Bella and the Summer Fling

by Amy Sparling

  After dinner, I’m still trying to figure it out. There’s only so many ways you can Google the phrase “what should I do with my life” before you realize that the internet might not have all the answers.

  Liam calls me around ten o’clock at night, which is only eight in California time. I want to hear his voice and fall asleep to him telling me all about his day. But that’s something would make it harder to say goodbye at the end of summer. He’s a fling, after all. I don’t need to talk to him every day.

  I let the phone call go to voicemail even though it hurts to miss out on an opportunity to talk to him. I need to stop relying on Liam to bring me happiness.

  I need to start finding it for myself.

  12

  Liam

  Team Loco puts me up in a five-star hotel which is so nice I feel like I shouldn’t be in here. Like maybe my mere presence will mess up the high-class luxury in this place. It has a hot tub and a shower and a balcony that overlooks Beverly Hills. The room always smells luxurious, if that’s even a thing. Like lavender and money. I take pictures of the room and I wish I could tell Bella but she didn’t answer my call last night. Or the night before. I worried that maybe my phone somehow didn’t work this far from Houston, but I can call my mom just fine. It’s Bella who isn’t picking up.

  In the morning, I gather my stuff and get some cinnamon flavored coffee from the hotel’s lobby before I check out. Marcus calls me and wishes me a safe flight, and tells me they’ve arranged for a driver to take me to the airport. I’m really going to like being a part of Team Loco. They treat their people like royalty. Team FRZ Frame never did anything like this for me. They emailed my contracts and I had to sign them and email them back. With Team Loco, I got an all expenses paid trip to LA. Pretty awesome.

  Now I’m even more determined to prove that I’m the racer they know I can be. I will stay on my best behavior and I will race with everything I’ve got. Just like Jett Adams, I’ll bring them the podium wins this season. My flight back to Texas goes quickly, and soon we’re landing and I’m eagerly taking my phone off airplane mode.

  I wait a few minutes, watching my notifications pop up, hoping in vain that one of them will be from Bella. But there’s nothing from her. It’s been two days. This has officially moved past the territory of me just being paranoid. She’s avoiding me.

  I grab my suitcase and haul it off the airplane. I text Phil that my plane arrived on time and I walk out to find him waiting in the pickup line.

  Before I get to the doors, I see two poster board signs that are wiggling excitedly from the two boys holding them. My mom, Phil, and the boys are all here, waiting for me.

  The two poster board signs have been decorated in Matt and Dylan’s signature comic book style. They’ve drawn me on a dirt bike, soaring over a jump, with my hands in the air in celebration. Off to the side, there’s a stick figure holding a checkered flag.

  Along the top of the sign are the words:

  Welcome home Liam Mosely, bigshot professional racer

  I can’t help but laugh.

  Mom hugs me. “How was your trip? Tell us all about it.”

  “Do you like our signs?” Matt says.

  “I love them,” I say, ruffling his hair.

  “We’re going to hang them on your bedroom wall,” Dylan says.

  “Cool.” I don’t bother telling him that the room I’m staying in isn’t exactly my bedroom so I don’t get to decorate it as if it were. It’s the office with a bed in it. My mom might toss the poster boards long after I’m gone, but the boys don’t need to know that.

  We go out to eat and I tell them everything about my trip. It’s hard to focus about all the exciting Team Loco things because I can’t stop checking my phone, hoping for a text from Bella. My mind runs through all the situations that might have caused this lack of communication.

  Maybe her phone broke?

  But it’s been two days. She would have gotten a new one or texted me from a friend’s phone, or something. She could have emailed me to tell me her phone broke.

  Maybe she’s sick.

  Maybe she got the flu from me and she’s been in bed sick… but that wouldn’t have stopped her from sending a text.

  Maybe it’s that guy she met at the mall. Maybe he took her on a date and she’s in love with him now.

  My stomach twists into knots. I don’t want Bella to move on, not yet. I know she’ll find a better guy after I’m gone and that’s good—I want her to be happy. But I don’t want to lose her yet. I still have three weeks.

