeks.

  He takes my hand and tells me to follow him because he knows where Mrs. Taffar keeps the donuts with the candied bacon on.

  We get to the main kitchen and again it is deserted but pots and pans are bubbling away on the stove and the ever present smell of bread is in the air.

  Austin finds two fudge glazed donuts with bits of candied bacon on top and after setting them on a plate, he takes my hand and leads me outside, to sit on a bench by the back of the kitchen.

  You know how they say that a criminal always comes back to the crime scene? Yeah, I feel a bit like that since I was in that exact same spot just yesterday morning.

  We take one donut each from the plate and bite into it at the same time: the fluffy fried dough, the creamy sweet fudge and the salty, crunchy bacon make me moan with pleasure and he chews on his donut with his eyes intent on me and a satisfied smile since he got me this delicious treat.

  I keep eating until the last bite is in my mouth and I am chewing in a bit of a sugar daze, until I see him staring at me again and I stop mid chew.

  He smiles, totally relaxed, definitely amused at something.

  ‘Did you enjoy it?’

  I nod swallowing the last bite and his face draws near: he takes a nibble at my upper lip, in a wet but not slobbery way and says:

  ‘You have fudge on your lip, let me help...’

  And takes another nibble which makes me breath in and open my mouth slightly which he takes as an invitation because he’s kissing me again and what can I say? Donuts make kisses much better because it’s sweet, a bit smokey because of the bacon and I still can taste that pineapple and strawberries from before.

  His kiss gets more confident, he knows I want him to do this now and he explores my mouth without holding back, his teeth occasionally grazing my lower lip.

  Just when I think that my heart will explode between the donuts and his kisses, we hear someone clearing their throat in a familiar kind of way for me.

  Mrs Taffar is standing on her kitchen’s threshold with a puzzled expression: her green eyes look straight into mine when she says:

  ‘I don’t know what it is with you kids and my kitchen. You have a beach, the woods, cabins, lots of sports facilities that aren’t always popular or used and yet, you come to make out here at the back of my kitchen... Have you guys done with that plate, by the way?’

  And she extends her hand where I deposit the plate where the donuts were just a minute ago.

  She doesn’t break eye contact, always smiling and for a second I wonder what she must think since she cannot possibly confuse Austin with Xander.

  And it hits me all of a sudden that my problem just got one third more serious: still no one has tried to call me his girlfriend but I kissed another impossibly hot guy and I guess my decision is now even harder.

  Austin has some work to do and then has promised his brother to hang out with him so he tells me that he expects to see me tomorrow morning in class if for some reason we miss each other in the evening.

  I go back to my cabin to change into my bikini to go and see Logan at the beach and I bump into Brie who’s just coming out of the shower.

  ‘Hey babe, what are you doing here?’

  I tell her I’m headed to the beach and she asks me if I can wait for her.

  ‘Just the time to put my bikini on and we can walk together, I haven’t seen you at all yesterday...’

  ‘Well, you were busy with you beau...’

  I smirk and she just drops her towel, totally naked in front of me. I flinch a bit and try to turn so I am not facing her but she puts a hand on my shoulder to stop me.

  ‘Clary, what do you think?’

  I look at her belly button where she has a deep red jewel. It looks very good, but I feel like I want to faint only thinking about getting my navel pierced.

  I tell her she looks amazing and she tells me that tonight she has a date with Justin who’s taking her to dinner into the village.

  I guess I could tell her now about Lucy and Justin sleeping together but instead I ask her if he’s her boyfriend now.

  ‘He hasn’t exactly asked... Why, do you like him? Because I called dibs...’

  I reassure her that I have no interest in Justin.

  ‘Has Logan asked you?’

  I tell her that he hasn’t but that he kissed me last night and he’s waiting for me at the beach now.

  ‘Let’s go then, he’s always surrounded by a gaggle of adoring girls, almost as bad as Joel. Let’s make sure they don’t step on your turf... Especially that Leah, even though Logan hates her: you can see that from a mile away...’

  As soon as we are both changed into a bikini, emerald green for me and stark white for Brie, we head to the beach, chatting about what she should wear for her date.

  When we get there, we spot Logan playing beach volleyball with a group of people which includes my three worst nightmares and also Justin, Rob and Brooklyn.

  I have to say that both Lucy and Hayley look amazing in the skimpiest bikinis I’ve ever seen.

  Logan spots me and gets distracted waving at me, when Lucy who was about to serve, spikes the ball really violently aiming at my face.

  Thankfully I see it in time but in trying to avoid the ball I step on a b
ig pebble and take a fall, my ankle twists and I end up on the ground in a cloud of sand.

  ‘Clary, are you ok?’

  Logan is at my feet straight away, he scoops me up in his arms protectively and then turns to glare at Lucy, who’s standing at the other side of the net with a hand on a hip and a satisfied smirk on her face.

  ‘Did you not see Clary?’

  She flips her hair back in her usual, arrogant way and she shrugs:

  ‘Clary should have known better than to come so close to the playing field. She’s lucky the ball didn’t hit her head...’

  ‘What’s going on here?’

  Joel, Xander and Jemma approach us and Joel is the one asking the question.

  Logan explains what’s happened with me still in his arms and I spot Xander looking at us while Jemma is intent on looking at Xander.

  ‘Ok, let’s see how bad it is. Put her down.’

  Instructs Joel but Logan takes a step back, reluctant to do as told.

  ‘Come on, kid! We don’t have all day.’

  Joel urges him and this time Logan complies very slowly, depositing me softly on the sand.

  ‘Can you walk?’

  This time it’s Xander talking, his turquoise gaze dark and menacing while he positions himself between me and Lucy, who’s still standing there and now has her arms folded over her chest in a protective stance.

  I try to take a couple of steps but I get waves of pain as soon as I put my foot down and end falling down again.

  ‘Ok, let me take a look at it.’

  It’s Joel approaching and kneeling down on the sand next to me, taking my ankle in his hand and touching it with gentle yet deft fingers.

  ‘Does it hurt here?’

  He keeps touching different spots on my ankle and foot and after a minute he concludes:

  ‘I think you twisted it when you fell and if you rest it for today, it should be fine. We should also put some ice on it, it’s already swelling up and possibly keep it elevated.’

  ‘I think she needs a doctor, I don’t think you are qualified for a diagnosis...’