Fake Halo

by Piper Lennox

  Twenty-Eight

  Wes is not at all the kind of boyfriend I imagined he’d be.

  Okay: the wild sex was a given. In less than forty-eight hours, he’s gotten me reduced to tears twice, made me scream his name four times, and gotten me soaking wet too many times to count. Even picking up the rental car this morning was peppered with smoldering looks from over his sunglasses, and whispered innuendos that had me aching all over.

  But the rest...that’s been nothing but surprises.

  Turns out he is chivalrous, but in a casual way I’m not sure he even has to think about. Holding doors, paying for every meal, and offering me his sweatshirt whenever I hint at being cold: he does it all like it’s engrained, and up until now he’s had to stop himself from doing it.

  Most surprising of all, though, is how he looks at me.

  “Eyes on the road,” I chastise, biting into the Airheads he got me at the gas station near Patchogue, when we stopped to clean about fifty splattered bugs off the windshield.

  “You’re a lot more interesting to look at.” When I blush and roll my eyes, he turns back to the road. “Why do I get the feeling you don’t fully believe any compliment you get? Especially from me?”

  “Maybe because you’ve spent years insulting me?” I joke, mouth cramping from all the sugar. He just glances at me sternly, waiting.

  “Guys don’t usually compliment me.”

  “There’s no damn way that’s true.”

  “Yep. If Georgia’s around me—which, I mean...she almost always is—she’s the one they go for.”

  “I used to think I wanted a twin, when I was a kid. Now I’m relieved. The thought of someone being in your face all day, every day? Pass.”

  “It’s actually not as annoying as you’d think. Other people, yeah, it would get on my nerves—but almost never with her.”

  “Almost never?”

  “Look, I love my sister. Really. This sounds cheesy, but she really is my best friend on this entire planet. But...yeah, sometimes it gets overwhelming. Especially because her personality is the stronger one. Like she’s so...herself, there’s not much room for me to be me.”

  “Have you ever told her that?”

  “No.”

  “Maybe you should.”

  “I’m pretty sure it’s totally unconscious on her part. And besides...this is just how we’ve always been. She’s always been the most popular one. The prettiest one.”

  While I speak, Wes reaches past me and opens the glove box, then shuts it. He digs around in the center console, flips open the sunglasses holder, and even pats himself down.

  “What are you doing?”

  “Looking for a dictionary so you can look up the word ‘identical.’” He laughs and draws back when I swat him. “For real, you guys have the exact same features, Clara.”

  I shake my head. It’s not just how we look or dress. Georgia’s magnetic.

  Maybe I am, in my own ways—but not as much as her. And everyone knows if you put two magnets side by side, the stronger one pulls in more.

  “I’ve always thought you were the prettier one, for what it’s worth.”

  “Do you need a dictionary? You just said we look identical.”

  “I said your features are the same,” he corrects, adjusting his phone in the GPS holder, “but you’re sweeter. Kinder. There’s something about your heart that just...changes everything about you.”

  “Georgia can be very sweet.”

  “Beg to differ. It wasn’t so ‘sweet’ when she slapped me across the face at Comic-Con two years ago.”

  “I slapped you two days ago.”

  Slowly, he smirks. “Yeah, but I deserved that one.”

  “You don’t think cutting in line for that panel when all of us had been waiting for hours was deserving?”

  “I was following my sister. We had VIP passes to avoid the wait and get seats near the front.” He glances at me. “It was some charity thing, through her hospital.”

  The candy tears up my esophagus on the way down. “Oh.”

  “Yeah.” Like a magic act, he casts the hint of sadness aside and laughs. “Why else would I be at Comic-Con? And I never jump lines, by the way. Concert etiquette applies everywhere.”

  More than feeling guilty, I’m amazed. For days now I’ve assumed things were shifting between us because Wes was changing…but he isn’t.

  He was never as bad as I thought in the first place.

  “Do you want me to drive some? I don’t mind.”

  Clara asks this when we stop at a grocery store to stretch. She ran off to buy drinks, and now shoves a red Vitamin Water at me while ignoring the two bucks I try to trade for it.

