Small Town Hearts

by Lillie Vale

  I remembered the bite in her voice as she’d hustled me off her houseboat. My chest tightened. She was mistaken if she thought I’d had a choice in the matter. I didn’t want her to be fucking grateful now.

  “Yeah,” I said, bringing my hand to my forehead to shade against the brilliant glare of the morning sun. “No problem.” I grabbed my bike from where it leaned against the candy-cane-striped lighthouse wall.

  “We can bike down together?” Penny offered. Without waiting, she got back on her bike and used her heel to push back the kickstand.

  The descent from my clifftop lighthouse wasn’t steep, but the road was narrow and winding. The breeze carried traces of azaleas and roses, tickling my nostrils and kissing my cheeks.

  As my thighs pumped, I tried not to look at her, tried not to give her any opening to continue the conversation about Chad. I just wanted to wipe last night from my mind. The embarrassment, the awkwardness, the kiss. A fresh shiver went down my spine and I pedaled harder, faster.

  We reached the town center of Oar’s Rest, forced to slow for pedestrians and cars. The ride down never got me out of breath, so I knew the tightness in my chest had everything to do with Penny’s proximity and the secret that hovered between us.

  Hang in there, just hang in there, I said to myself over and over like a mantra. In just a few short moments, I would be able to duck inside the shop and Penny would be on her way. Just hang in there.

  As I waved to one of my regulars, a young mother pushing a stroller into the Busy Bean, Penny drew up alongside me. My muscles stiffened.

  She came to a stop, angling her wheels so I couldn’t go past her. “Hey, speedy, you didn’t tell me it was a race!” she said with a laugh.

  I smiled stiffly and swung my leg over the bike, getting off. “Guess you win.”

  Tom, the owner, was bent in front of the windows with a watering can. As he straightened from the window boxes, he raised his dark-brown hand, then called out cheerfully, “Morning, girls!”

  “Morning, Tom.” I wheeled my bike by the handlebars, sidestepping Penny.

  “Hey,” said Penny with a bright smile, undeterred. She swiped her glossy black hair over her shoulder. “Coffee smells wicked good.”

  It was hard not feeling a little intruded upon when she let her bike lean against mine on the rack in front of the shop. “You’re coming in?” I asked.

  She nodded. “Think I’ll get something to go.”

  She followed me in, smiling and waving at the familiar faces of Oar’s Rest. While she was waylaid by a table of young high school girls, I shimmied myself behind the counter, where Lucy was making coffees to go.

  It was only once I donned my familiar green apron and breathed in the strong, aromatic blend of our house favorite that my unease faded. It was as if my apron was a suit of armor, strong enough to protect me from whatever came my way.

  The Busy Bean, affectionately known to the locals as Busy’s, was an eclectic cluster of kitsch and old-world charm. Nothing matched—not the mugs or the furniture. The tables and chairs were solid European workmanship, odds and ends that Tom had picked up at antique malls and liquidation sales, with the odd bit of patio furniture thrown in. I loved the jumbled look of the place, “tasteful eclectic,” as Tom called it.

  Now that I was here, it was easy to think of Busy’s as my castle and the separating counter as my moat. It divided me and Penny, made me feel a little less emotionally and physically attached. Not quite a drawbridge, but it’d work in a pinch.

  “Slow morning,” I said, surveying the room.

  Busy’s earned its name during the summer months when the tourists descended en masse on our coastal Maine town. In the days leading up to tourist season, however, work consisted of chatting with the locals who came in with their books and portable chess sets, half-heartedly wiping down spotless counters, and offloading the day’s baked goods before they got dry and stale.

  “Mhm.” Lucy pressed domed plastic lids on the to-go cups. “Everyone’s down at the beach. Surprised you didn’t see them.”

  Truth be told, I’d been a little distracted by Penny’s presence, otherwise I was sure I would have been more observant. Hands behind my back, I tightened the apron strings. “Why? What’s going on?”

  “Sign-ups for the sandcastle competition start today!” Lucy chirped, sticking in the bright red straws. “You signing up?”

