Sunkissed

by Kasie West

  My brain frantically tried to figure out how I could still perform at the festival. If I had been thinking more clearly out there, I wouldn’t have lost my temper. I would’ve tried to apologize with the hopes that they’d soften and let me sing in two weeks.

  I took in several deep breaths as I stared into the blackness above me.

  “You really made it?” Lauren asked, her voice barely above a whisper.

  “Yes.”

  “I…That’s good.”

  “Yeah.” Several more quiet minutes passed. “You really have six thousand followers?”

  “Yes.”

  “That’s impressive.”

  “Yeah.”

  At some point after that, without another word between us, I fell asleep.

  * * *

  The next morning at the breakfast table was somber. Mom and Dad sat on one side, Lauren and I on the other. The light from the front window of our cabin cast a perfect square of yellow on the untouched fruit and Danishes between us.

  Dad placed his clasped hands onto the table and looked at me. “We’re not sure what’s gotten into you, Avery. This is very unlike you.”

  “I know,” I said. “I shouldn’t have lied.”

  “Well, your mother and I have discussed this,” he said. “And we think the proper punishment for you is a week of grounding. And you obviously can’t see this boy again.”

  Panic gripped my chest, but I tried to keep it at bay. We only had two weeks until the festival. I couldn’t be grounded for one whole week of that. We had an entire song to write. “Okay,” I said. Fighting them right now would be pointless. I had to show them I was sorry first, humble, let everyone calm down. Then maybe I’d be able to change their minds.

  “What?” Lauren said. “No! She made the festival. You have to let her sing in it!”

  I squeezed my sister’s knee. “It’s fine, Lauren. They’re right, I messed up.”

  “And if we do catch you together again,” Mom said, “we’ll report him to Janelle.”

  I took in a deep, shaky breath. “Okay.” I could tell they were done and it made me sad. I’d thought maybe my dad would apologize for what he’d said about me to that couple at the beginning of the summer. That maybe he’d say, I’m sad that you lied but I’m proud that you sang. But he didn’t.

  “For the record,” I said, “I think you’d like Brooks. He’s a really nice guy. And maybe if you met him, you’d see that.” Really, Avery? You couldn’t hold it in for one more second?

  “A really nice guy doesn’t need to sneak around with a girl,” Mom said.

  “I agree,” Dad said. “We’re beyond disappointed in you, Avery.”

  I stood abruptly, my chair scraping the tile in a loud whine. Once in my room, I tried to calm my emotions but that seemed to only make them worse, so after three times pacing the small aisle between our beds, I threw myself on my pillow face-first and cried.

  Several minutes passed before the door creaked open and then shut. My mattress shifted as someone sat down next to me.

  “Avery.” It was Lauren.

  “Leave me alone, Lauren.”

  She started scratching my back softly. “I’m so sorry. I was just mad and hurt and I didn’t know all this would happen.”

  I sniffled as more tears came.

  “So you actually cry like the rest of us.”

  “If you record this, I swear…”

  She laughed a little at my obvious joke but then sniffled herself. “Do you really hate me?”

  “No.”

  “I don’t hate you either.”

  “I know,” I said; then I sat up and wiped at my eyes. She wiped hers as well. “You don’t think they’ll tell Janelle, do you? Brooks needs this place, this job. He has so much guilt inside him and he’ll think this is the universe punishing him for having dreams.”

  Lauren’s eyes shot back and forth between mine. “Oh, you’re in love with him. I didn’t realize that.”

  “I’m not in love with him. I’ve known him for like five weeks.”

  She gave an exaggerated sigh. “Excuse me. You like him very much.”

  I pressed my right thumb into my left palm. “Yes.”

  A little smile snuck onto her face. “My sister the no-drama queen likes the unpredictable rocker.”

  “Your sister has never been so full of dramatic angst.”

  She laughed. “You’ll figure something out, Avery. You always get the parents on your side.”

  “That’s because my side has always been their side! Until now…”

  “Oh…I guess you’re right. That sucks. Oh, and by the way, I’m grounded too.”

  “What? Why?”

  “I guess Dad analyzed what you said last night and decided I’d been lying too.”

  That’s what my dad took from what I’d said the night before? The least helpful part? “I’m sorry.”

  She shrugged. “It’s fine.”

  “Did they tell you what a grounding on vacation consisted of?”

  “They said we got the lovely privilege of staying here the rest of the day to think long and hard about our actions. Then for the rest of the week, we get to do every single activity as a family.”

  “Ugh,” I said. So both Lauren and I were on house arrest for twenty-four hours and on guarded watch for a week, and I had no way to tell Brooks what was going on.

  “Yeah. They’re good at punishments.”

  “Welcome to my epic adventure.”

  * * *

  “I can’t live like this,” I whined, lying in my bed, staring at the ceiling. My sister hadn’t been joking when she’d told me our punishment. We had done everything as a family going on forty-eight hours now. I loved my family, but this was way too much.