  I start to tell her it’s not much farther to my cousin’s place, but a sudden burst of squeals stops me.

  “I knew it!” A teenage girl with braces shakes her sister in excitement as they approach. “I told you it was her!”

  “Can we get a photo with you?” the younger one asks. Timidly, she holds up her phone.

  Clara smiles and tells them of course; I take the phone and snap away, filling the girl’s camera roll until someone across the parking lot shouts at them to come back to the car.

  They thank Clara profusely, asking her to tell Georgia hi and gushing about her makeup tutorials as they walk backwards. It’s not until the man shouts for them to hurry up that they stop dragging their feet and actually run back.

  “Sorry,” she says, turning to me again.

  “Don’t apologize. I got stopped back at that gas station,” I remind her. And it definitely wasn’t as easy for her to watch that as this was for me: the women who recognized me were our age...and kind of grabby. I’d let it slide for a few photos, then deftly shook their hands and got back in the car while Clara pretended to be absorbed in her phone.

  My cousins are screaming obscenities at me from a balcony when we pull up to the massive glass-and-stone house around lunchtime. When I climb out, they get louder.

  When Clara climbs out, they shut their mouths.

  “Glad you made it,” Theo says, still panting when he meets us in the foyer. I introduce him to Clara, who shakes his hand shyly.

  “Wes said he was bringing someone,” he tells her, then cuts his eyes at me, “but he didn’t tell me it was a girl. Let alone you.”

  Clara takes a microscopic step back, but I catch it. “Oh...well, we’re—”

  “Theo knows you have a long and justified history of hating me,” I tell her, then duck low when he turns away so I can whisper, “I didn’t tell him about the email and assistant shit, don’t worry.”

  She seems equally relieved to hear this, and amazed that I knew it was worrying her. Theo asks if she’d like a tour.

  “You guys go ahead, I’m gonna take our luggage up.” They’re already in the downstairs den, which Theo’s dad turned into a home theater. I hear Clara sweetly complimenting the décor...and geeking out over the framed anime movie posters adorning the walls.

  Upstairs, I find Van right up against a girl, who’s right up against the wall outside our room.

  I recognize her: Juniper Summers, an influencer best known for yoga videos in weird outdoor places, and detailed accounts of her life in a converted Ford Transit.

  I’d describe her as something between a hipster and hippie. Her Instagram has way too many photos of her own legs stretched out in front of her, doors open to some scenic view, white string lights draped around her bed in that “meticulously arranged to look casual” way influencers do.

  She and Van have bad blood, gallons more than Clara (or even Georgia) and I ever had, so it’s a shock seeing them plastered together…until I realize they’re not making out. They’re arguing.

  I clear my throat, and they pull apart like I threatened to separate them with a hose.

  “Don’t mind me.” I breeze through the doorway. Juniper runs off somewhere, while Van follows close behind and jabs my sides. As soon as I drop the luggage, I spin around and catch him in a h
eadlock.

  “Shit, dude, I give!” His laugh turns into coughing, so I let him go and wait until he’s done with his inhaler before faking him out with another lunge. “Asshole,” he wheezes. “Glad you’re here.”

  “Same.” We slap hands. I jerk my chin at the deserted hallway. “You brought Fairy Lights?”

  “Long story,” he sighs. “You brought Hurley?”

  “Longer story.”

  “New Set posted some photos of you two last night,” he says slowly, like he’s not sure if I’ll shrug this off or get him in a headlock again, punishing the messenger. “You were at a restaurant with your mom.”

  I look up from my open suitcase, a stack of shirts halfway to the bureau drawer. “What’d they say?” Devoting even one brain cell to gossip rags is a hobby I gave up in the internet-free hell of rehab, along with all my other unhealthy habits. But something in his expression makes the question impossible not to ask.

  “They figured you were introducing her to your mom, and that things must be...official, or whatever.” Gently, he kicks my guitar case—until, gently, I give him a look like I’ll murder him if he does it again. “Is it true?”

