by Inda Herwood
“But how do I do that?” I ask her, racking my brain with idea after idea, but none of them seem like enough, not after everything she’s done for me.
“Well you can’t wait outside on her porch like she did. Her father would murder you the second he knew you were there,” Catch says, smirking when I glare at him.
“Why don’t you write her a letter?” Leigha suggests.
“No,” I veto immediately. “I don’t want to copy anything she’s done. That’d just look like I was too lazy to come up with something on my own.”
We all take a few minutes to think about it, but after a while, it’s obvious no one has anything. Leigha drops her head into her hand, saying, “Alright, so we’re not the most romantic bunch. But in the end, it isn’t really about the gesture. It’s about being sincere and honest with her. That’s all girls ever really want. Just tell her how you feel, that you screwed up, and that you hope she can forgive you. One, two, three.”
“Easy peasy,” Catcher agrees, pretending he has any idea about what she’s talking about. The longest relationship my brother has ever been in lasted a week, and that was in third grade. “You have to do it like ripping off a Band-Aid. It’s gonna hurt at first, but then – hey, where are you going?”
Halfway out the door, I tell them, “The second you start throwing out metaphors is the second I know your helpfulness has lapsed.”
“You’re welcome by the way!” Leigha calls to me after I shut the door, a grumbled “Jackass” following after it.
I chuckle to myself.
Blaire
The night before the wedding, everyone decides to go to bed early, knowing it’s going to be a long day tomorrow; leaving the house eerily quiet for the first time in almost a month. I sit in my window seat, enjoying the silence and the moon in full measure, remembering the look on Nana’s face today when she tried on her dress, as if she was a giddy, twenty-year-old bride again. It’s hard to believe that in the course of a week, my nana will be a newlywed, I’ll be a senior in high school, and we’ll have spent a whole summer in the Hamptons. It’s crazy how much change can happen in such a short amount of time.
Thinking about how one other major thing has changed, my eyes linger over to the window on the second floor of the Lyons’ home. I’ve since stopped hoping to see a face staring back at me, wearing a tilted smile and a pair of headphones. But tonight, the customary curtains are no longer closed. There’s a small gap in them, and I could swear I see a pair of eyes looking back.
My phone dings with a text a few seconds later.
Pulling it out of my pocket, I see a familiar number, name, and picture pop up on the screen.
It says only four words.
I read your letter.
My lungs constrict painfully, staring at the text for well over a minute, wondering what I’m supposed to take away from it. I regretted giving him the letter as soon as I saw the blank look in his eyes after I asked him if he ever loved me. That was pretty much all the confirmation I needed to know it was over, and that all the begging in the world wouldn’t change anything.
So what’s the point of his text?
Another ding.
I’m an ass.
I want to be mad at him, but I can still do that and smirk at the same time, right? I’m nodding my head when I reply, Yes, you are.
I’m sorry.
For what? I ask, holding my breath. Is he sorry for not listening to me? Sorry for treating me like a stranger on the porch? If it’s really over, what would apologizing do now?
Would you be willing to talk with me? Face to face? I have some things I want to say.
I tap my finger on the side of my phone as I read the text over for a third time, weighing his request. Perhaps he’s looking for closure, and that’s what this is all about. Leigha told me that he got his interview with NYU, and with his academic and extracurricular background I’m sure he’ll get in. He probably just wants to tie up loose ends before I go back to school and he leaves for the city after the new year. Truthfully, I’d like the same thing, if only to leave on a good note instead of the one we did last week.
Where?
The beach.
Okay. See you in ten?
Sure.
Nostalgia washes over me as I take the same path down to the foyer as I had the first time I snuck out with him. Only this time there’s no need to fear Nana will catch me, because I can hear her lumberjack snores coming from her room, sound asleep. Grabbing a light hoodie, I slip it on before sneaking out the door, closing it quietly behind me.