  Dinner is good, and my family is great, but it’s a struggle to get through the meal without letting them know I’m freaking out on the inside. I put on a smile and answer my brother’s questions and try to act normal.

  They’re all fascinated by the custom riding gear and custom bike I’ll get now that I’m a member of Team Loco. Phil and the boys don’t know much about motocross at all. My mom knows just enough because I grew up in this world, but she’s always distanced herself from the sport. Now, they all look on eagerly while I explain how professional motocross works.

  “Do you get paid too?” Dylan asks.

  I grin. “Yep. It’s a job. But I only get paid for each season and they only hired me on for one season so far.”

  “How much do you get paid?” Matt asks.

  “It’s rude to ask about money, son,” Phil says.

  I shrug. “It’s a pretty standard contract. All rookies make the same amount.”

  My mom looks up, curiosity painted on her features. “A hundred grand,” I say, answering her unasked question.

  Her eyes widen. “Liam Mosely,” she says, putting a hand to her chest. “Are you seriously getting paid that much?”

  I can’t tell if she’s mad or happy, or just too surprised to smile. “Yes,” I say. “I have the check in my backpack.”

  “Holy sh—” she breathes, stopping herself before cursing in front of the children. She grabs my hand. “No way.”

  I laugh. “Yes, Mom. That’s why I’ve worked so hard to go pro. The money is worth it. And that’s just rookie salary. If I stay on, I’ll be making way more than that.”

  “Good job, Liam,” Phil says. “I’m proud of you.”

  Mom’s eyes tear up. “Oh honey,” she says, pulling me into a side hug while we sit at this restaurant table. “I’m so, so proud of you.”

  She doesn’t elaborate but I can see it in her eyes. She’s thinking that she finally gets it now. The reason I dedicated so much of my life to the sport. The reason I let it take over my world. The money will be worth it. All of this hard work will result in being financially set for life, should I manage to stay on the team and not get hurt.

  This is what I’ve worked so hard for, and now I’ve got it. The check is in my backpack. I’ve signed on the dotted line. I start racing for Team Loco in two weeks.

  All of my wildest dreams have come true and yet I’m not as happy as I should be because I’m missing the girl who hasn’t been answering my calls.

  After dinner, there’s still some time left before the motocross track closes for the day. If she’s anywhere, she’s there. I load up my bike and head out to Roca Sprigs Motocross Park, eager to see her. Maybe it’ll all be a misunderstanding and maybe she’s still mine, if only for a couple of weeks. I long for it to be true. I need it to be true. I’m not ready to say goodbye to her just yet.

  I drive down the track, carefully looking at each truck in the parking lot. She’s not by our tree, which is the only place she ever parks. Still, I refuse to give up hope until I’ve searched the entire facility. But her old black Chevy truck isn’t here. I don’t have the heart to ride my bike tonight, so I turn around and drive back home, defeated. Hurt. Heartbroken.

  I can try to make excuses all I want. I can imagine scenarios where her phone broke and she’s been trying to contact me but can’t.

  But deep down I know that’s not true. Something happened between the time I got on the plane and whe
n I got home.

  Bella Castro doesn’t care about me anymore.

  13

  Bella

  I can’t take it anymore. I thought I could cut him off cold turkey, but I can’t. Liam is my drug. He’s also my friend. We’ve spent all of summer hanging out nearly every day at the track. I can’t just drop it all because my feelings are hurt.

  I text him on Saturday morning. I know he’s back home because he tried calling me and left me a voicemail after he arrived back in town. I’m afraid he might be mad at me for ignoring him, but he answers on the first ring.

  “Hey, stranger.”

  I swallow. Busted. “Hi.”

  “What’s been going on?”

  I can feel the tension in the air, the awkwardness between us that I personally put there by ghosting him for three days. I sigh. “I’m sorry, Liam. I was ignoring you.”

  “Yeah… I figured that much,” he says. “Any reason why?”