  “Not really thinking that far ahead. Might just be a good time and a great fuck. We’ll see.”

  Actually, I don’t want to see. The thought of being nothing but a fling to Clara twists every organ I’ve got.

  Van, of course, sees all this spelled out on my unreadable face, because he’s got those same genes. Can’t bullshit a bullshitter. “You’re scared to ask,” he snorts quietly.

  “And this,” Theo announces, leading Clara through the doorway, “is your room. Sorry you have to share with Wes. Feel free to crash in the theater, if he pisses you off.”

  “Thank you for having me,” she tells him, with such a warm smile I want both my cousins gone so I can have it all to myself.

  “You’re Van Andreas,” Clara blurts suddenly, when she turns and sees Van on our bed. I’m itching to kick him out and throw her in. “Oh, my God, I didn’t even realize!”

  When she shakes his hand, he flashes her a smile I’m tempted to knock off his face. There’s nothing to worry about—not only is Clara not his type, but the fact I brought her makes her off-limits, and I know he’d respect that. But still. I know what his smile does to girls.

  “Official name,” I interrupt, putting my arm around her waist, “Sullivan Durham-Andresco.”

  “Van is fine,” he tells her, while giving me the middle finger.

  “Westcott doesn’t have much room to talk,” she whispers loudly, and the guys crack up, announcing that they like this one.

  Theo and I head down to his dad’s wine cellar; Van and Clara talk shop all the way downstairs and out to the pool.

  “Didn’t think your girl would be into skaters.”

  I shove Theo down the last two steps. Unsatisfying: he fully anticipated it, rights himself way too easily, and laughs when I tell him to shut up and just pick a fucking wine.

  Twenty-Nine

  “You’re sure you don’t want to get in?”

  Wes knows to whisper this to me, since I got the same question from Van, Theo, and several of Theo’s friends, all locals with gorgeous tans and gorgeous teeth. And even more gorgeous hair.

  “I’m good for now.” My feet swish back and forth through the warm water of the pool, while the rest of the group roughhouses near the infinity edge overlooking the bay. “But you should go back to them. Don’t feel like you have to swim near me all night.”

  Especially since I’m not your girlfriend yet, I think, and might never be.

  I might be nothing but a good time and a great fuck.

  We’ll see.

  When Wes’s words hit me on the stairs during his cousin’s tour, I wasn’t sure what hurt worse—realizing I was dumb enough to consider Wes my boyfriend when, clearly, he wasn’t in the same place as me...or that Theo visibly cringed and looked at me with so much pity, I could have made it back to Brooklyn on foot, fueled by nothing but my own embarrassment.

  Luckily, I’ve had way too much practice in overhearing what people really think of me, and promptly ignoring it. Whether it’s a comment about my makeup or how strange my hair looks some days, I’ve got a reflexive smile and amazing ability to power through. Which I did.

  Which I’ve been doing, for hours, even though I can’t stop hearing it in my head.

  It helped that Theo whispered, “Wes is an asshole,” before we finished our trek up to the room.

  Well: it helped my resolve, getting some solidarity from someone. It didn’t help the rest of me.

  You’re being ridiculous, I tell myself now, as Wes covers my hand with his on the dampened bluestone coping. In the twilight and tiki torch glows, his smile looks even brighter and the scent of him hits me harder than usual, and I remind myself he isn’t the jerk I thought.

  Maybe he’s just guarding his heart. But at least now, I know he’s got one.

  “You need more wine.” Wes swims the length of the pool and snatches a bottle from the cupholder of Van’s float. He doesn’t notice, half-asleep in the moonlight with mumble-rap blasting from the portable speaker on his stomach. A local girl, also half-asleep, is resting on his legs while the rest of her stretches into the water like ivy tendrils.

  “We should wake them,” I tell Wes when he swims back and hands me the wine. I take a long, long drink before handing it back. “They could go under and drown.”

  “Yeah, we’ll drag them out soon.” He skims his hand across the water to splash Van, who barely reacts, then shoves the bottle at me. “Drink.”

