Later, Costa sits between Sam and me. “This might be paradise, but I wish Toby and Amy and I could come home, back to Watermark. But I can’t exactly show up with my formerly dead son who hasn’t grown at all.”
“I know you miss home,” Sam says. “I have had one idea…”
“What’s that?”
I glance at Sam. I have mixed feelings on this possible plan, but I smile and silently tell him to share his idea. It might be the only solution.
“If you wait a little bit longer, say another eight months until Toby is technically almost two, you might be able to tell people that he’s a second child of yours.” Sam raises a hand. “I know. It sounds crazy, but if he’s older and doesn’t look exactly as he did, you can say he’s a son you didn’t know about until his mother brought him to you because she didn’t want him anymore. Yes, yes, it’s insane. But it might work. You’d obviously have to change his name. Maybe call him by his middle name.”
“A brother could easily look a lot like Toby,” I add.
Costa watches his son laugh as he bends over to lift the ball. “Evan isn’t a bad name,” he says slowly.
“You’d need paperwork, social security number, and such. You will anyway though since Toby Jorden is officially deceased.”
Costa smirks. “I got a guy who can get me what I need.”
“Of course you do,” Sam says with a laugh.
“That actually might work.” A smile begins to take over Costa’s face. “I want to be able to go home. For me, for Toby. I want to show Amy the places that are important to me and be near you two again.”
I lean back and stretch my legs, pushing my feet into the sand. “Sam and I talked. If you don’t think that will work, we’ll go where you need us. The five of us need to stick together. We have to keep each other in check.”
Costa’s face tells me how touched he is. “You’d leave Watermark?”
“Of course. If that’s what has to happen, of course we would,” Sam says.
“What about college? Neither of you wants to go back?”
Both of us shake our heads.
“Nope,” I say. “At least not yet. Maybe one day, and maybe we’ll be forty when we do it but not now.”
“Now,” Sam says, “is all about adjusting and finding stability. Let’s just live. Well, you know, with the occasional death, but let’s just live.”
“Okay. I don’t want you two not doing what you want because of this.”
“We are doing what we want, Costa. Really,” I say. “We’re staying with family.”
Costa thinks for a minute. “Let’s wait and see what Toby looks like in six months. I bet we can pull this off. We should all be able to stay in Watermark. It’s where we belong.”
“Okay. Then, we’ll wait.” Sam looks seriously at Costa. “We’re staying on schedule, right? Tripping once every five weeks or so?”
Costa nods immediately. “Yes. If we can taper down, we will. Oh! I did want to show you something cool that we figured out yesterday. Watch this.” Costa hops from his chair and waves to Amy. “Ready?”
“Again?” she asks with a laugh. “Okay.” Amy tucks her hair behind her ears and narrows her eyes toward Costa.
He calls Toby’s name, and when his son turns, Costa puts out his hands and makes a circle with his fingers. Bubbles, just like the ones blown through a plastic wand, begin to rush out, floating gently through the air right to Toby. The little boy laughs and claps his hands, and then he begins chasing them as they blow in the breeze.
Sam looks astonished. “You got your powers back?”
Costa lifts his bubble-making fingers higher and grins. “I got me a power augmenter, Sammy, just like you.”
“Amy?” I ask delightedly. “Amy is your power augmenter?”
“So, it seems.”
Sam looks at me. “What did I tell you, Stella? Love comes first, and power augmenter comes second.”
“You might just be right about that, Bishop.” I can’t take my eyes off him.
I’ll never get tired of the way he looks at me, the love he gives, the many ways in which he builds me up and lets me thrive. And I’ll also never tire of loving him back. To get to wholly give myself to another person—it’s monumentally fulfilling.
“When we ate that watermelon when our surge started, it shut down you getting a power, Sam, right?”
Sam nods.
“I didn’t have one to lose, and then I think Amy activated mine.” He swoops his hands through the air and produces a series of giant bubbles. “Check me out being all powered up!”
For a moment, I’m concerned. Costa has always liked tripping too much, and having powers again could be dangerous.
But before I can say anything, he says, “I don’t want you to worry. If all I can ever do is blow bubbles and make my son laugh, I’m cool with that. Maintenance tripping only. I promise. For you guys, for myself, for Toby. I’m okay.”
“I’m glad to hear that.” Sam stands and brushes sand from his shorts. “I’m going to shuck the oysters we got and start dinner. Half shells to start and then grilled swordfish with basil mayonnaise, green beans, and fresh bread.”
“Oysters!” Costa rubs his hands together and raises his eyebrows. “Oh. Aphrodisiac night!”