  “I’m just not ready for the fake breakup. I know it’s coming after summer and when I saw you on YouTube it hit me that you’re famous and I’m not. You’ve got a future and I don’t.”

  “That’s not true,” he says. “You have whatever future you want.”

  “Not whatever future,” I mumble. The future where Liam and I are together and happy doesn’t exist in this world, only in my dreams.

  “Look,” he says softly. “We still have time. Let’s not throw away our fling just yet. How about we go on a date today?”

  I should say no. I shouldn’t have called him. I should just stay away.

  But my voice betrays my heart. “What did you have in mind?”

  “Houston Comicpalooza.”

  “Houston what?” I say.

  He laughs. “It’s like the Comic Con of Texas. A huge superhero, super nerd convention. It’s fun.”

  “It’s two hours away.” I say.

  “Then we better get going.”

  I tell my mom I’m going to the Comicpalooza event with “some friends” and she just tells me to have fun. I don’t get the third degree of questioning now that I’m eighteen. Since Brent isn’t home, I let Liam come pick me up at my house, but I wait for him at the end of my driveway. No need for my mom to accidentally meet him. It’s not like he’s a real boyfriend after all.

  Liam is wearing jeans and a Captain America T-shirt that hugs his muscles as if he were Chris Evans himself.

  “Look at you, all nerded out,” I tease as I climb into the passenger seat.

  “No worries, I got one for you.” He tosses a black shirt at me. I hold it up and see the same Captain America shield emblazoned on the front. I grin.

  “Don’t look,” I say. Liam holds up one hand to block me from his view while he drives and I quickly slip out of my shirt and into this new one from Liam. It’s brand new but has a hint of Liam’s intoxicating scent on it.

  When I’m done I turn toward him. “How do I look?”

  “Like a very beautiful avenger,” he says with a grin that makes my toes tingle.

  The two-hour drive to Houston seems to take no time at all. I’d been a little worried that we wouldn’t know what to talk about, but I was wrong. Liam and I fit together perfectly. Either as friends, or lovers. Doesn’t matter. There are never awkward silences with us.

  He tells me about Team Loco, but he keeps it brief and I’m grateful for that. I think it’s extremely cool that he’s an official pro racer again but I don’t want details about the life he’s going to have once he leaves me this summer.

  I tell him about my friend Rachael who also rides dirt bikes but has been out of town at her dad’s house this summer and how she really wants to meet him.

  “Maybe we can all go out to dinner or something,” Liam suggests.

  I look down at our hands, which have been clasped together since we left Roca Springs. I don’t even remember doing it—who reached over and grabbed the other’s hand. It just comes naturally when we’re alone.

  I bite my lip. “We can totally hang out with my friends but just as friends,” I warn. “No one knows that we’re doing this… this fling thing.”

  “Got it,” he says. “No flirting with you. Maybe I should flirt with your friends to throw him off the scent of us?”

  I give him a look and he laughs. “I’m just playing.”

  Houston is a massive city that I haven’t been to in a long time. We have to park several blocks away for the convention because it’s so jam-packed with comic book fans. Liam and I walk hand in hand toward the convention center, passing hundreds of people in full on Cosplay outfits. Some of the costumes look amazing, and some are silly. Some people dress up as superheroes and others dress as obscure characters from lesser known TV shows. It all looks like fun, though.

  The convention center has three floors of activities. The bottom floor is full of vendors selling every comic type thing you can think of, and Liam and I spend an hour wandering through them, but we haven’t seen even half of what they have to offer yet. There are celebrities in attendance too, from movie stars to TV stars to the people who do the voices on cartoons and anime. You can get their autographs, take pictures with them, or watch them talk on panels.

  Liam and I are totally out of our element here, but we’re having a blast just looking at everything.

  I get to sit in an actual helicopter, and he makes me take a photo of him in front of the car from the show Supernatural.

