I hear him murmur a quiet, “I’m really sorry.”
“Don’t be. I’m just glad you’re doing so well,” she says, and smiles again when he gives her a chaste kiss on the cheek.
The mood seems to ease a little after this. Even Harlow allows herself a tiny smile at him as everyone shifts over to make room on the blanket, with the enormous picnic lunch in the middle. Luke sits cross-legged beside Lola, and of course it ends up that I take my seat directly between Luke and Margot.
My heart is in my throat. I feel like I’m in a fishbowl, every movement being cataloged and analyzed. Am I sitting too close to him? Acting too familiar? Do I look like I’ve seen him naked? Like I’m imagining it now?
The food is passed around and Margot and the girls jump into easy conversation while Luke and I keep our eyes pinned on the picnic blanket.
When I finally have my nerves under control and look up, Lola catches my eye and smiles a little in reassurance. In her expression, I read the You two are adorable look there. And she’s right: he is fucking adorable. It surprises me how happy I am to see him, but also how much it suddenly sucks that I can’t really enjoy it without pissing off someone really important to me. For her part, Harlow doesn’t seem to be too worried about it; she’s not even looking at us.
“So let me get this straight.” Margot blinks from Luke to me as she unwraps a sandwich. “London said she had to work so she didn’t have to hang out with you?” She is clearly delighted.
One side of Luke’s mouth turns up as he slides his eyes to me. “Apparently.”
It is obvious to me that it would never occur to Margot or Luke that this would be at all weird, and it makes me like them both, just a little bit more.
“Okay, okay,” Margot says, moving to her knees to pull her phone from her back pocket. “Just let me put this in my calendar.” She starts typing. “ ‘The day . . . the tables were turned . . . on my dear, sweet brother . . . and a girl made up a work story . . . so she didn’t have to spend time with him.’ ” She taps her screen once more as if saving it, and smiles. “There. Noted.”
“Don’t forget to send a group text,” he tells her. “Wouldn’t want to leave Mom and Grams out of the loop.”
She turns her phone to face him. “Oh, the group window is already open.”
Luke shrugs good-naturedly and takes a bite out of his sandwich. “I’m man enough to take this.”
I glance over at Mia and see she’s grinning ear to ear. “At least this time your shame was not captured on film.”
“Oh my God, I forgot about that Homecoming!” Harlow says.
“You think I was ashamed of that?” Luke asks, leaning closer to me. So close that our arms touch from shoulder to elbow.
He’s including me.
He’s making it clear he’s here for me.
He’s saying something to me, and he’s saying something to Mia and all her friends: that is our history. This is my now.
My heart trips over itself, but falls down down down inside my chest when I feel Harlow’s gaze on my face.
I look over to her, redirecting her stern attention. “Okay, what happened at Homecoming?” I ask.
Mia is already laughing, and the sound diffuses the tiny slip of tension that—thankfully—Luke and Margot have yet to notice. “So it’s halftime. Keep in mind, this is our senior year, so the boys give exactly zero shits about good behavior at this point. Everyone’s up in the stands waiting for the drill team to come out, and this group of naked guys wearing masks burst out onto the field.”
I glance at Luke, and realize I’ve been unconsciously leaning just a tiny bit into him. He smells clean, and warm. I smell his soap, and remember how different it was on my own skin. He’s blushing, high along his cheekbones, visible even beneath his tan. He looks like he’s barely keeping himself from laughing, too.
Margot nods. “The local newspaper was there—about two thousand parents with zoom lenses, too—and it was like wagging penis—camera flash—ass—camera flash. Our aunt recognized his butt from the photos Grams sent out to the entire family.” She can barely get the last word out before she falls over, giggling.
“Oh my God,” I say to him. “What were you thinking?”
“Look,” Luke says, gesturing down the length of his body. “Sometimes you just can’t keep the beast contained, okay?”