  “I already did.”

  “Drink more.” His fingers close mine around the neck of the bottle before he lies back, floating on the surface with his eyes shut. “Drink until you’re comfortable getting in here with me.”

  Biting my lip, I look around the massive deck. Theo and a few people are inside playing video games; two girls are sleeping on some inset stone benches that give my neck a crick just looking at them.

  The only fully conscious people out here are Wes, myself, and two guys far more interested in their ice bong in the far corner than whatever we’re doing.

  I undress down to my underwear. It’s a black bralette and matching panties, but could pass for a bathing suit in this scarce lighting.

  “No splashing,” I tell him, slipping in. “And don’t make me go under.”

  “I won’t. I just want you in here with me.” Through the glowing blue-green water, his hands find my waist and draw me close.

  His wet skin makes me hungry for him again, all worries dissolved in the warm water and chilled wine. I press my lips to a rivulet running behind his ear and thank him for inviting me. “You were right. It’s wonderful out here.”

  “I’ll take you around tomorrow, show you the shops at Sag Harbor. You’ll love it. And I’ll hate it.” With the torches burned out, there’s only moonlight and the pool glow left to illuminate his smile. It’s more than enough. “But I’ll love watching you.”

  We stay in the water like this, floating and weightless and kissing each other’s damp necks and chests until the hunger’s too much.

  Wes helps me out and wraps me in the largest towel I’ve ever seen, so thick it feels like a blanket. I press it to my nose and love its scent: suntan lotion, like Santa Barbara, still surviving under all that bleach.

  “Van,” Wes hisses.

  The girl on his legs wakes and looks at us. We pantomime flipping motions until she gets it.

  The last thing we hear on our way inside is a chorus of splashes, laughter, and Van’s sputtery curses after she tips him off his float into the pool.

  The crowd in the living room sleepily begs us to stay and hang out. I’m tempted; they’re loud, fun, and covered in details I’d love to sketch from the corner, like the girl with a tree tattoo that crawls all the way from her ankle to underneath her shorts, or the boy wearing nothing but Kenzo, from his shoes to his hat and everything in betwe
en, save for a hemp bracelet of shark teeth on his wrist. Combined with the backdrop of, for whatever reason, a sprawling shelf filled with animal skulls on the far wall, the scene before me is an art goldmine.

  But before I can give in to the call of this new group, Wes tugs my hand and tells them, “No, thanks—we’re pretty tired,” before whispering against my ear, “I’m keeping you up all night.”

  “Isn’t that my job?” I muse on the stairs. His laugh is as soothing as the bathwater embrace of the pool.

  He asks if he can shower with me. Even knowing he’s seen me without my hat and makeup already, my nerves knot themselves up as he steps into the glass-tiled space and joins me.

  “Here,” he says, voice dripping down the walls, and takes the body wash from me to pour into his palm. It’s warm by the time he glides it across my skin, slowly lathering it up across every inch of me.

  My shoulders lean against the wall; his hands slip down to cup my ass. A finger makes it way to the center—running up and down across my sensitive opening until I think my thighs will give.

  “Anyone ever touched you there?”

  Water streams down my face, caught on my lips as I tell him no.

  “Do you like me doing this?”

  I shut my eyes. Nod.

  “I can do more.”

  The feeling of that single digit entering my ass terrifies and thrills me, both emotions so strong I cling to his shoulders to stop myself from doing something: pulling away, begging him to go deeper—I don’t know which.

  He gently wiggles his finger inside me. “I could come inside there, tonight.”

  Good God, I want him to. I want him to finish everywhere on me and inside me until not a single inch of me doesn’t know what it feels like.

  “Not actual anal sex,” he goes on, perhaps feeling me tense up at the thought, exciting as it is. “Maybe we’ll work up to that. But for tonight...we can do this. Me fingering your ass while I fuck your pussy. Then I’ll pull out and press it here when I finish.” He shuts his eyes, seeming to bask in the shudder his words draw from me. “You like that plan?”