  The day before at the lake, I’d been able to sneak a letter to Maricela for Brooks. The letter spelled out everything that had happened since I last saw him and told him I’d try my hardest to still make the festival, but this time I needed to do it with my parents’ permission and I wasn’t sure I could get that. Cross your fingers for me was how I’d finished the letter, then signed my name. I thought about adding a little heart after my name, but I hesitated and ended up clicking the pen closed, leaving my letter heartless.

  “You’re being so dramatic,” Lauren said from her bed, repeating the words I was sure I’d said to her dozens of times in our lives.

  “I know! I’m so bad at being grounded. How do you do this all the time?”

  “Wait, is this your first time? How had I not realized that before now?”

  “I’m going to die of boredom,” I groaned.

  She threw her pillow at me and I laughed.

  She flipped onto her stomach. “Tell me about the auditions. Were you scared?”

  “Terrified.”

  “So is this it? Your passion? Your life’s purpose or whatever it is you’ve been after all summer?”

  I thought about that question as I watched the ceiling fan go around and around above us. “I don’t know. Maybe? I barfed afterward, so not sure my body agrees with me.”

  “Lots of people get nervous stomach.”

  “Like who?”

  “I don’t have a list or anything, but I’ve heard it happens. Maybe it will get better the more you do it.”

  “Yeah, I definitely need to do it more to see if it’s something I’m good at.”

  “But you obviously did well. I mean, you made it.”

  “Yeah…we did well. And honestly, aside from the barfing, it felt good.”

  “I’m happy for you.”

  There was a tap at our bedroom window and fear gripped my heart. I looked at Lauren.

  “Don’t look at me, lover girl. That’s for you.”

  “Is he trying to get fired?” I moved the c
urtain aside. Brooks stood there, just like I’d both dreaded and hoped for.

  “I’ll go turn on the shower in the bathroom and if the parents ask, I’ll say you’re in there. You have twenty minutes. Tops.”

  Would that work? That would work! “Thank you so much,” I said to Lauren, then opened the window. There was a screen that I popped out and let fall to the ground outside. Then with very little grace, I tried to step over the nightstand to the windowsill.

  “Don’t be dumb,” Lauren said. “You have to step on the nightstand first. Here, let me move the lamp.”

  But I was already climbing and the nightstand was tipping and Lauren let out a squeal as she held me up from behind. Then we both stared at the closed door for a long moment. Nobody came.

  “Hurry,” she said.

  I finished my climb out the window.

  She leaned her head out. “Stay close.”

  I nodded and she moved the curtain back into place. I turned around and faced Brooks.

  “Hey,” Brooks said.

  “Hi,” I said back.

  An awkward tension hung in the air. I hadn’t talked to him since we’d kissed. Did he regret that or was this tension from the letter? From the fact that I was single-handedly crushing his dreams?

  My parents’ window was on the complete opposite side of the cabin, so I wasn’t too worried, but I pointed to a group of trees about ten feet away from the house and lit pathways. He nodded and we made our way there.

  Once protected by the foliage, I nervously played with my hands.

  From somewhere nearby, a frog croaked a low deep song over and over. Finally, Brooks said, “Avery, are we good?”

  My breath hitched. “I think so. Are you not good?”

  “No, I’m good. I was just worried about you after reading the letter.”

  “I’m so sorry.”

  He immediately started shaking his head. “No, it’s fine. I understand. I didn’t want you to get in trouble over something you were doing for me. That’s never what I intended.”

  I reached out and took his hand. “I know. I hope that by the end of the week they’ll have softened a bit.”

  “What do you think the odds are of them coming around? That you’ll get to sing in the festival?”

  “I don’t know.” My eyes found a mushroom growing out of a crack in the tree bark. “It doesn’t seem likely right now. But I’m hopeful.”

  His jaw tightened.

  “I know, I know. Hope is a four-letter word.”

  “I’ll try to find it somewhere deep in my black heart.”

  I smiled. “Did you tell Kai and Levi about making the festival? What did they say?”

  “They were surprised. Asked if we needed two more band members.”

  “They did?”

  “Yeah.” He bit his lip. “What do you think?”

  The request surprised me. “Oh. Is that even a possibility? We’re allowed to add them?”

  “Yes, the rules are pretty loose about band members, actually.”

  “Yeah, I mean, I don’t care. That’s fine with me. You guys are the originals anyway.”

  “Thanks, Avery. I didn’t want to have to tell them no,” he said. “So…do your parents hate me?”

  “What?” He was worried about that? “No, they don’t even know you. It’s this festival thing, the lying, it’s all just an initial impression.”

  “Aren’t those the ones that matter?”

  “That’s what they say, isn’t it? But I honestly don’t think so. Initial impressions are stupid. Superficial. If people really cared, they’d want to know more than their first thoughts about a person.” I hoped my parents would give Brooks a chance.

  “But isn’t that the point?” Brooks said. “People don’t care. Or they’re always trying to decide if they’re going to care. Hence initial impressions.”