“None for you!” Sam yells with a laugh. “Stella, you want to come?”
“You bet.” I get up to leave, but Costa takes my hand.
He waits until Sam is a few yards away and pulls me down to whisper, “I might be a good boy now, and you might be a good girl, but I will always miss that knife.”
I’m reassured that Costa is still very much Costa. I turn my head and softly kiss him on the cheek. “I will, too.”
“Who knows? Maybe once a year, we can have a throwback? Reminisce a little, the three of us?”
I smile. “Maybe we do. Maybe we don’t.” I walk to Sam and turn back to Costa. “Or maybe we do.”
He laughs. “Atta girl!”
I catch up to Sam and take his hand. “I’m ready for my oysters.”
“Good.”
I follow him inside and hop up onto the counter to watch him shuck the oysters. Expertly, he wiggles the thick oyster knife between the two sides of the shell and jimmies it open. As he did the first night that he cooked for me in my apartment, he moves to stand between my legs.
He smiles at me as he lifts the oyster shell to my lips. “Drink.”
So, I drink the briny liquid and groan at the rich flavor.
Now, his smile gets more flirtatious. “Swallow…” He tilts the shell more, and the oyster slips into my mouth. “Don’t chew.”
These are just as good as he promised. “I can’t believe that I’m finally getting my raw oysters. A lot of our plans last summer got interrupted.”
“Yep. Seal Cove. We still haven’t been there.”
“Then, that’s what we’ll do when we get back into town.”
“Deal,” he says. “And painting your apartment. I never finished that.”
“I don’t want you to paint it. I want my patches of color and your words.”
“Then, I’ll just keep adding to them. I’ll cover all the walls.” Sam opens another shell and lets me drink from it. Then, he downs the oyster and kisses me.
“When we trip next week?” I start.
“Yeah?”
“Maybe we’ll go to Seal Cove in the early evening. We can hope to get lucky and see actual seals. Then, we’ll watch the sky begin to turn to night. When it’s dark enough, we can swim out to sea, and we can death-trip at sunset. I can do it myself, I think.”
“We’ll make it beautiful,” he says.
“We’ll make it beautiful. And we’ll get you the light power back.”
“I like it.”
“And I like you,” I say teasingly.
“You like me?” He pretends to be offended.
“I love you, Sam Bishop. When we’re alive, when we’re dying, when we’re under, when we’re surging. Always. I l
ove you always.”
“And I love you always.”
Sam leans in and embraces me around the waist. My hands go around his neck, and I rest my head on his shoulder. I am happy and loved at long last. I have built a life for myself, I’ve found people who are family, and I no longer doubt who I am.
My bracelet begins to warm my skin, and I rub the letters. Something is different, very different. I go over them three times to be sure and then lift my wrist to look.
Adored is still there, the familiar word etched into the silver plate.
There is also another word etched below it—Always.
Instantly, I jerk back. “Sam.” I show him my bracelet. “Sam, look.”
He studies the lettering, looking as stunned as I am. We’re silent for a long time.
Then, his face relaxes, and he lifts my chin. “Do you see?”
“No. What is this? How is this possible?”
“You wanted beautiful? Here’s beautiful.” He kisses my bracelet and then kisses me. “This is from your father. He did this. He does adore you. And he knows that I adore you. Always.”
Sam is right. Inexplicably, as it is with all of death tripping, this is from my father. I feel that truth beyond any doubt. Somehow, someway, he is watching over me and continuing to be my father, even from afar. There will always be a great distance between us, but now, there is also great forgiveness.
“We found our good,” Sam says definitively.
“Yes. We found our good.” I smile through my tears.
After years of fog, my head, my heart, and my world are finally clear.
WRITING A BOOK is an enormous undertaking, and doing so would be impossible without the dedicated help of so many.
Author friends are lifelines during the writing process. Jamie McGuire, Abbi Glines, Tina Reber, Tracey Garvis Graves, and Michele Scott all listened to my pitch during lunch one year at BEA. It is their enthusiasm that helped keep my book idea alive for so many years.
Tracey let me vent and ramble and rage numerous times as I fought with this story, and I am most grateful for her unfailing enthusiasm.
Rebekah Crane is the brainstorm queen, and her many what-if questions guided me to the plot that I wanted. Few have the wild imagination and bottomless creativity she does.
Years ago, Heather Webber read a convoluted outline and gave brilliant insight and advice that impacted even this final version.
Andrew Kaufman…oh, Andrew Kaufman swooped in at my darkest moments and surfaced me over and over. His patience, intelligence, and unfailing encouragement saved my sanity over months of struggle. It takes a strong person to put up with my crazy, and he never once buckled—or at least, not that he let on.