  My neck prickled. The sandcastle competition was an annual tradition that came around every August, and competition was fierce. In the weeks leading up to the event, our town would spill over with tourists, and there wouldn’t be a lot of space on the beach to practice.

  In the kids’ division, teams could have as many members as they wanted, since it was all about the fun of participation. When we were younger, Chad, Penny, and I had dominated the competition, but once we hit sixteen, we were in the adult group. It also meant everyone taking part was in it to win it, and there were some pretty savage pseudo-professional sandcastles erected on our beach. And because it was more competitive, teams were restricted to just two people. Since Chad and Penny were dating … well, it hadn’t been a surprise who the odd woman out had been.

  “Signing up for what?” asked Penny. She sidled up to the counter and leaned forward on her elbows.

  I made eyes at Lucy, but she answered Penny anyway.

  “The sandcastle competition,” said Lucy. She shot Penny a grin. “Think you and Chad have what it takes to beat me and Lorcan?”

  Penny’s smile dwindled. It was no secret that she and Chad always came in second to Lucy and her boyfriend. Chad always stressed, coming up with convoluted plans to maximize the number of towers and fortify the walls against collapse. Penny hated getting sand everywhere, but she loved the limelight of being a winner’s girlfriend.

  “Hey, sorry. Too early in the day for trash talk?” Lucy made eye contact with the table of girls and waved them over to collect their drinks.

  As the door banged shut behind them, Penny said, “I’m not competing this year.”

  Lucy’s eyes flicked to me. “Are you?”

  “Yeah,” I said, shrugging. “There’s usually someone left over who doesn’t have a partner.” Between my skill and my dud partner, we usually scored third place.

  Lucy’s face lit up.

  I knew what she was going to say before she said it, and in that microsecond, the guilt was gasoline in my stomach.

  “Babe, you and Chad should team up!” Lucy said excitedly. “Oh my God, now that would be a real competition.”

  She’d lit the match.

  Penny blinked. “What? Oh, I didn’t even—” She turned to me, forehead creased. “Do you … I mean, you could if you wanted.”

  It sounded like an offer, but was it a test? The idea of actually standing a chance to win first place was tempting, and I knew that together, Chad and I could pull it off. He’d been the one to teach me how to build sandcastles competitively. He’d taught me everything I knew. What angle to hold the tools that would get the best results. The creative vision to create something beautiful. The patience to erect that vision into reality.

  I could still remember being thirteen and letting him take my hand, feeling the sprinkle of sand against my palm. Every grain of sand had a story, Chad had said. A history of the earth that stretched behind us so far that it was only the tiniest of pinpricks against the horizon. Chad didn’t take a lot of stuff seriously, but building sandcastles was his religion.

  I wanted to say yes. I wanted to be on the A team. I wanted to win. And yet … was Penny hoping I’d say no?

  I searched her face for any sign of fakeness but came up empty. Did I owe it to Penny to brush off Lucy’s suggestion? To pretend like this didn’t feel like my chance to come in from the cold? Like I didn’t know that Chad and I could take home first if only we had the chance?

  He’d been right when he said we used to be able to talk, just us. We’d been able to hang out and text each other without freaking out about wh
ether we should include Penny. But when they’d started to date, it had changed everything.

  It wasn’t just me and him, or me and Penny. It became the three of us together, no secret too secret. Everything was laid bare between us. Nothing was secret, but we couldn’t be open with each other anymore, either. Chad was right. When had any one of us really talked?

  It was only group texts from then on, and hanging out became a trio activity. We’d made a few Golden Trio jokes—Penny insisted she was Harry, even though we all knew she was a total Slytherin—and at first, I hadn’t seen it. That Penny couldn’t, or wouldn’t, trust us on our own.

  The stare I exchanged with Penny had turned into a stalemate. I couldn’t say anything, not if I didn’t know what the right answer was. I was keenly aware of the dull, throbbing beats of my heart.

  The silence had lingered too long. Enough for Lucy’s friendly smile to waver into something awkward and uncertain. I wondered if she even knew what a minefield her innocent suggestion had been.

