Lara reached up and covered her mouth. “Is that true?” she asked through her hand.
Drew smiled. “Um, maybe.”
She fished the errant bit of fruit off her tooth with her tongue. “Why didn’t you tell me?” she demanded.
“Well,” Drew admitted, “it sort of made me feel more comfortable. Like, you looked so beautiful that it was actually making me shy. So when you got that blue front tooth, it kind of made you more…approachable.”
Lara reached out and swatted his shoulder. “You idiot,” she laughed. “I’m always approachable. And you’ve approached me plenty of times, if you know what I mean.” Her voice was full of sexual innuendo, which Drew clearly understood.
“Yeah,” he said, grinning. “And I want to approach you again, as soon as possible.” Under the table, his hand reached out and caressed her knee, then slid a few inches up her thigh.
Lara felt goose bumps rise on her skin and her breath came light and fast. She wanted to be alone with him—she wanted to fall onto a bed with him in a tangle of limbs and hungry mouths. Yes, she knew what she wanted now, and what she wanted was Drew. She wanted to share their secret love with everyone. But there was something she needed to do first.
The sun was setting as Lara approached the bobbing white shape of Marco’s boat. She stood uncertainly on the dock as Marco, unaware of her presence, polished the shining oak of the helm. After a moment, she cleared her throat.
Marco turned around, startled. “Oh,” he said happily, “it’s you!”
Lara looked down at the dock, at her high, uncomfortable sandals. This wasn’t going to be easy, so she might as well get it over with as quickly as she could.
“I came here to tell you something,” she said. Marco raised his eyebrows expectantly, and she summoned her courage and barreled on. “I think you’re really great and I’ve loved hanging out with you. You’re funny and smart and you’re a great sailor and a wonderful big brother to Marcela and I admire you so much.”
Marco frowned. “I think I know where this is going,” he said, tossing the rag he’d been using to the floor of the boat. He looked down at his feet and his shoulders slumped. He seemed to shrink two inches in height.
Lara nodded sadly. “I’m sorry,” she whispered. She fingered her crystal necklace from Drew nervously. “I can’t see you anymore.”
Marco nodded and Lara just stood there, not knowing what else to say. She felt a little better than she had before she’d made her decision—but she still felt pretty terrible.
“Wow,” Marco breathed. “I don’t know what to say.”
Then a cold but familiar voice broke the silence between them. “That’s really too bad.”
Lara whirled around, her heart pounding. Drew stood behind her, his face as dark as a thunderstorm over the Atlantic.
“I can’t believe you did this to me,” he said, his eyes blazing. “To us.”
Lara was speechless with shock. Drew stared at her for another interminable minute, and then, without saying another word, he turned and stalked back to shore.
Lara held out her hands to Marco, who by now was looking just as furious.
“So you were with him all along, too?” he asked, shaking his head bitterly. “Wow. Can I say that again? I know some girls like to get around—you know, like they say, a guy in every port—but I wouldn’t have thought you’d be that kind of girl.”
“I’m not,” Lara cried. “Marco, I’m not!”
But she knew the evidence was against her.
Marco bent down and began to polish the helm again with angry energy.
“Marco?” she asked querulously. “Really, you have to understand—”
“I think we’re done here,” he responded without looking at her at all. “See you around, Lara.”
And there was nothing for her to do but walk away, as her tears blurred the shapes of the sailboats and the white wings of the hovering seagulls.
24
“I just can’t even believe it,” Jessica moaned. “It’s like some after-school special gone horribly wrong.”
She lay on Greer’s bed, on the impossibly soft, 600-thread-count Egyptian cotton sheets Greer had brought with her from New York, and stared up at the ceiling in misery. The fan whirred, blowing cool air on her hot cheeks. She had stopped sobbing, but her body was still wracked by the occasional teary hiccup.
Greer handed her a cool washcloth, which she took gratefully and placed on her forehead like her mom used to do when she had a fever. “I just can’t believe it,” Jessica said again. “He told me he loved me, and then he went and got another girl pregnant. I mean, it’s completely insane.”