Huge thanks out to Autumn Hull for…well, for everything—moral support, skilled PR work, editing genius, humor, understanding, common sense, and so much more. She’s the total package.
Maryse Courtier Black was kind enough to talk to me over the phone and let me bounce ideas off her well-read mind, and Alexa Lewis and Tom Cullinan are both faithful friends who were constantly available to me when I needed smart consultants. Maria Milano and Liis McKinstry have emotional pom-poms that they waved enthusiastically at every opportunity.
There are so many wonderful readers and bloggers to whom I am eternally in debt for their continued loyalty and cheering. I’m terrified to list any because I’ll invariably leave out someone I adore, but I have been overwhelmed over the years by a most amazing community.
As always, my husband, Bill, and son, Nick, remain troopers. Living with an author often means living with a lunatic, and they both deserve awards for their ability to cope.
Thank you to Matt Phillips of The Cover Lure for his constant tolerance when I tweaked and retweaked the cover, and also to Jovana Shirley from Unforeseen Editing for being absolutely dynamite and a true joy to work with.
And finally, to Tracy Hutchinson, whose honesty and openness were crucial in helping me find the heart of this book.
JESSICA PARK is the author of Left Drowning, the Flat-Out Love series, and Relatively Famous. She grew up in the Boston area and attended Macalester College in St. Paul, Minnesota. After spending four years in the frigid north, including suffering through one memorable Halloween blizzard, Jessica hightailed it back to the East Coast. She now lives in relatively balmy New Hampshire with her husband and son. When not writing, Jessica indulges her healthy obsessions with Facebook and complicated coffee beverages.
Left Drowning
What does it take to rise from life’s depths, swim against the current, and breathe?
Weighted down by the loss of her parents, Blythe McGuire struggles to keep her head above water as she trudges through her last year at Matthews College. Then, a chance meeting sends Blythe crashing into something she doesn’t expect—an undeniable attraction to a dark-haired senior named Chris Shepherd, whose past may be even more complicated than her own. As their relationship deepens, Chris pulls Blythe out of the stupor she’s been in since the night a fire took half her family. She begins to heal, and even, haltingly, to love this guy who helps her find new paths to pleasure and self-discovery. But as Blythe moves into calmer waters, she realizes Chris is the one still strangled by his family’s traumatic history. As dark currents threaten to pull him under, Blythe may be the only person who can keep him from drowning.
Flat-Out Love
He was tall, at least six feet, with dirty blond hair that hung over his eyes. His T-shirt read Nietzsche Is My Homeboy.
So, that was Matt—who Julie Seagle likes. A lot. But there is also Finn—who she flat-out loves.
Complicated?
Awkward?
Completely.
But really, how was this freshly minted Boston transplant and newbie college freshman supposed to know that she would end up living with the family of an old friend of her mother’s? This was all supposed to be temporary. Julie wasn’t supposed to be important to the Watkins family or fall in love with one of the brothers, especially the one she’s never quite met. But what does that really matter? Finn gets her, like no one ever has before. They have a connection.
But here’s the thing about love. In all its twisty, bumpy permutations, it always throws you a few curves. And no one ever escapes unscathed.
Flat-Out Matt
A Flat-Out Love companion novella for true fans! You saw geeky, damaged, loveable Matt Watkins through Julie's eyes in Flat-Out Love. Now, go deeper into Matt’s world in this Flat-Out Matt novella. Live his side of the story, break when his heart breaks, and fall for the unlikely hero all over again.
Take an emotional skydive for two prequel chapters and seven Flat-Out Love chapters retold from his perspective, and then land with a brand-new steamy finale chapter from Julie.
Flat-Out Celeste
For high school senior Celeste Watkins, every day is a brutal test of bravery. And Celeste is scared. Alienated because she’s too smart, her speech too effected, her social skills too far outside the norm, she seems to have no choice but to retreat into isolation.
But college could set her free, right? If she can make it through this grueling senior year, then maybe. If she can just find that one person to throw her a lifeline, then maybe, just maybe.
Justin Milano, a college sophomore with his own set of quirks, could be that person to pull her from a world of solitude. To rescue her—that is, if she’ll let him.
Together, they may work. Together, they may save each other. And together they may also save another couple—two people Celeste knows are absolutely, positively flat-out in love.
Whether you were charmed by Celeste in Flat-Out Love or are meeting her for the first time, this book is a joyous celebration of differences, about battling private wars that rage in our heads and in our hearts, and very much so, this is a story about first love.
Jessica Park, Clear
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