  “Sure,” I said at long last. I was testing the waters, so I made sure not to look away, not even to blink. “I mean, if you’re sure you’re not going to do it. The competition. With Chad.”

  “Uh, I don’t think so.” Penny’s face betrayed nothing. “So, Luce, I’ll just take my usual to go.”

  The couple sitting at one of the tables by the door scraped back their chairs. While Lucy began preparing Penny’s drink, I headed to clean up the mess. Some coffee had spilled onto the table, milky liquid pooled in the dents and gouges of the wood. I took my sweet time clearing up. After carrying the used cups and plates back to the dishwasher, I swept away muffin crumbs and sopped up the coffee. By the time I was done, Penny had already gone. A glance out the window told me she was biking away. My heart twinged—this morning could definitely have gone better.

  I wrung out the rag in the sink. Coffee dribbled down the drain in a steady brown stream.

  “Is everything okay with you two?” asked Lucy. “It’s just … I kind of feel like I stuck my foot in it back there. About you and Chad?”

  I squeezed the rag even harder. “Nah, everything’s good.”

  “You sure?” she pressed.

  It wasn’t my place to tell Lucy that my friends had broken up, and that I’d been way more involved in the process than I wanted to be. I shifted my feet, leaving the rag draped over the sink. “It’s fine, we’re fine, it’s all fine,” I said through a smile, although the words were more for myself than for her.

  We’re fine, we’re fine, we’re fine became my new mantra, although the repetition did zero to convince me. Partly because I already had the feeling deep in my gut that we weren’t.

  * * *

  “Oh, shit. Babe.” Lucy glanced at the wall clock. Both hands had aligned at the twelve. “Don’t you have to go check in the dude who’s renting your mom’s house?”

  “I almost forgot about that. I can’t believe it’s noon already.” It felt like just a few minutes since Penny had left. “I better get moving.”

  “Fingers crossed he’s cute!”

  “Are cute boys all you think about?”

  She rolled her eyes. “It’s the only thing worth thinking about.”

  I rushed for the door. “Back soon!”

  “You better. I’m not crazy about handling the lunch rush by myself!” Lucy called after me.

  I made my way along the boardwalk toward my mom’s house. My old house looked out on the beach, painted the color of lacy green fronds. The door was burgundy, and in front of it stood a boy. When he turned around, my eyes widened.

  “You!”

  It was the boy from Busy’s, the one I had dubbed Mystery Boy yesterday. His eyes lit up with recognition, and the wood creaked as he stepped off the porch.

  “Me,” he agreed, using his thumb to point over his shoulder. “I wasn’t expecting the cute waitress to follow me home.” A faint smile played on his lips.

  I breezed past the word cute with an awkward laugh. “I didn’t follow you. This is my house. Well, my mom’s house. I’m here to check you in.”

  Now it was his turn to laugh. “I guess that makes you my landlady.”

  “I guess that makes you Levi Keller.”

  He nodded and pulled a folded square from his back pocket, smoothing it out against his thigh before handing it to me.

  My eyes skimmed the email confirmation. “Looks like everything’s in order.” I glanced at him. “You should have given me a call yesterday. I would have let you in early.”

  The corner of his mouth quirked up. “It wasn’t a big deal.” He tilted his head to the car parked at the curb. “I didn’t want to bother anyone. I didn’t really think ahead when I decided to drive here early,” he said with a rueful smile.

  I swallowed. Maybe if he’d given me that call, I wouldn’t have gone to Penny’s place. Rationally, I knew I couldn’t blame Levi, but the unwelcome thought had taken hold: Everything that had happened last night could have been avoided.

  “Anyway, my car was comfortable enough for one night.” Even his eyes seemed to smile at me.

  I moved past him to slide the key into the lock. From here, I could smell the clean detergent that clung to his clothing. My stomach fluttered. It was just the sweet smell of laundry. Why was I so hyperaware of it? I twisted the doorknob. Hard. “Come on in.”

  I didn’t know much about him. All Mom had told me was that our renter was in Oar’s Rest on an eight-week grant sponsored by the local artist colony and the historical society. Since the house was empty after I’d moved into the lighthouse, Mom decided to rent it out for some extra cash. Levi would be the first one to stay there.

