Levi is only required to stay long enough to collect the money. We’re invited to stay for the after party, but there are other things we’d like to do this evening. (Like kissing.) So we spend our last half hour in Felix’s home listening to the host calling out names, watching men and women walk to the front of the crowd with checks in hand. Levi shakes his head, like he can’t believe it, but I can. Everyone loves Levi. They love what he’s doing, too, and I’m sure they look at him and his smile and feel his warm handshake and think, What a standup guy.
It’s just the way the world works. All I have to do is stand by his side, hold his hand, let him drape his arm around my shoulder or waist. Sometimes I even let him kiss me, soft and warm and light, which helps me forget about how strange it feels to be here.
It’s been dark for two hours by the time Levi collects the check from Felix, and it’s folded neatly and placed in his wallet with the words “The Color Project” written across the front. We say quick goodbyes to Felix, thanking him again and again, before sneaking back upstairs to gather our things.
The bedroom immerses us in quiet; we can barely hear the sounds of the party below us. Levi squeezes my hand as we stare across the bed and out the glass door, lingering on the ocean that goes on forever.
“Hey,” he finally says, walking to the window. “I think there’s a lookout over there.”
I stand beside him, putting my arms around his waist. He points toward the north, where the cliffs jut out over the ocean and there are no houses or cars. “We should go,” I say. “We’ve got time, right?”
He nods. “It’s only ten.”
“Then let’s do it.”
Levi turns in my arms, kissing my forehead. He rests his chin on the top of my head and inhales. “I’m glad you’re here.”
“Me, too.” I turn my head, tilting backward, and it’s like he just knows I want him to kiss me. He lowers his mouth to mine. It’s different this time, knowing what to expect, but no less exciting or wonderful. He squeezes my waist, then his hands are rising toward my hair, and he releases the clip so it falls loosely around my face. Instantly, his fingers get caught in the tangling waves, and he has to carefully—awkwardly—extract himself.
Laughing, I lean back and pull my hair to the side. “We should go,” I whisper.
He touches my nose, softly, the pad of his finger trailing from top to bottom. “Okay.”
I gather my old clothes and stuff them into the dress bag, as well as my shoes (I think the straps might be cutting into my skin by now) and my makeup bag. Levi stuffs his clothes into his own bag, shouldering it.
I glance out the window one more time.
“Ready?” he asks, holding out his hand to me.
I do more than that—I slide in for a hug. “Want to say goodbye to your dad first?”
He gives me a look that says Ha ha no. He tugs on my arm. “He didn’t say hello, so he doesn’t get a goodbye. Come on.”
We wait for the valet to bring his car, but we only make it one block down the road before Levi’s phone rings. He hands it to me as he turns onto the side road that leads to the lookout.
“Hello?” I answer.
“Hey, Bee, it’s Felix.”
I glance at Levi. “Hey... did we leave something?” I ask, my first guess. I take inventory, trying to remember if I left my shirt on the bathroom counter or my tennis shoes under the sink.
“No,” Felix reassures, “I was just wondering if Levi knows where his dad is? We found his coat and wanted to return it to him.”
I relay this to Levi.
“Seriously?” He scowls.
I nod.
“I have no idea where he is.”
Felix tsks when I repeat this. “Well, if you hear from him before I do, let me know. And I’m sorry he showed up—Penelope was supposed to cross him off the list.”
“It’s all right,” I answer. “Levi figured it was a mistake.”
Felix sighs. “Thank him for me, and again, send his dad this way if you find out where he went.”
I hang up, and Levi swings into the lookout parking lot (which consists of a few dusty spaces right before the cliff’s grassy edge). He holds out his hand for his phone, and the second the car jerks to a stop, he’s dialing his dad’s number.
“Dad,” he says. There is nothing but irritation in his tone. “Where the hell are you? Felix is looking for you—you left your coat.” A pause. “Seriously? Where are you?” Levi puts his head in his free hand, grumbling something under his breath. “How many drinks have you had?” Another pause. “You need to pull over right now—Dad, don’t give me shit. Pull over and park by the beach or something. Drop a location pin and send it to me. We’ll come get you.” His dad says something else, loudly, but I still can’t hear him clearly.