There’s a collective groan and now everyone has completely lost it, Lola laughing so hard she looks like she can barely breathe. “He had to do community service at the senior center and spent the summer having his butt pinched by old ladies who’d already seen it in the newspaper.”
“I can’t believe I forgot about that,” Margot says, and reaches up to swipe away a few tears. “Oh my God, I’m crying.”
“My sides,” Harlow says, leaning forward to catch her breath.
“I do what I can,” Luke says. He looks completely unfazed by all of this as he takes a giant bite of his sandwich and I can’t help but be impressed. It also occurs to me that I haven’t seen him look at his phone once, and I wonder if that has anything to do with his sister being with him.
Finally recovered, Harlow turns her attention to Luke. “So now that that’s out of the way,” she says, and dabs at the mascara just under her eyes. “What have you been doing with yourself?” I hold my breath, but exhale quietly when she says only, “I heard you were going to law school?”
“Hopefully,” he says. Luke explains that he’s a law clerk—Margot cuts in to brag that he works for the biggest transactional law firm in San Diego County—and that he barely has time to use the bathroom without taking files into the stall with him. He’s hoping to attend law school in the fall. “My mommy and sister made sure I mailed off my applications,” he says with a grin aimed at his sister, “so we’ll see what happens.”
Harlow points her water bottle at him. “That is such a coincidence because you know Mia’s husband is an attorney.”
“Subtle, Harlow,” Lola says, and puts another cupcake in her hand. “Why don’t you shove this in your mouth for a while?”
“What?” she says, but takes the second cupcake nonetheless. “It’s an interesting bit of trivia, don’t you think?”
“I know this,” Luke says, “because I ran into him on campus the other day and went up to talk to him. He seems like a great guy.”
Everyone goes still, except Luke, who casually takes another bite of his sandwich, and Mia, who seems to already know this story.
“He is,” Mia says, smiling at him with such gratitude it makes my throat go tight in relief for both of them.
Lola hands out more cupcakes to everyone and the others continue to catch up, talking about Harlow’s mom’s recovery from a double mastectomy and chemo, Margot’s teaching job, about Finn and Ansel, and, of course, about Luke, when he turns to me, leaning in.
“You owe me, you know,” he says, and I feel my brows disappear into my hair.
“I owe you?”
“Calm down there, Zurich. I don’t mean like that. I mean that you lied to me and just gave my sister enough ammunition to last her through the summer.”
“Hey, don’t look at me,” I say, unable to hold in my smile. “It’s not my fault you offer up so much amazing material. You’re a comedic gold mine.”
“And yet you ignore the fact that you lied.” His brows draw down, but even so, he can’t remove the smile from his eyes. “That wasn’t very nice.”
He has a point. “You’re right, but in my defense I was just trying to keep your expectations manageable. I didn’t want you to think there was anything between us that could lead to—”
He holds up a hand to stop me. “We’re not doing that. I know.” Surprisingly, he glances at Harlow and then back to me. Maybe he catches more than he’s letting on? “And I get it. But even you have to admit that this—hanging out?—doesn’t completely suck, right?”
“Way to set the bar high there, superstar.”
He laughs. “You know what I
mean.”
I pick at the wrapper of my cupcake. “It doesn’t suck,” I admit.
“You just said I was right. I’m sort of mortified by how happy that makes me.” He leans in again, nodding to Margot. “Don’t tell my sister.”
“Your secret is safe with me.”
Luke reaches for a piece of my cupcake and I let him, watching as he tears off a chunk and pops it into his mouth. A smear of white frosting colors his bottom lip, and he flicks out the tip of his tongue, licking it off. He watches me watching him with a knowing smirk.
I swallow, and can only hope it’s not as loud as I imagine. Lola—who by all accounts is totally engaged in the other conversation—covertly squeezes my hand on the blanket behind Luke’s back. She is such an enabler.
I clear my throat, and busy myself wiping imaginary crumbs from my shorts. “So what have you been up to?”