Greer made an unintelligible answering murmur. Playing therapist was not Greer’s strong suit; Jessica realized that. But she was desperate to talk, desperate to have someone explain to her how everything had gone so wrong when it had started out so right. And then the lyrics to that Ziggy Marley song that Mike Tuttle always played popped into her mind without warning: Some people got the wrong right, some people got the right wrong…She shook her head to banish the melody. What was it about the human brain that made it recall stupid things in times of crisis? She supposed it was a defense mechanism of some sort, but it was annoying. She didn’t want to be distracted. Because even though the memory of the events at the barbecue hurt, she wanted to keep going over the scene: Connor’s betrayal, her own response, Lily’s freak-out.
Jessica couldn’t wrap her mind around it, no matter how hard she tried. Connor—the cute, sweet, and wonderful guy she was supposed to lose her virginity to—was more of a player than Greer’s Hunter Brown. And even worse, he was going to be a dad.
With that, the tears came again and she didn’t bother to wipe them away. She could feel her mascara running down her face, but she didn’t care at all.
Greer reached out and patted Jessica’s knee. “It’s going to be okay,” she offered. “I mean, not right away, but eventually it will.”
Jessica sniffled and said nothing. She stared at the ceiling fan as it circled around and around and felt the tears trickling down into her ears, and then she rolled over onto her side and stared out the window to the blue-green water a few hundred yards away. Suddenly she wished she were back home in Ithaca, in her warm and cluttered bedroom, instead of this clean, white room with its ivory-colored aromatherapy candles and its spare, modern furniture.
She kicked at the jacquard comforter in sudden anger. “I hate this place,” she cried.
“It’s going to be okay, I promise,” Greer repeated, getting up and fetching Jessica a glass of water from the bathroom. “Here.”
Jessica waved the water away. “Just dump it on that damn rug,” she said. “Or pour it onto that stupid ottoman over there. What’s an ottoman doing in this room, anyway? There’s no chair that goes with it. Who designed this stupid place?”
“Someone with a minimalist’s sense of decor,” Greer said quietly. “I think it’s classic, actually.”
Jessica was about to launch into a tirade against minimalism, whatever that was, when she heard the door open and the sound of a purse being flung to the floor.
“Damn it.” Lara’s voice sounded weird and strained.
Jessica leaned her head back over the edge of the bed—which made her nose feel even more stuffed up—and saw, upside down, the figure of her stepcousin. Mascara was running down her cheeks, too, and Jessica realized why her voice had sounded so strange: It, too, was thick with tears.
“Oh, no,” Greer exclaimed, getting up. “What happened?”
Lara wiped her eyes angrily. “I need to talk to you, Greer,” she said. Then she looked at Jessica, completely ignoring the younger girl’s obvious distress. “I need to talk to you alone,” she clarified.
At that, Jessica sat up, indignation momentarily banishing her sorrow. “What do you mean, alone? What is it that I can’t hear?”
Lara shot Greer a look; Greer shrugged.
“Hey,” Jessica nearly shou
ted. “I can see the significant looks you guys are sharing over there. I’m not blind.” She put her hands on her hips and stood her full five feet eight inches. “And you know what I think? I think that whatever you have to say to Greer, Lara, you can say to me, too.”
Jessica tried to seem fierce, but the fact was that she’d never stood up to her cousins like this, and she was a little bit scared about how they would react.
Lara turned to her, her blue eyes blazing. “I don’t have to tell you everything, Jessica,” she responded, taking off her sweater and throwing it onto the floor. “And if I did tell you, you’d only get more upset. And I just don’t feel like dealing with it right now, okay?” A big tear slid down her cheek and landed on the front of her pretty gold tank top.
Seeing that, Jessica softened. She didn’t want Lara to feel bad—one of them drowning in misery was more than enough. “Try me,” she said. Her voice was gentle.
Greer and Lara exchanged another one of their looks, and Jessica tried not to be annoyed. In the quiet room, the air seemed to crackle with tension.
Lara kicked off her high-heeled sandals and sank onto the lower bunk bed with a heavy sigh. “Fine,” she said. “You really want to know?”