Levi hangs up. He lays his phone between his legs and drops his head to the steering wheel—which lets out a bothered honk. He groans. “He said he lost count after drink four. And if I know anything for certain, it’s that my dad is a lightweight.”
I sigh. “Where is he?”
“About an hour north of here.”
“Is he with someone?”
“Yeah, and she’s just as drunk as he is. She was practically shrieking in the background.” Levi looks up, out the window, at the cliff and our lookout and the moment we’d wanted to share here. He looks like he’s about to apologize, so I stop him.
“You need to go get your dad, Levi. Don’t worry about this.”
“I can’t believe him.”
Frankly, neither can I, but this is important. Levi needs to know that I’m here for anything. “Let’s go,” I murmur. “We only have so much time.”
Before he puts the car into reverse, Levi angles his body toward me, grabbing my face in his hands, and kisses me hard.
“I’m sorry,” he gasps, in between bursts of kisses. “We’ll come back here, I promise.”
I smile and poke his cheek to make him face forward. “Don’t get distracted now. You’ll never get anything done.”
“Right. Well, I can only think of one thing that might be as exciting as kissing you by the moonlit sea.”
“What’s that?”
He grins devilishly as he pulls back onto the road. “Borrowing one of my dad’s excellent sets of wheels.”
Chapter 32
Levi looks incredibly scrumptious in the front seat of his dad’s matte gray Maserati GranTurismo. So scrumptious, in fact, that I have to stand back and gape at him for a second.
“Get in, Bee,” he prompts, fiddling with the radio. With the flick of his wrist, the top of the car goes down, and I’m looking at a convertible that’s almost as gorgeous as my boyfriend. He looks up at me when I don’t respond. “Speechless?”
“No,” I lie.
He calls my bluff. “It’s kind of badass, right?”
I pretend to be unimpressed as I climb in. “Nah.”
Levi laughs. “There’s just no way in hell I’m paying for the gas to go get him, and he’s not going to remember any of this in the morning anyway, so we might as well.”
“Sounds reasonable.” It’s ten thirty now, which means it will be nearly midnight when we get to Mr. Orville. Wherever he’s stopped. I silently thank Tracy for letting me take the late shift tomorrow.
Levi follows the map on his phone, which directs us to the Pacific Coast Highway. It’s a drive I’ve always thought of as beautiful, but now I’m stunned. Looking out of this roofless car, I feel like I can see everything and touch all the pieces that make up the mountains and the ocean and the sky. My dress swirls around my legs, picked up by the wind, and my hair is never going to calm down at this speed.
Levi switches on a mix CD and turns it to a low volume that I can barely hear over the rushing and the sound of tires on asphalt and
the ocean waves against rocks. We talk sparsely (Levi: If we were stranded on a desert island, who would eat who first? Me: Sh, don’t even think about that. Levi: It’s important. Me: It will never happen. Levi: I’d let you eat me. I’m probably delicious, but then again, I hope no one ever knows for sure.), mostly just holding hands between us, watching the small beach cities and mansions in the hills as they pass.
We reach Mr. Orville’s awkwardly parked car at 11:44, and by this time I’m yawning and stretching and shifting uncomfortably. Levi makes a U-turn and pulls up behind his dad’s sleek, black car—yet another convertible, this time a Jag—and flips off the lights. The beach is to our right, across the freeway; the little town we’ve parked in is called La Conchita.
That is, until I hear, “Son!” Jerking my head toward the sound, I catch Mr. Orville practically springing out of his car. His date is primping herself in the passenger seat, her skimpy purple dress showing me a lot more of her boobs than I ever wanted to see.