Not seeing Beckham in the driveway, I take the walk down to the beach on my own, imagining what it is he wants to say to me. The moon’s bright beam lights the way for me while I think about it, taking me past the dunes and down to the edges of the water. I let the waves wash over my toes and the tops of my feet, sinking further into the wet sand. A cool breeze has me zipping up the front of my jacket, digging my hands in the pockets.
“I wasn’t as smart as you,” I hear Beckham say. Turning to my left, I see him standing a foot away from me, looking cold in his shorts and T-shirt. “I didn’t think to bring a coat.”
“I’m not giving you mine if that’s what you’re playing at.”
“Then you’re not the gentlewoman I thought you were. It’s the age of equality, remember?”
“I’m saving you from embarrassment. That’s gentlewomanly, isn’t it?” I ask him, failing at hiding my smile at our old back and forth banter. It’s like cozying up with your favorite blanket – comfortable and familiar.
“How?”
“Because if you fit in my jacket, I would most definitely laugh at you.”
He nods, flashing a small smile of his own. “Then thank you for saving me from that fate.”
“You’re welcome.”
A long silence descends on us both, staring out at the vastness of the ocean rather than each other. It hurts not to put my hand out and have him take it, like he used to. It became such a natural thing for us that sometimes it would take me a while to realize I had done it. It was like breathing, the easiest thing in the world.
“You said you wanted to talk,” I remind him, burying my toes further in the sand, watching them disappear.
“I did. And I want to start out by saying that I’m sorry for the other day. I should have contradicted you when you said,” he pauses, letting out a breath that sounds pained, “when you said I never really loved you. That isn’t the truth. In fact, it’s the farthest thing from it.”
Turning to me, his eyes dark, even under the moon’s reflection, he explains, “Loving you is the realest thing I’ve ever felt. And I didn’t just stop because of what happened, though I’ll admit I tried. I was angry enough that I wouldn’t even let rational thought in. It was consuming me.”
“And now?” I find myself asking, sucking on my bottom lip out of habit.
“Now I just feel regret,” he says quietly, closing his eyes, and my heart drops all over again.
“You regret us?” My voice breaks, and so does everything else inside me. Or so it feels.
“No, no. Absolutely not. That’s not what I meant,” he says, stepping into my personal space to wrap me in his arms, my face buried in his shirt and his scent, flooding me with memories. “I regret not listening to you when you asked me to. I should have never shut you out like I did. It took me reading your letter to realize that I was holding onto a lot of the things I thought I had let go of when we started dating. But the truth is, they only hid themselves until the right moment, and then they all flooded back to me. I’m so sorry, Blaire.” His face buries itself in my hair, his hands tightening around me. I lift my arms to hold him back, having missed the safety I always felt with his touch. “I should have known that if you kept something from me, it would be for a good reason. And protecting your family is the greatest one. I would have done the same.”
I breathe him in, lips grazing his shirt when I say, “I guess we both did things wrong.�
�
“True,” he chuckles against my ear. “Maybe we can call it even then?”
Pulling away enough to look up into his face, I ask, trailing my fingers over his chin and up the curve of his jaw, “What if this happens again the next time we fight? We can’t keep doing this, Beck.”
“I know. I know,” he says, kissing the side of my temple. “I’ve actually been thinking about that a lot lately, and I figured the best way to stop the pattern is if we promise to be honest at all times with each other. Then we’ll always be on the same page. And when we fight, we make it mandatory that no matter how mad the other one is, we have to talk it out.”
“Do you really think you can do that?” It sounds easy enough, but the memory of his blowing up and stomping away on the beach is still fresh in my mind. “Anger shuts you down faster than I think you realize.”
He nods, biting his lip; that look of regret entering his eyes again. “You’re right. And it’s something my family has pointed out to me about a thousand times since all of this happened. But I came up with a solution for that as well.”
“You’re just a problem fixing machine, aren’t you?” I say with a smirk, watching him take something out of his pocket.
