“Oh. Um, okay.” The pancakes immediately turn to stone in my stomach. Why do we have to talk about what happened last night? That definitely can’t be good. What can really be said about it, anyway? That it was fun? That it was nice? That he doesn’t want me to think it means anything? Because those are things that don’t really need to be said.
Oh god. Maybe he’s going to tell me something even worse than that. Like that I’m really bad at sex. Am I horrible in bed? How does one even fix that? Can you learn to be good at sex, or is it just a natural talent?
Maybe I’ll just have to become a virgin again. Then I can say I’m saving myself for marriage, and whatever guy I end up with won’t have to know I don’t know what I’m doing until it’s too late. Of course, it won’t technically be true, the whole saving-myself-for-marriage thing, since I’ve already had sex with Abram, but still. I can become one of those born-again virgins.
I saw a show about that once—these three girls were all, like, forty or something and they lived in a house together and they were all waiting to have sex until they were married. And one of them was a born-again virgin. She’d had sex with a bunch of guys when she was younger, and then she decided not to do that anymore until she got married. Is that what I should do? Have a bunch more sex before I decide to become born-again?
But isn’t that kind of . . . dangerous? It sounds like a surefire way to end up with an STD. Oh my god. Does Abram have an STD? We used a condom, but still. Those things aren’t one hundred percent.
Abram takes a deep breath and sets his container of pancakes down on the rocks next to him. I immediately take it as a bad sign. Why does he have to set his pancakes down? You only set your food down in the middle of eating it if you have something really serious to say.
“I just want you to know that I don’t do that all the time,” he says.
“Do what?”
“Take girls back to my house.”
I look at him incredulously. “You’ve never taken a girl back to your house before?” Seriously? Does he really expect me to believe that? There’s no way. I saw the way he was on the beach yesterday, handing out those flyers, the way girls were responding to him, looking at him like they wanted to jump on him right there.
“No, I didn’t say that.” He grins at me, but I look away.
“Look,” I say. “If this is the part where you try to make me feel better about sleeping with you, you can save it.”
“No!” He shakes his head. “Wow, I’m really screwing this up.” He takes another deep breath and then turns and looks at me. “Yes, I have hooked up with girls I’ve met on the beach before, or in the club. But what happened last night, that was . . . I just want you to know I don’t do that all the time.” He’s looking at me, his eyes serious, like he wants me to know last night meant something to him. Longing fills my body. I want to believe him so badly. But how can I? Of course he’s going to say he doesn’t do that all the time, if only because he knows it’ll make it easier to sleep with me again. I feel like he’s expecting me to say something, but I don’t know what to say that won’t make me sound completely crazy.
“Okay,” I say finally. “Well, thanks for telling me that.”
“You’re welcome,” he says, and a brief look of disappointment crosses his face, and then there’s a bit of an awkward moment between us, and I wish I could go back and say what happened last night was special to me, too, but before I can, he picks up his pancakes and starts eating.
I do the same. “So you’ve lived here your whole life?” I ask, in an effort to gloss over the weirdness.
“Yup,” he says. “Born and raised. Same house and everything.”
“You’ve lived in the same house your whole life?”
“Yeah.”
“Wow. My mom would never allow that. She loves to move.”
“Really? So you’ve gone to a bunch of different schools?”
I shake my head. “No, we always stay in the same town. She likes the school district. But she loves to move all around, looking for the best houses. She’s kind of a snob.” As soon as the words are out of my mouth, I regret them. Sitting here with a perfect stranger, telling him my mom’s a snob, seems like a breach of trust. I’ve never called my mom a snob before, to anyone. So to call her that to a guy I don’t even know seems really unfair.
“Is that why you were so concerned about coming off as snobby last night?”