  Wait. I knew his name from somewhere. I rifled through my memories, hunting him down. The answer pressed gently against my mind, and I grasped at it, pulling tight. Cotton candy perfume and a laugh like a fairy tale. The bouncy, natural curls falling across her brown shoulders as she leaned forward, snatching the macaron from my hand.

  One day I’ll be in Paris for an art show and I’ll eat these every day.

  If Ladurée’s are better than mine, you’d better not tell me, El.

  C’est impossible! Your macaron is magnifique!

  I remembered her feigning a look of total horror that any macaron could be better than mine, even if they came from the most famous pâtisserie in Paris. At the time, I’d glided past her Paris-for-one future, even though it was pretty much the most glaring writing on the wall I could have asked for.

  I was trying to be cool and unaffected, but inside, my heart hammered in relentless beats. How had I missed this? Levi Keller. It had been a name I’d heard on and off when I’d been with Elodie, but it had faded from my mind in the last year we’d been apart. I sneaked a covert look at Levi. Was it him?

  I could remember El lounging on my couch, scrolling through his Instagram feed on so many of our secret dates that it felt like she was in a relationship with the wrong person. The last time she’d done it, I’d dragged my head up from her lap and asked her to come back to me, please. She’d kissed me, quick and sweet, said “Just a sec,” and gone back to her phone. It was only when I got up that she snagged my wrist and let her phone slide into the gap between the cushions. I’m right here, Babe. I’m not going anywhere. C’mon, don’t be mad. And I couldn’t be. Not at her, and not for long. At least back then.

  Levi took a delicate sniff, then crinkled his nose like he was about to sneeze.

  The house smelled like pine, thanks to the trio of overpowering scented candles on the mantelpiece. Memories accompanied the nostalgic fragrance: me, Chad, and Penny doubled over in laughter on the couch, watching C-list slasher flicks; Mom coming home late from her hostess job in Bar Harbor, but never too late to still spend time with me before bed. Our couch was imprinted with the memories of many midnight hot chocolates, Mom’s favorite drink, and her firm insistence that neither of us would go to bed until my homework was done.

  The entry was small, and Levi and I bump
ed shoulders. A frisson of electricity went through my arm. I glanced at him from the corner of my eye, but he hadn’t seemed to notice.

  A leather couch and two armchairs pointed toward the TV stand, and a laminated list of emergency numbers was underneath the remote. Painted driftwood from last summer’s art exhibition hung on the walls, and there were probably more oversize shells on our shelves than actual books. Mom really loved playing up the seaside cottage aesthetic.

  “Wow, this is great. I like the look in here,” he said, glancing at the gigantic seashells and glossy photography books on the kitschy Americana center table.

  I gave him a walk-through, explaining which knobs to fiddle with on our ancient washing machine, and pointing out the closest grocery store from the second-floor hallway window. He seemed especially impressed with the view of the beach from the master bedroom.

  “So,” I said once we were back downstairs, “there’s milk and eggs in the fridge, bread on the counter, and some menus on the dining table if you want to eat out. There’s also stuff for coffee and tea in the cupboards, and you can just help yourself to anything else you find in here.”

  “Thank you,” said Levi, ducking his head into the kitchen for a quick glance. “That’s really nice. I wasn’t expecting a welcome package.”

  There was no reason for me to linger, and yet my feet were stuck to the floor. I searched my mind for something—anything—to say that would keep the conversation going, but what came out was: “So, art, huh?”

  Oh my God, did I just—

  Levi’s lips twitched like he was fighting back a grin. “Art,” he replied gravely.

  “Cool.” I swallowed, feeling my cheeks warm. “So, uh, my phone number is on the contact list next to the TV. If you have any questions, feel free to call. I hope you have a pleasant stay.”

  “I’m sure I will.” His blue eyes held mine.

  Realizing I hadn’t told him my name yet, I added, “I’m B—”

  He cut me off. “Wait, I’m good at this. Bella!”

  “Uh, no.” My left eyebrow scrunched.

  “Becca? Becky?”