“Let’s see . . . I texted you”—he says with a teasing smile—“feel free to answer those anytime. Practiced up on my video games, did some laundry, hung out at my mom’s house, and jerked off a few times.” He pauses and his brows come together. “Absolutely not in that order.”
I cough out a laugh. “I was going to say . . .”
“Uh, yeah. Let’s rebrand that conversation and edit out that last part.” He reaches for another piece of cupcake, and I hold it out for him.
“Thanks,” he says.
I glance over at his sister, who seems deep in conversation with the girls. “It’s really great how much time you spend with your family.”
“Did you know my room at home still looks exactly like it did when I was sixteen?”
“Really?”
He nods. “Most of my friends’ parents have turned theirs into a den or a sewing room or something, but nothing has changed. My awkward adolescence has been preserved like an archeological dig.”
“I can’t tell if that’s terrifying or intriguing,” I tell him.
“My bed is in the same place, the posters on the wall, even the corkboard I made in shop when I was in eighth grade is still there, complete with friendship bracelets, concert tickets, and dance photos. I think there’s even the condom wrapper I used when I lost my virginity,” he says, narrowing his eyes like he’s trying to remember. As if it just occurs to him what that would mean, he glances quickly over to Mia, his cheeks coloring again.
“Wow, that’s . . . nostalgic.” It’s a little weird to hear him talk about this, if I’m being honest. My family life is nothing like his.
He shakes his head. “I’m sure my mom doesn’t even know it’s there. I didn’t even realize until I was looking for a phone number last summer and found it tucked between a Tower of Terror Fastpass from 2009 and a ticket stub from a Tom Petty concert.”
“That’s sort of amazing,” I say, picking at a blade of grass. “I’d been gone less than a month and my mom had my room turned into a craft cave.”
“I don’t know what I’d do if I couldn’t go home,” he says quietly. “Like, I go back there and I’m twelve years old again. I can lie on my bed and look up at the pages I tore out of the 2002 Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Edition—Yamila Diaz-Rahi was on the cover, just in case you were wondering—the poster of a Lamborghini I swore I’d own by the time I was eighteen,” he says with a roll of his eyes. “And I can just be dumb and pretend like nothing else matters.”
“I think I’m jealous of your cool room.”
“Let’s make a deal,” he says, and licks a smear of frosting from his thumb. “I’ll let you hang out in my room when real life blows, provided you let me feel you up at least once while you’re there. Twelve-year-old me would be really impressed with that.”
“And they say chivalry is dead.”
“Dear God, you would get along with my Grams. I’m actually a little afraid of what would happen with you, my sister, my mom, and her all in one room. Frankly, I don’t think I’m man enough to handle it.”
I’m just about to tell Luke that that sounds like a bet I’d be willing to take, when he casually reaches for his phone.
Though it’s clearly been on silent, the screen is alive with notifications. I have no idea when he checked it last, but he’s been with us a good twenty minutes. There have to be at least a dozen alerts there. I feel myself frown and I’m not even sure why.
“So what are you guys up to after this?” he asks, and I wonder if he even notices how he carries on a conversation while scrolling through the screen, practiced eyes flicking down and then back up again.
“Actually,” I say, and push myself to my knees, “I should probably get going.”
“You have to go?” he says, and immediately tosses his phone to the blanket. He looks disappointed and I have to knock down my tiny, thrilled reaction.
Harlow meets my eyes and—despite the weirdness between us and the cool distance I still catch in her eyes—I’m reminded again why she’s one of my favorite people in the world. It’s like a bat signal must have gone off above my head because within seconds she’s up, looking at her watch and giving some excuse about why we have to leave.
Mia follows suit, helping Lola load up the basket and fold the blanket.
“So when will we all see each other again?” Margot says to the girls, getting out her own phone to check her calendar. They make plans and Luke pulls me over to the side.
“Are you working tomorrow?” he asks.
I consider lying, but decide there’s really no point. I like Luke, I want to be friends with Luke. Harlow can’t really have a problem with it, and aside from that, what he does with whoever is on his phone or otherwise is none of my business. “Yeah,” I tell him, adding, “at Fred’s.”