My heart does a double beat. Coming off as snobby last night? Did he think I was inhibited while we were hooking up? But then I remember telling him at the restaurant that I probably sounded like a snob since I was complaining so much about not getting into Stanford. “Yeah, maybe,” I say. I dip my toes farther into the ocean. The sun is rising higher in the sky, and I turn my face toward it, not caring that I’m not wearing any sunscreen, not caring that I might get a little bit of a burn. It feels good, and so I’m going with it. “I shouldn’t put it all on my mom, though. I mean, she’s set up all these expectations for me, but I’m the one who bought into the whole thing.”
“What kind of expectations?”
“Mostly school stuff,” I say. “Stanford.”
“But you didn’t get in.”
I shake my head. “No.”
“So what will you do?”
I shrug. “Go to Yale, maybe. Or Georgetown.”
Abram gapes at me. “You got into Yale and Georgetown?”
“Yeah.” Suddenly, I’m embarrassed. I don’t like it when people make a big deal about where I’m going to school or how smart I am. You’d think I’d be used to it by now—it’s been happening since I was in kindergarten. But it makes me uncomfortable.
“That’s insane,” he says. “That’s amazing.” He shakes his head. “You must be so happy.”
“Yeah,” I say. “I am.” But now I’m embarrassed for another reason—the truth is, I’m not happy about Yale or Georgetown. I’m just upset about Stanford. Talk about the glass being half-empty. “Actually,” I say, “that’s a lie. I’m not happy about it.”
“You don’t want to go to school at either of those places?”
“I wanted to go to Stanford,” I say. “At least, I thought I did.” I shake my head. “Now I’m just . . . confused.”
“It’s okay to be confused,” he says simply, like he doesn’t care about the fact that I didn’t get into the school I wanted, that I’m sitting here next to him complaining about having to choose between two great schools. “But if you didn’t get into Stanford, it probably happened for a reason.”
“You think?”
“Yeah.” He grins. “I think everything happens for a reason.” He turns to look at me, his eyes locking on mine. “Like how you were on the beach yesterday at the exact moment I was.”
I grin. “Oh, yeah,” I say. “And what was the reason that happened?”
He grins back. “So we could be here, right now, together.” He kisses me softly on the lips.
“Talking about what a snob I am?”
“I don’t think you’re a snob at all.”
“Thanks,” I say. I don’t know why, but it means something to hear him say that. He’s just so easy to talk to, so nonjudgmental, such a good listener. I can tell he’s not the type of person to say something just because he knows you want to hear it—so when he tells me he doesn’t think I’m a snob, I believe him.
I’m done with my pancakes and bacon, and all that’s left in my container is fruit salad. I fork up a strawberry and eat it.
Abram’s food is completely gone, and he takes his fork and sticks it into my fruit salad, spearing a piece of pineapple.
“You really don’t care about taking other people’s food, do you?” I ask.
He grins and pops the pineapple into his mouth. “Hey, I left you the good stuff,” he says. “I took the pineapple. Everyone knows that’s the worst part of a fruit salad.”
“What if I love pineapple?” I ask. “What if pineapple is my very favorite fruit in the whole
entire world and you’ve just deprived me of it?”
“Oh, I’m sorry,” he says, pretending to be apologetic. “I didn’t mean to deprive you.” He spears another piece of pineapple and holds it out to me, and I lean down and eat it off his fork.
“Yum,” I say. “Pineapple. Best fruit ever.”
He laughs and shakes his head, then brushes his thumb against my lower lip. His eyes are on mine, and a breeze blows through the palm trees, ruffling the leaves. “Pineapple juice,” he explains.
“Thanks,” I say softly.
But he doesn’t move his thumb away. It stays there, brushing against my lip for a moment, before his whole hand moves to my chin and pulls me toward him. His mouth is on mine, soft and sweet, different than it was last night. Last night our kisses were hungry, like we were both trying to prove something, like we were both trying to lose ourselves in each other or at least in what we were doing.
But today his kiss feels softer, more searching. Kissing him last night left me breathless and frenzied—kissing him today is more of a slow, steady burn.
