“Actually,” I say remorsefully, “I can’t. I’m starting a new job today.”
Baffled, Ian looks around the outside of the house. “What? Here?”
I point up. “There. I’m replacing the roof.”
Ian peers behind me at the truck in the driveway with the Metzler Roofing logo on the side, and a flash of comprehension comes over his face. He must know why I’m so uncomfortable right now. If anyone gets what it’s like to be an outsider on your own island, it’s him. Even though he’s not technically a local, he’s not really a tourist, either. His grandparents have a house on the beach, but they certainly aren’t dripping with cash like all of their neighbors. Ian and I have always had a kind of kinship that way. The two “poorer” friends of Grayson Cartwright.
“Is that gonna be weird?” he asks.
I shrug. “I hope not. But I’m gonna talk to Grayson about it, just to make sure.”
“Good idea. Maybe check around by the pool?”
“Thanks. I’ll see you around?”
“Sure,” he mumbles, and it’s like I can see the cloud of heaviness drift back over him again. I feel the urge to question him about it, but what do I say? How do I even bring it up?
“You doing okay?” I ask lamely.
He seems to perk up a little at the question. “As good as can be expected, I guess.”
And then he just watches me, like he’s waiting for me to dish out some Yoda-like wisdom about life and death and the great, unexplained mysteries of the universe. But I don’t have any of that. I don’t know any of that wisdom. So I just say, “Good. Well, I better get to work.”
“Yeah,” Ian mutters. “See ya.”
“Maybe we can watch the episode when I’m done?”
Ian nods. “Okay.” And then he closes the door.
I walk around the side of the house to the pool but am stopped halfway when Grayson suddenly comes spilling out of the bushes, looking incredibly flustered.
“Mike!” he says, his voice way too high and squeaky for a six-foot-two football player.
“Hi,” I say hesitantly. “What are you doing out here?”
He brushes a few stray leaves from his shirt. “Me? Oh, you know, just trimming some edges.”
“You mean ‘hedges’?”
He seems completely distracted, like he can’t quite focus on my face. “Yeah. That.”
I have to laugh at the idea of Grayson doing yard work. Or any work at all, for that matter. “Since when do you garden?”
“Uh,” he says haltingly. “Since recently. I just got into it.”
I look back to the bush he just tumbled out of. For a second I swear I see it move, but it’s probably only the breeze. I point to an overgrown bulge on the side and start walking toward it. “Looks like you missed a spot.”
Grayson lets out a strange yelping sound and runs to step in front of me. “Let’s not talk about gardening. That’s so boring. What’s up? Why are you here?”
I almost forgot the real reason I came. For just a second it was every other summer, and I simply stopped by to hang out at Grayson’s pool or play football on the beach.
Then the second is over and the reality of this summer comes rushing back to me.
I take a deep breath and steel myself for what I’m about to say. “Actually, there’s something I want to talk to you about. It’s a little . . . um, awkward.”
Grayson looks like he just swallowed a spider. He glances uneasily over his shoulder. “Sure. What is it?”
“I didn’t really want to bring it up because it’s kind of, I don’t know, embarrassing, but now I think I have to.”
Grayson looks confused. His brow furrows tightly, and he rubs at the stubble on his chin. “Okaaay,” he says slowly, like he’s convinced I’m going to say something horrible next.
“A few months ago my dad had an accident on a roofing job. He hurt his leg. It’s not healing the way the doctors want, so he hasn’t been able to work for a while. That’s why I’ve had to pick up some of the slack this summer to help with the bills, and my dad got word of a new roofing job and . . .” I let my voice trail off, hoping Grayson will pick up on the implication and I won’t actually have to spell it out, but he still looks like he hasn’t followed anything I’ve said.
“I didn’t know it was here until after I agreed to take it,” I tell him. “I just hope it won’t be, you know, weird.”
“Wait,” he says, after an awfully long pause. “You’re going to be working here? On this roof? All summer?”
Finally. Jeez, that took long enough.
“If it’s too weird, I understand,” I rush to say, looking anxiously down at my feet and praying he won’t tell me that it is. “It’s just that we could really use the money. And if Harper and I leave for New York in the fall—”
“Harper?” he blurts out. “You and Harper? Are you back together?”
God, he really is acting crazy. Maybe the idea of me working for his family is too much.
“I mean, not yet. But you know how it is. How she is.”
“No, I don’t,” he snaps, startling me. “I don’t know how she is. Why would I know how she is?”
“Because you told me,” I say, convinced I’ve missed something. “We talked about this, last night at the party when you said she was insensitive and manipulative.”
Grayson flinches and once again casts his eyes hastily over his shoulder.
Is he on something?
“I mean, I know you said I should move on,” I continue, trying to ignore this strange behavior. “But I guess I just haven’t quite given up hope yet. We’ve been planning this move since we were fourteen.”
Grayson doesn’t say anything. But he looks like he’s trying to do complicated mathematics in his head.
“So, I could really use the extra cash, you know?”