  We eat nachos and get slushies and sit in the audience of panels that feature some extremely famous movie stars. Maybe it’s because we’re surrounded by all this other fame, but no one recognizes Liam. We are just two regular people here, holding hands and enjoying the show. It’s like motocross and my hometown and my brother no longer exist while we’re here. We get to be ourselves.

  From an outsider I bet we look like a happy couple. Not a fake summer fling that is about to be over for good. From an outsider’s perspective, I bet our lives look ideal.

  We spend all day walking around, taking pictures, meeting people, and seeing cosplay contests. Soon my feet are aching from all the walking, and I’m hungry again.

  “I have an idea,” Liam says. “There’s a pizza place right next to my house. Let’s go get a slice.”

  “You live around here?” I ask.

  He nods, his eyes brightening. “Yes, ma’am. Like four blocks down.”

  “But we’re in the middle of the city,” I say, gazing up at the skyscrapers as we step outside. “Does anyone actually live here?”

  He chuckles. “My dad and I live in one of these high-rises.” He points to the left to a white building that stands tall against the Houston skyline. “My dad designed it. It’s all luxury condos.”

  ‘Wow,” I say. “That’s about as opposite as you can get from a life in Roca Springs.”

  “Tell me about it.” He squeezes my hand. “Let’s go.”

  Liam’s building has its own parking garage in the lower levels, and he gets in with an access card on his dash. Even the parking garage is fancy looking. We park in his designated spot and he looks over and grins at me, pointing to the empty parking spot next to him. “My prayers have been answered. My dad isn’t home. He’s never home.”

  “I guess you don’t want me to meet your dad the same way I don’t want you to meet my mom.”

  “It’s not the same,” he says as we get out of the car and he reaches for my hand. “My dad is a prick. I’m not ashamed of you or anything, but I don’t want to do that to you. He’s not exactly friendly. I don’t want you to meet him and think poorly of me.”

  “I know you, Liam. Your dad isn’t going to change my opinion of you.”

  We step into an elevator and Liam presses the button for the fifteenth floor. Then he turns to me, placing his hands lightly on my hips.

  “I missed you so much,” he says softly, right before he kisses me.

  The elevator takes off, making me lightheaded. Or maybe that’s the power of Liam’s kiss. Whatever it is, I wrap my arms
around him and hold on tightly while we ascend to the fifteenth floor. My lips brush against his in a soft but passionate kiss. We’ve done this enough times that we’re pros at it now, but then his tongue flicks across my bottom lip and it sends a shiver running straight down my body. I never get tired of kissing him.

  The elevator slows to a stop and the doors click open, and we’re forced to pull away. Liam gives me a sultry grin as he steps out of the elevator first.

  I blink, my mind taking a second to adjust to the sight around me. I expected a hallway. But I’m standing in Liam’s living room.

  “You live on the whole floor?” I say, my jaw practically hitting the marble flooring.

  “Yep,” he says, tossing his keys into a glass bowl by the elevator. “This is my dad’s domain. I just live in that room over there.”

  The elevator closes behind us and I whirl around to look at it. “But what if someone just walks into your house?”

  He laughs. “You have to have a keycard to gain access to this floor. You must not have been paying attention when I used my card.”

  I blush from head to toe. “Well… no… I was preoccupied with you.”

  He touches my cheek and then plants a quick kiss on my forehead. “You’re so cute when you’re flustered. Come on, I’ll give you the tour.”

  Liam’s home has obviously been decorated by a professional. The place is luxury at its finest, and I feel a little silly for not realizing that he came from so much money. He doesn’t talk about his dad much, besides telling me that he let him ride dirt bikes and that’s why he lived with him after his parents’ divorce. I’ve seen his mom’s house and it’s just a simple small-town home. It’s nothing compared to this place, where one whole wall is made of glass windows that overlook the city of Houston.

  His dad must really be a jerk for her to move away from all of this privilege and choose a small simple life instead. I guess that’s why Liam doesn’t want me to meet him.

  “And here’s my room,” Liam says, finishing up the tour by saving his room for last. “It’s a little better than my room at my mom’s house.”