After a few minutes, he pulls back and looks at me.
“Hi,” he says, smiling.
“Hi.”
He leans back on the rock and looks at me. “So what do you want to do today?”
“Today?”
“Yeah. What should we do?”
“I don’t know.” I wasn’t planning on hanging out with him today. I wasn’t planning on any of this.
“Are you up for something fun?” he asks.
“Um, duh. Always,” I say. It’s meant to be sarcastic, but then I realize he doesn’t know me that well. All he knows about me is that I had sex with him last night, that I met him on the beach and then went home with him, that I ditched my friends to hang out with him, and that I didn’t get into Stanford, which probably means he has no idea that I should have gotten into Stanford, that I’m the kind of girl who works hard and plays by the rules and doesn’t ever do anything that’s even remotely fun.
“Cool,” he says. He starts to pack up the remnants of our breakfast, picking up the empty containers and used silverware and putting them in one of the plastic bags. I marvel again at the ease with which he moves, with the easy way he just asked me to spend the day with him. There was no stressing over it, no wondering what I was going to say, no worrying I was going to turn him down or think he was crazy for suggesting it. Is this how normal people live? Or just him?
We walk back through the cove and out onto the beach, and this time, when we go over the tricky part of the wall, he holds my hand tight.
We make a plan to meet back up on the beach in an hour. As nice as it was being able to wear Abram’s sister’s yoga pants, it’s time for me to change into my own stuff. Abram wouldn’t tell me where we were going—all he said was to wear a bathing suit and clothes that I wouldn’t mind getting wet. So obviously it has something to do with the water. But on a barrier island like Siesta Key, that could mean a million different things.
When I get back to the hotel, no one’s in my room. I breathe a sigh of relief. Not that it would have really mattered—I’m only going to be here for a few minutes, just long enough to change. But still. I want to limit my interactions with Lyla and Aven as much as possible.
I brush my hair until it shines, then quickly go over it with the straightening iron, flipping it up at the ends so it falls in beachy waves. It will probably get completely wrecked once I’m in the water, but hopefully it’ll last at least until I’m on the beach. I add a quick slick of pink gloss to my lips and a swipe of bronzer to my cheeks. It’s a lot different from the smoky eye I was wearing last night, but I’m hoping Abram can appreciate my more casual look.
I’m just about to head back out when my phone buzzes with a text.
Paige.
COME DOWN HERE IMMEDIATELY
Wow. Demanding, much?
I text back, What?
Come down to our room.
I hesitate. I don’t really want to go down to their room. They’re going to be asking me tons of questions about last night. Do they know I never came home? Did they come to my room and look for me? Were they really going to call the police? How angry are they that I never texted them?
I wonder if I can get away with pretending I’m not here, that I’m still out at Abram’s.
But a second later, my phone buzzes again.
I saw you coming in the lobby, so I know you’re here.
Great. Well, there goes that plan, I guess.
Whatever. It’s not the end of the world to go down and check in with Celia and Paige. Actually, it will probably be good for them to see that I haven’t been chopped up into a million pieces, that I’m totally okay and happy. That way when I tell them I’m going to be spending the day with Abram, they won’t give me crap for it.
But when I knock on the door to Celia and Paige’s room, they’re not in good moods.
“Where the hell have you been?” Paige accuses as soon as she opens the door. Her hair is pulled back in a ponytail, and she obviously just woke up, because she’s wearing her glasses.
“Good afternoon to you, too, Paige,” I say brightly.
“Do you know how worried we’ve been about you?” she asks. “We thought you were dead!”
“Why would you think I was dead?” I ask, as she moves aside and lets me walk by her into the room. “You knew I was with Abram.”
This seems to throw her a little bit, and she shakes her head. “Yeah, but you never came back last night.”
“Why are you giving me such a hard time?” I ask. “You guys ditch me all the time.”
Paige’s eyes bug out of her head. “We do not!”