“Dad,” Levi answers, and if I didn’t know him so well, I would have missed the underlying relief in his tone. While Levi steps out to talk to his dad, Miss Purple Dress closes her mirror, collects her things, and saunters over to the Maserati in her four-inch pumps. She doesn’t acknowledge my presence, just opens the back door and sits behind me.
Good, I didn’t want to talk to you anyway.
After speaking quietly to his father by the car, Levi turns to look at me. “Bee, you feel comfortable driving one car?”
I immediately shake my head no, and Levi sighs and turns off the other car, the one we’re going to leave here.
Mr. Orville fumbles with the handle on the Maserati for a second. Then he looks up at me, catching my attention only because I can feel his stare. “You,” he says, as if he’s only just seeing me.
I raise an eyebrow. I have no response for this idiot.
“I met you earlier?”
I can’t hold back my laugh, but I still don’t answer. Yeah, I think, and at the last fundraiser, too. Nice to see you again. I’m your son’s girlfriend. No need to remember me, though.
“You’re wearing my wife’s necklace,” he adds, his face darkening. From behind me, his purple-clad date makes a sound of protest. “Ex-wife,” he amends, and finally manages to open the door. He gets in the vehicle (jumps is a more appropriate word), landing beside his girlfriend with a plop, and (I kid you not) grabs her boobs to catch himself.
“AuGUStus!” she shouts, laughing.
I turn to Levi as he gets in the driver’s seat again and just stare at him, waiting for him to say something, anything, because I’m speechless.
He shields his eyes from the backseat and says, “If I wasn’t wearing this suit, I’d probably puke.”
“Son, did you meet Penelope?” AuGUStus! yells from the backseat, even though we’re, like, a foot away.
Levi and I exchange a glance. “Ah,” he says. Then he turns around. “Yep, we did. Buckle up, please, or you’ll fall out onto the freeway and I won’t be able to come back for you until tomorrow, and by then you’ll already be a street pancake.”
He mumbles the last bit, making me laugh loudly, over the sounds of AuGUStus! sloppily smooching Felix’s (probably fired) secretary, over the music and the wind. The only thing left is Levi, and just as the rest of the world world disappears, he is everything.
We pull up to AuGUStus’s house a little over an hour later, music blaring to keep us awake. I’ve yawned once a minute for the last half hour, and Levi’s eyes look a little bloodshot. But the massive house looming ahead of us, even with its seven garage doors and palm tree collection and glass roof, provides a sense of calm. In my mind, House + Bed = Sleep.
Until I remember that we have to drive home, of course. “Who’s on drive home duty?” I ask.
“If I have anything to say about it, neither of us.” He inches into the Maserati’s assigned garage and closes the door behind us. With one shared look, we seem to come to the agreement that neither of us wants to drive at this hour, so staying here is our only option. He nods and pulls the key out of the ignition, and at the same time we turn to look at the back seat.
AuGUStus! is passed out with his head in Penelope’s lap, and she looks incredibly annoyed. Levi, in all of his wild-haired glory, shoots her his most charming smile. “Thanks for taking care of that,” he says, climbing out of the car and closing his door behind him.
“Aren’t you, like, going to help?” Penelope whines.
“Oh, I’m totally sure you’ve got this all under control, considering how well you probably know him by now, in these, like, four days you’ve been dating him. Or should I say nights?” Levi walks around to my side (I’m staring openly like a shocked four-year-old) and pushes on my back with two fingers, toward the door that leads into the house. He glances back at Penelope one last time. “Peregrine, right? Have a great night,” he adds, and shuts the door behind us.
I plaster my hand over my mouth, a giggle escaping. “That’s not the first time you’ve had to do that, is it?” I say beneath my fingers.
“Nope.” He flicks on the lights. An expanse of kitchen spreads out before me, so massive that it’s like there’s an entire canyon between me and the other side.
I make a sound of pure awe.
“It’s butt ugly,” Levi mutters.
“It totally is not. It’s just…excessive.”
“Okay, fine, it’s gorgeous,” he grumbles. “But I reserve the right to call anything and everything in this house gross any time I want, okay?”