“You better believe it.” He winks, jiggling whatever it is he has in his hand. It sounds metallic. “Want to see what I came up with?”
Far too curious, I nod.
“I’m going to need your hand first,” he says, holding his out to take mine, and I give it to him. “This is a memory bracelet,” he says, hooking the clasp to said bracelet around my wrist, the charms shining under the moonlight. “Every time you look at it, especially when you’re mad at me, I want you to remember what we have, and why we need to protect it.” Lifting my hand, he lays it on his chest, pointing out each charm to me. One is a mini set of headphones. The next is a paintbrush. I laugh when he gets to the jellyfish, and smile when he points out the little boat. All along the bracelet are our memories, and I feel my heart swell with the amount of thought he put into it.
“What about you?” I ask once he’s done explaining it to me, curious what he’s going to do to remember.
“Since bracelets aren’t my jam, I got myself something a little different,” he says with a grin, and out of his opposite pocket comes a ring, flashing gunmetal in his palm. “I had it custom made with your birthstone in it.” Staring down at the ring, I see a small citrine stone placed in the middle of the band, sitting there proudly. It’s beautiful and yet somehow still manly. “You’ll be with me wherever I go, whatever I do. And no matter the circumstances, I will remember us, and how much I love you,” he promises, placing the ring on his index finger. He then takes my hand with the bracelet, giving my wrist a sweet kiss.
It’s the kind of thoughtfulness I would have never expected to receive from him after everything that happened, and it’s a gesture that shows he really is going to put in the effort to move on from the pain of his past and embrace the future – one that I hope he’ll share with me. And from now on, I’ll always be honest with him, because love deserves that kind of respect. And that’s something I’ve realized over the course of this summer, and these last few weeks in particular. Love is patient, and kind, and forgiving, but it isn’t always perfect, and it requires work. But as long as you try and don’t give up, nothing can break it.
“You really came up with everything,” I tell him, wrapping my arms around his neck, standing on my tiptoes to reach. “I have to believe you had some help, though.”
“I may have sought council, but it didn’t get me anywhere,” he says with a snort, surprising me when he grabs me around the middle and lifts me so that my legs are around his waist, my weight supported by his arms. “That’s better.” He smiles, our eyes on the same level now.
“You’re telling me your cousin and brother didn’t have any sage advice for you?” I ask, taking a wild guess on who he’s talking about.
“Sage is definitely not the word I would use,” he says flatly, making me laugh. “And besides, the last thing I want to do right now is talk about my family and their irreversible weirdness.”
“Is that so?” I ask him with a grin, pushing back a curl from his forehead. “And what do you want to do?”
“Kiss you until you forget your name,” he says, right before he does just that.
A little while later as we’re strolling up the beach, catching up on everything we’ve missed in each other’s lives these last few weeks, he says, “I do have one question I’d like answered, though. About the lottery win, that is.”
“Oh?” I ask innocently, having waited for him to ask this question for a while now.
“How much did you win exactly?”
I shrug, liking the tinkling sound my new bracelet makes when I move. “Enough to keep us comfortable for the rest of our lives.”
“That’s a good amount –”
“And my grandchildren’s grandchildren,” I finish.
He comes to a dead stop in the sand, our joined hands pulling me backwards. His face is a mask of shock. I smirk.
“Excuse me?” he says, sounding completely dumbfounded.
“Who’s the gold digger now?” I taunt, laughing when he kicks a bunch of sand at me with his toes in retaliation.
EPILOGUE
Blaire
“Are you ready for this?” I ask Nana on the back patio where we’ve been waiting, keeping an eye out for Beckham with the news that everyone has gone down to the beach before the ceremony starts. She’s been oddly calm for this being her wedding day, glowing in her beautiful ivory gown. It has a fifties style boat neckline with billowy sleeves down to her elbows, the silk dropping to her feet from her waist. She couldn’t look better if she tried, especially with the gorgeous, antique hair broach Mr. Lyons got for her as an engagement present, holding one side of her curls back from her ear. She reminds me of an old Hollywood movie star.