“Yes, you do.”
“No, we don’t.”
“Yes, you do.” The thing at Bronx’s birthday party where Celia left me was just the latest incident. They both abandon me constantly—at parties, at school, on random Saturday nights when one of them decides they want to go home with some guy or hang out with some guy instead of all of us hanging out as a group.
It’s annoying that Paige is giving me crap for something the two of them do on a regular basis. But whatever. I’m in too good of a mood for her to bring me down. Plus, I want to get out of here before it starts getting late.
Paige throws her hands up in the air and then shakes her head, like I’m the one who’s being ridiculous. “Look, just forget it, okay? You’re going to be around today, right? Because I need help.”
She turns away, and that’s when I see Celia, lying in bed. She’s got one of those eye masks over her eyes to block out the sunlight that’s streaming through the window, and there’s a washcloth on her head. “Stop talking so loud,” she grumbles. “Seriously, you guys are, like, screaming. It’s too early for that.”
“It’s not too early,” I say, sighing. “You’re just too hungover.”
“It’s not my fault,” she moans. “Those guys last night, they kept buying us drinks.” She says it like she was a completely innocent party in the whole thing, like she hadn’t specifically gone over to them with the intent of getting them to buy her as many drinks as possible. I saw those guys—they were harmless. They didn’t seem like the type to ply innocent girls with alcohol in an effort to get them wasted. They seemed nice, and they probably kept buying drinks because Celia and Paige had somehow convinced them that Celia could hold her liquor.
“You didn’t have to drink them,” I say. I walk over to the bed and sit down next to her.
She lifts up her eye mask and blinks in the sun. Her eyes are a little watery, but they’re not bloodshot or anything, and her pupils and focus seem fine. However bad she feels right now, there’s no reason to think there’s anything really wrong with her. She probably just needs to sleep it off and get rehydrated, like she did yesterday.
I reach for the bottle of water that’s sitting on the nightstand and open it.
“Drink,” I command.
Celia takes a tiny sip. “I’m
never going to drink again,” she says. “I promise.” She does the sign of the cross, which makes no sense, since she’s not even Catholic. Maybe she means she crosses her heart, but still.
I sigh. “I’ve heard that one before.”
“No, this time I mean it,” she says. She looks at me hopefully. “Quinn, will you order me a pizza?”
I glance doubtfully at the trash can that’s sitting next to her bed. Obviously it’s been put there for a reason.
“I haven’t thrown up in two hours,” Celia says, catching me looking.
“She hasn’t,” Paige confirms. She flops onto her bed and turns on the TV. “So you can definitely order her pizza. Then after she eats it, maybe she’ll feel okay enough to go to the beach.”
I look at her incredulously as she flips to a Golden Girls rerun. On the screen, Sophia is making fat jokes about Blanche’s daughter. The jokes are tasteless and mean, but Paige laughs and throws her head back. “I just love this show,” she says. She glances at me and Celia. “Promise me we’ll be like that when we get old and our husbands are dead?”
“Of course,” Celia says. She squints at the screen. “But we’ll have a way better house than that. And we’ll be better dressed. No old-lady clothes.” She leans back on the pillows.
I have a moment of panic thinking about the three of us living together as old women. Is that how my life is going to turn out? Am I going to be living with Paige and Celia, in some little house in Miami, taking care of Celia when she gets drunk and tries to flirt with the pool boy? Am I going to be fixing her meals and trying to hide in my room so she doesn’t ask me to order her a pizza? The thought is so horrible I almost want to throw up into the trash can myself.
“Quinn,” Celia moans. She pulls her eye mask back down over her eyes. “Can you please order my pizza now? Not from the place we got it yesterday, it was too greasy.”
“Yeah, and can we get half with just veggies?” Paige pipes up. “I want to limit my meat consumption. I’m feeling a little bloated.”
“Thank you, Quinn, so much,” Celia murmurs, patting my arm. “You’re saving my life.”