I practically snort. The house is immaculate, down to the mahogany cabinets and giant sink and wide island tabletop. Everything sparkles. I take Levi’s hand, following him first to the fridge (because he guesses I’m hungry and tells me he’s starving), where he procures yogurt and water for us, and then out into the rest of the house.
I don’t have much time to pay attention to the massive rooms I’m passing. I focus solely on Levi’s hand and his long stride and the sleep that awaits me on the other side of the house. I might cry from sheer exhaustion and emotional discovery and happiness.
Levi first stops by his bedroom, which is set up like his room at home: organized, minimalist. He puts his backpack and yogurt on the bed and sighs down at them.
“What’s wrong?” I ask.
“The day’s over, that’s what’s wrong.” He rubs the back of his neck. “There’s an extra bedroom for you, down the hall—”
I act quickly, grabbing his hand before he can move. “Um, no.” Suddenly I’m nervous, because I know that I don’t want to sleep by myself in this gigantic, strange house where Levi’s drunk dad could be lurking at any moment in time. But I also know that asking to sleep in his bedroom, where there is only one bed and a lot of floor, might open up a can of worms, and I will have to do a lot of explaining.
About sex.
Out with it, Bee. Just tell him.
My jaw is frozen shut. I don’t want him to think it’s stupid, or lame, or pathetic, because it’s not. It’s important to me, and I want him to know.
Levi raises an eyebrow at me, as if he’s trying to give me the impression that he’s clueless, but I know from the way his skin color deepens that he’s thinking the same thing I am.
“I can’t sleep here,” I say, but since I mean in this house, it only confuses him more.
“Okay,” he deadpans. “That’s why I’m giving you your own bedroom.”
“No, no, I mean, I can’t sleep here, as in, the house, because it freaks me out a little bit—okay a lot—no offense.”
“So you want to sleep in my room?”
“I do—I mean—” I whimper, hopeless. “I really want to, but if I do, I have to tell you The Thing.”
This is not how I planned to do it. In fact, I hadn’t planned to do this at all. In the se
veral weeks of our dating life, I’d been so preoccupied with everything else (I’m looking at you, cancer) that I’d only thought about this once. I hadn’t thought about Levi’s expectations, or what his past love life looked like. He’s probably had a ton of girlfriends—oh my goodness, this makes me feel even worse—and probably has experience, because he’s Levi, and look at that beautiful face!
“Bee? What thing?” He’s watching me, eyes traveling back and forth with me as I pace incessantly across his room. I’m pretty sure it’s driving him crazy. Three. Two. One—
“Bee—” He puts his hand on my arm to stop me, running his fingers down my bare skin to tantalize me, bringing me in close to hold me. “What’s this Thing you want to tell me that’s making you so nervous? You’re shaking,” he adds, and it’s true. My hands, especially, are wavering where I have them pressed to his chest.
“Okay, so, like, I’ve never had to explain this to anyone except my mom and Gretchen, and especially not to a boy, and especially not to my boyfriend, because, you know, I’ve never had one of those. One of you. You know?”
He nods, like this makes complete sense. (He’s an angel.) “All right. Go on.”
I wiggle out of his arms and sit on the edge of the bed, my hands fumbling in my lap. “I have this thing,” I begin, and instead of continuing I just stare at his expectant face.
He nods, slowly, like he’s trying to be patient. “You said that already.”
“Okay, and, well. I wasn’t really going to tell you like this. I just don’t know what you expect and what you want but I have made a promise to myself not to have sex before I’m married because I want it to be the most special thing in the world, and I figured out when I was with Karl that it wasn’t going to be special if we stayed together. That’s why I broke it off with him, actually. And now I’m here and we’re a thing and we kissed, naturally my next question is what on earth is Levi going to think about this so I’m asking you here, now, what you think MMPH—”
He smashes his whole mouth on mine, sudden and a little violent, but it’s all the better for it. I grab his face and squish it between my hands because I am a lot panicky and he’s here to make it better.
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