“I’ve been ready for this for a long time,” she tells me, holding my hand in hers. “I just wish everyone would get their asses down there so we could go already. I’m not getting any younger here.”
Only my nana, ladies and gentleman.
“I think we’re all ready,” Beckham says, coming around the corner of the house, looking handsome in his light slacks and white dress shirt. Nana wanted a neutral color scheme for the wedding, matching the beach and the ocean. The guys are in white and beige while Mom and I’s dresses are a pretty light blue, made of chiffon and skirting our toes. Another request of my grandmother’s? No one was to wear shoes. An idea Mr. Lyons wasn’t too psyched about, but he did it anyway – for Nana.
“You’ll escort my maid of honor straight to the beach, right?” she asks him with a trace of dislike in her voice, still on the fence about him even after I told her and my family what we did to make up. She and Beck are starting at square one again, but I have hope that they’ll get to a good place again. Someday.
“Yes, ma’am,” he tells her confidently, giving me a megawatt smile.
“There will be no make out session on the way there, you understand me? We have a timeline to follow.”
“Nana,” I groan, amazed that even on her wedding day she still finds the time to embarrass me.
“Promise,” she says, ignoring me.
“I promise, Ms. Hawkins,” he confirms, hand held over his heart.
“And enough with that Ms. Hawkins business. I’m gonna be your family in a few minutes. Might as well start calling me Nana now. Just like Theodore hopes Blaire will call him Grandfather,” she says, smiling at me with that last part.
“Really?”
“Yep. And talking about family, how does it feel to know you’re dating your step-cousin?” Her evil smile and glinting eyes let me know she’s been planning to drop this joke for a while now, and she finally found her moment.
That little –
Dropping her hand like it’s got radiation on it, I step away from her and over to Beckham, lacing my fingers with his. �
�You just had to go and say it,” I mutter, hearing her chuckle behind me.
“At least it’s just through marriage,” she counters, just as we all hear “Can’t Help Falling In Love” start to play on the beach.
“I think that’s our cue… What are you laughing at?” I hear Mom ask her after she steps out onto the patio, my nana still in stitches.
“So what do you think the odds are?” Beck asks me on our way down the path to the beach, seeing a group of twenty or so people gathered by the shore. Nana didn’t even want an aisle for her wedding, or an arch to stand under. She just wanted everyone to be together as one, no chairs or formalities. It feels a lot less intimidating as we get closer, starting to see some familiar faces in the crowd.
“What are you talking about?”
“I’m talking about your nana flying down here just to make sure I don’t kiss you and throw off her schedule,” he explains, and I chuckle. That would be quintessential Nana.
“I’m praying that she’ll overcome the urge,” I tell him, just as we reach the edge of the circle, people stepping aside for us to get to where elder Mr. Lyons, younger Mr. Lyons, Theo, and Catcher are standing.
I see Leigha off to the side, looking beautiful in her matching blue dress. Nana made her a bridesmaid as well, and I swear the girl actually teared up when she was asked. She gives me a big smile now, a familiar face standing at her side, their pinkies interlocked.
Kaito wears his small, sweet smile, staring down at her.
There’s an interesting story there, but I think it’s one better told for another time.
Still, my heart swells for the both of them.
Once we get to the man of the hour, we part ways, me going left and my boyfriend going right, our hands slowly drifting apart. I stand next to Leigha while Beck stands by his grandfather, also having been chosen as best man; his father and younger brothers right next to him. I smile and wave to the boys, Theo looking precious in his little bow tie and slacks, smiling wide. Hawn, ever the trusty sidekick, wears a matching bow tie collar, his excited tail kicking up sand and spraying anyone within a five-foot radius.