His gaze darts to me. “Huh?”
“Extra cash. The roofing job. What’s going on with you, man? Did you take something last night at the party?”
“What? No,” he says hastily.
“So, it’s okay then?”
“What’s okay?”
I just have to laugh now. This is the most pointless conversation I’ve ever had. “Me taking this roofing job. Working here all summer. Stomping around on your roof, peering into your windows, watching your every move.”
Of course I’m totally kidding with that last part, but Grayson kind of flinches when I say it.
“Oh, um, sure. Totally okay. I’ve got nothing to hide.”
I shake my head. “Great. Well, I better get to it. I guess I’ll see you around.”
“Yeah, okay,” he mumbles.
I walk back to the truck, pull the ladder from the bed, and lean it against the side of the house. I climb up, then cringe as I gaze across the mansion’s massive roof. I can see why they hired someone. These shingles are one storm away from total disaster.
I hear hushed voices coming from the side of the house where I just left Grayson, and I think about what Ian said a few minutes ago. How Grayson has been acting kind of cagey. I wonder what that’s about. Curious, I step off the ladder onto the roof and make my way in the direction of the voices. I carefully scoot to the edge of the house and peer into the hedges below, but no one is there.
Grayson has mysteriously vanished.
CHAPTER 18
IAN
Hand me another box of screws,” Mike calls down from the roof. I search the worktable until I find the plastic container of metal screws, then climb up the ladder to hand it to him. For the past two weeks I’ve been hanging out more and more with Mike while he works on Grayson’s roof, because there’s really not much else to do around here.
Normally we’d all pass our summer days swimming in the pool or catching footballs on the beach or watching episodes of Crusade of Kings until our souls couldn’t take the pain anymore, but it’s already Fourth of July tomorrow, and we haven’t done any of those things. It’s like our group is drifting apart. Mik
e is always either working here or mowing lawns at the beach club, and Grayson has turned into a regular Houdini. He disappears for hours on end and doesn’t tell anyone where he’s going.
And Whitney?
I don’t even want to think about her. She’s been completely avoiding me. If she’s not in her room with the door locked and the music blasting, then she’s off traipsing around the island somewhere. We haven’t really talked since that morning after the pool party, after she nailed that douche bucket in the balls, who, come to think of it, I haven’t seen around the island since. Not that I’ve left this house much in two weeks. Which is probably a good thing. I’m not sure what I’d do if I did see him.
Probably get my ass handed to me again.
“Are there any more boot vents down there?” Mike’s face appears over the edge of the roof again.
I scan the worktable, pushing aside tools and scraps of material. “What do those look like again?”
“Tubey-looking thing with a flat base. They fit around the plumbing pipes.”
I don’t see anything matching that description. “I don’t think so.”
He climbs back down the ladder. “I’ll have to swing by the hardware store to get some. Wanna come?”
I shrug. “Sure.” Because, really, what else do I have to do today?
We climb into the truck and rumble out of the driveway.
“How much longer do you think the job is going to take?” I ask as he turns onto the main road.
“Probably at least another month. The roof is in terrible shape.”
He rolls down the window and sticks his arm out, letting the breeze lift his hand up and down, like the ocean under his surfboard. I wonder if he even gets a chance to surf anymore. Or is he too tired at the end of the day?
“It’s exhausting,” he continues. “But it keeps my mind off things.”
He doesn’t have to say what exactly he’s trying to keep his mind off. I already know. It’s been almost a month since Harper ended things, and I don’t think they’ve spoken once. Or if they have, Mike certainly hasn’t said anything.
This is how we are now. We don’t talk about things. At least not about anything real. We just avoid.
It’s like we’ve settled into this comfortable little bubble of delusion.
“How’s the job at the beach club?” I ask, searching for a topic to fill the silence.
“It’s good,” he replies. “The same.” He’s quiet for a second before he adds, “There’s some new people working there this summer, which makes things kind of interesting.”
I swear I see the hint of a smile light up his face as he says this, and I’m about to question him about it when he suddenly, out of the blue, asks, “Have you talked to Grayson recently?”
“Not really. Why?”
“Have you noticed he’s been acting strange lately?”
I think about how many times Grayson has been gone before I’ve gotten up, and how many times he has come home after I’ve gone to bed. And come to think of it, whenever he is around the house, he doesn’t really say much. Sure, we chitchat and joke around like usual, but he’s been sort of distant. Cutting conversations short for no reason, constantly distracted by his phone.
“I guess, a little.”
“He’s barely said a word to me since I started the roofing job.”
“That’s weird,” I agree.
“Do you think it bothers him? Me working at the house?”
“That doesn’t seem like Grayson.”
“Yeah. I know. That’s why I was wondering.”
“He probably just has some pop tart in town that he hasn’t told us about yet. You know how Grayson gets when he finds a hot new distraction. He goes all AWOL.”
“Maybe,” Mike admits. “But then why ignore me for two weeks?”