“My liver’s had a break, so maybe I’ll stop by.”
He can be so cute when he wants to, it’s really annoying. “I’ll be there. Be sure and bring lots of dollar bills. That car isn’t going to pay for itself.”
“You can always start stripping,” he says, and then Margot is there, cutting in front of him.
“It was really great to meet you. Anytime you want to help me drive this guy to drink, just call me.” She surprises me by pulling me into a hug and I hug her back, meeting Luke’s eyes over her shoulder.
“It’s becoming my new favorite pastime,” I tell her. “Maybe we can start a club.”
Chapter TEN
Luke
“NO THANK YOU,” Grams says as Mom carries the serving dish to where she sits. “No asparagus for me, Julie. Those white ones make me feel like I’m eating tiny penises.”
Dad chokes on a sip of wine and Margot’s eyes shoot up to the ceiling while she struggles to keep from laughing.
Our dining room is bright and expansive, with thick cream wallpaper and a large chandelier hanging over a hand-carved cherry table. The décor is way too nice for the kinds of conversations that go down in here when my grandmother is around.
I smile adoringly at my grandmother. “You’re a poet, Grams.”
“Mom,” Dad says in warning, and then looks at me. “Don’t encourage her.”
“What?” Her milky blue eyes widen innocently at him across the table. “Have you looked at them, Bill? It’s been forever since I changed your diaper or wiped your butt, so I’m not suggesting it looks like your—”
“Can you pass the bread?” Margot interrupts.
Grams picks up the bread bowl with a shaky hand and passes it to my sister. “Honestly.” She shakes her head. “Penises are the strangest-looking organ. If being a lesbian had been an option in my day, I would have definitely gone that direction.” She waves a hand. “Not that I didn’t love cleaning up after my feral children and cooking for your father for fifty years.”
“Oh boy,” Margot mumbles.
“Female bodies are so much more pleasant,” Grams muses. “With the breasts and legs and whatnot.”
I laugh into my water glass.
“You should laugh,” Grams says, pointing a delicate, withered finger at me. “You love your peni
s more than anything in the world.”
I raise my brows as if to say, Well, you’re not wrong, but Mom lets out a tiny squeak. “Anne,” she says quietly, “Luke doesn’t . . .”
The sentence hangs there and the silence bounces around between us.
“Doesn’t what?” Grams asks into the abyss. “Love his penis? Don’t be thick. Margot tells me Luke hasn’t had a girlfriend in years, but look at that smile.” She points at me again. “No boy his age smiles like that without a lot of willing ladies around, if you catch my meaning.”
“She has a point,” I say.
“Luke Graham Sutter,” Mom whisper-hisses. “Honestly.”
“There may be a change happening,” Margot says, and then slides a stalk of asparagus between her teeth, biting down savagely. I wince. Chewing, she says, “Remember that text I sent you the other day? Luke has a crush on a girl.”
Time stops. Forks go silent. Jaws drop open and dust settles.
“Jesus Christ,” I groan, stabbing a bite of chicken.
“Watch your mouth, son,” Dad says under his breath.
I glare at my sister. “You’re on a tear lately, Margot. Are you trying to push me out of this state?”
“Well, what do I have to lose?” she asks. “You’re running out of willing sexual partners in Southern California. Unless you just cycle through them again and forget their na—”
I cut her off with a low “Margot.”
“Luker?” Mom asks me, ignoring this. “You have a girlfriend?”
“No,” Margot answers for me. “There’s a girl who refuses him, but he loooooves her.”
“Are you twelve?” I ask.
My sister winks at me.
“Bubbles?” Mom addresses me again and the delicate hope in her voice makes something between my ribs grow tight.
“You guys,” I say, putting down my fork. “Can we all agree it isn’t healthy that you’re all so invested in me settling down? I’m twenty-three. I graduated last summer.”
“You were just so happy with Mia,” Dad explains.
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