  I took a tiny step closer. “What was your very first opinion of me in the theater, in that staff shirt?”

  His face, which had been nothing but worried since I crawled out the window, softened into a smile. “We are not going there.”

  “So it was bad,” I said, putting my hand on his chest.

  “No. Not at all. I was excited that you’d be around all summer, let’s just say that.” He covered my hand with his. “And what was yours of me?”

  “I thought you had a magic smile.”

  “A magic smile?” He offered it to me now.

  “Yes, that one. I also thought you were very confident and way too pretty for me.”

  “It’s the hair, isn’t it?”

  “Trust me, it’s the face.”

  “Well I like your face too.”

  I smiled and we fell into silence again. His thumb began making small circles over the back of my hand.

  I reached out with my free hand and let it travel from his shoulder to his neck.

  He closed his eyes. His lashes were dark and long; his mouth was relaxed, making his lips look soft. I inched forward until our noses touched.

  “Brooks,” I whispered.

  “Yes?”

  “You’re pretty cool.”

  He chuckled a little and I closed the space between us and kissed him.

  He responded, pulling me close. His body felt warm as the air around us became colder. His hands moved from my shoulders, then down my arms and back again.

  “When can I see you again?” he asked, pushing his forehead against mine.

  “It’s probably best we keep our distance until I’m done being grounded.”

  He let out a small groan but nodded.

  Then we both heard a distinct whistle back by the cabin.

  “I have to go,” I said.

  “Wait.” He reached into his back pocket and pulled out a piece of paper that had been folded in fourths. “I started on the second song. Think you can look it over and add another verse?”

  “Of course.” I pushed myself up on my tiptoes and kissed him one last time before I ran back to the window where my sister was waiting. I climbed inside, gripping the paper to my chest, and fell on my bed with a happy sigh.

  “So dramatic,” Lauren said, replacing the screen and closing the window.

  I laughed, then sat up and unfolded the page. The lyrics were written in his messy way—words crossed out, or underlined, or squeezed in as an afterthought—but that only made my smile bigger as I read through them.

  Sometimes the stars align.

  Sometimes the path seems moved for you.

  Sometimes it’s just in time.

  Exactly when hope was almost through.

  And sometimes is all I need

  And more than I deserved

  So I read into every sign

  Because sometimes, yes this time, sometimes brought me you.

  I took a sip of air. My boy who normally wrote soul-sucking lyrics wrote a love song? I read over the words again. Did he write our love song? Already a second verse about my side of the story was starting to take shape in my head.

  Sometimes the moon goes dark

  And the path ahead unclear.

  “I need a pen,” I said, scrambling to the nightstand and searching the top drawer before the words slipped away. “Give me a pen.”

  “Chill,” Lauren said. “Here.” She reached into her laptop case and threw one onto my bed. And I began adding my neatly written lyrics beneath Brooks’s messy ones.

  The rest of the week went by painstakingly slow. Every day we did a different activity with my parents—minigolf and tennis and crafts. We even left camp and went to some hot springs one day. And every night, I worked on the second verse of lyrics or the arguments I’d make to my parents at the end of our grounding about why I should sing in the festival.

  By the time the week was up, I felt anx
ious. I hadn’t seen Brooks in days, not even in passing, and began to make up stories in my head that he was somehow discovered and fired.

  “Hey,” I said to my sister. I was lying in bed and had just read over my festival arguments again.

  She looked over the top of her laptop. “What?”

  “Do you have some footage of Brooks?”

  “What?”

  “From practices. I just wondered if you ever got an actual interview with him.”

  “Are you going through withdrawals? You need a Brooks fix?”

  “Yes.” I didn’t even try to deny it.

  She patted the bed next to her and I rolled off my bed and onto hers.

  She exited the window she had up and opened another.

  “What were you working on?” I asked, pointing at the screen where the other window had been.

  “Oh, nothing, just a project. Let’s see, Brooks, the unhelpful guitarist.” She proceeded to show me several clips of him not answering her questions. His teasing eyes made me happy.

  I tapped a video thumbnail. “What’s this one?”

  She opened the clip. Brooks was sitting on the edge of the stage staring down, as if he didn’t love the camera but was willing to talk to his hands.

  “Music has gotten me through everything,” he said. “It’s been my best friend when I felt like I had no one.”

  My heart ached for him and how alone he’d felt over the years.

  Kai’s head popped over Brooks’s left shoulder and he gave a funny growl, his tongue sticking out.

  “Kai,” Lauren said off-camera. “You got your turn. Go practice or something.”

  Kai walked away, but the moment was gone. Brooks moved to a squat and then stood. “I should go practice too.”

  “Are you going to cut out the part where Kai interrupts for the documentary or keep it in?” I asked.

  “What do you mean?” Lauren said, closing that video and scanning the screen, probably to see if there were any others of Brooks. “I’m not doing this documentary anymore.”