“He’s probably so distracted that he doesn’t even realize he’s doing it.”
“Yeah,” Mike says, but I can tell he doesn’t buy it. And truthfully, I’m not sure I buy it myself.
When we get to town, Mike runs into the hardware store while I wait outside by the truck. I lean against the door and survey the little downtown area of Winlock Harbor. I always used to love it down here. All of the little shops where you can buy the most random things. Antique telephones, jams made from berries you’ve never heard of, and monogrammed food bowls for your dog.
My dad and I used to walk to the candy store, and we’d pick out mix-and-match saltwater taffy and eat it the entire way home. When we’d get back, our stomachs would be hurting and we’d be trying to pick all the leftovers out of our teeth for hours. My mom would yell at me for eating too much sugar and then yell at my dad for letting me.
My dad would nod and say things like, “You’re absolutely right, Jackie. That was irresponsible of me.” And then he would give me a wink, and two days later we’d be right back at that store.
I let my eyes drift to near the candy store, but I’m too afraid to look directly at it. Like how you’re not supposed to stare right into the sun. So I let my gaze settle on Barnacle Books instead. It’s a safer option. My dad was never a big reader. I remember one time when my mom took me in there to buy a birthday present for Whitney when she turned twelve. I complained the whole time, asking why I had to buy a present for someone who wasn’t even my friend.
“Because she’s Grayson’s sister and Grayson is your friend, and she invited you to her birthday party,” my mom said.
“But I’m not going,” I told her.
She acted like I had just told her I’d spanked the pope. “Of course you’re going. Don’t be ridiculous.”
“But it’ll just be a bunch of girls,” I said, feeling disgusted at the very thought of it. I was thirteen but had always been a little behind in the maturity department, especially when it came to the opposite sex. While Grayson had already started noticing girls and making embarrassing comments about their changing bodies, and Mike and Harper had already purportedly made out twice in some little secret alcove on the beach, I had absolutely zero experience with girls and even less interest in changing that.
I sulked the entire time my mom and I were in the bookstore. She picked out a copy of whatever popular book preteen girls were reading at the time, had it wrapped in pink heart wrapping paper, and handed it to me to deliver to Whitney.
When I got to the party, Whitney unwrapped the present right away. She took one glance at the book, and her mouth fell into a pout. She turned to one of her annoying little friends—a girl with glasses and braided pigtails—and said, “Here, Carly. Ian got you a present.”
Now, while I wait for Mike to come out of the hardware store, I watch a group of older women—probably a tourist book club—enter Barnacle Books. I’m just about to turn my attention to the next store on the block when the last of the book club ladies holds the door open for a customer coming out.
My eyes nearly fall out of their sockets when I see the familiar dark skin, wavy black hair, and long, lean legs.
It’s Whitney. Coming out of a bookstore. She may as well have been coming out of Diagon Alley.
She’s dressed in shorts and a loose-fitting T-shirt, and she’s carrying a giant shopping bag with the Barnacle Books logo on it.
Whitney Cartwright doesn’t read books.
Whitney Cartwright doesn’t even want to be seen carrying books.
Unless that bag is full of fashion magazines, then I’ve definitely fallen through a wormhole and landed on the wrong planet.
I watch in awe as she carries the bag to the curb, but instead of getting into her Mercedes convertible—which, come to think of it, I haven’t seen at all this summer—she places the shopping bag in a wicker basket secured to the back of a red bike that’s parked nearby, and swings her leg over the seat.
Whitney is riding a bike?
The thought is just so ludicrous that I almost laugh. But in reality I’m too intrigued to laugh. She starts to pedal away, and I get this insane urge to follow her.
/> For no other reason than to try to solve this strange, alternate-universe mystery.
Maybe she has a secret twin who I never knew about.
A twin who reads books and wears glasses and rides bikes.
I check the hardware store again—still no sign of Mike—and decide I’m just going to steal a peek at which direction she’s heading. Maybe then I can deduce where she might be going. But as soon as I cross the street, something else snags my attention.
It’s the other Cartwright. Grayson. He’s walking down a small alley toward the beach, and he’s not alone. He’s with someone. A girl.
The elusive pop tart, I presume.
Grayson stops and backs the girl up against the side of the building. He puts a hand on either side of her shoulders and leans in to kiss her.
She giggles and ducks playfully out of his reach, then runs ahead of him toward the entrance to the beach.
Well, there’s one mystery solved. At least Grayson seems to be having a normal summer. I guess one of us should.
It isn’t until she turns around to make sure he’s chasing her—which he most certainly is—that I recognize her.
And I feel the ground tremble beneath my feet.
This is far more shocking than a bicycle-riding, book-reading, T-shirt-wearing Whitney Cartwright.
This is downright disturbing.
I always knew Grayson could be self-centered and a little arrogant, but that’s usually just part of his charm. This, however, seems excessive. And just plain wrong.
Suddenly that haunting premonition I had at the pool party two weeks ago comes rushing back to me, crashing over me like a massive tsunami.