Jessica nodded.
Lara bit her lip, then spoke quickly, the words tumbling over one another. “I tried to end things with Marco and Drew overheard and now I’ve lost both of them.”
“Oh, no,” Greer whispered.
But Jessica could only stare. Marco? Who the hell was Marco? Had Lara been seeing another guy this summer? But what about Drew? She opened her mouth, but nothing came out. Her poor brother! He’d quit his job and come to Pebble Beach just to be with Lara, and she’d repaid him by cheating?
She realized that she was heading toward the door, and she watched her hand as it reached out and turned the knob. She couldn’t be in the room anymore, not with those two. She’d had enough betrayals for the evening. In fact, she’d had enough betrayals to last for the rest of her life. First Connor and Lily, then Lara running around on Drew. And Lara not telling her, and Greer knowing and not telling her—it was all so awful she couldn’t stand it.
“Jess, where are you going?” Greer’s voice was uncharacteristically soft and pleading.
Jessica whirled around, her blonde ponytail whipping against the doorframe. “Away,” she hissed. “So you two can keep having your horrible secrets. I don’t want to hear any more of them.”
“Jessica, please wait,” Lara called.
But Jessica didn’t hear her, because she was already out the door.
25
Greer yawned and stretched, wriggling her toes under the blankets in sleepy pleasure. She’d just had the best dream: She and Hunter had sailed out to one of the tiny rocky islands that dotted the water beyond Pebble Beach, and then they’d strolled along the shore as the salty waves splashed their feet. Then, out of nowhere, a beautiful red bird had appeared in front of them, and the bird told them that it was going to start growing very quickly, and that when it got big enough, it would take them across the ocean to a different island where they would be given a castle to live in.
Greer snuggled deeper into the covers and tried closing her eyes again so she could pick up where the dream had left off. But she was startled by a crash from down in the kitchen—likely Uncle Carr, attempting to wield the giant cast iron skillet to make scrambled eggs—which meant that, like it or not, she was awake for good.
As the spell of the dream lifted, Greer’s mood sank. She wasn’t going to be able to live on a beautiful island with a Hunter and a giant red bird because Hunter wasn’t speaking to her. Jessica, who was not as desirable a dream companion but who was nevertheless one of Greer’s favorite people, was also not speaking to her. And, to top it all off, Greer’s own mother had been avoiding her for weeks now.
Everything sucked.
Greer swung her long legs over the bed and tucked her feet into her pink silk slippers. The room was empty; as usual, she’d slept later than both of her cousins. As she stepped into the bathroom to begin her morning routine (face washed with Dr. Hauschka Rose Facial Scrub, toned with L’Oréal HydraFresh Toner, and moisturized with La Prairie Skin Caviar Luxe Cream), Greer thought about Cassandra. The weird thing was, before the whole Hunter blowup, her mom had been nicer to her than she ever had been before. When her parents were together, it seemed like Cassandra could hardly make time for Greer in between her appointments at Frederic Fekkai, her shopping sprees at Barneys and Bergdorf’s, and her lunches with other rich and idle women. But when they got to Pebble Beach, suddenly Cassandra wanted to eat breakfast with Greer, and take walks with her, and tennis lessons, and long drives through the Maine countryside. When she wasn’t throwing herself at men, of course, Greer thought.
Still, it made Greer feel like the worst daughter ever. Her mother had finally decided to pay some attention to her and she’d repaid her by accusing her of fooling around with an 18-year-old boy. Greer scrubbed her face vigorously, as if this would help her wipe away her bad behavior as well as any dead skin cells.
The water she splashed on her cheeks was bracingly chilly. She buried her face in a soft blue towel, and then peeked over the top of it to meet her hazel gaze in the mirror.
“Greer Hallsey,” she whispered, “you are going to apologize to your mother.”
That was what her father used to say, and Greer had always resented it. But this time, she knew that it was what she needed to do.
She finished the rest of her grooming routine and then she pulled on a pair of wide-legged shorts and a fitted green top. She made the uncharacteristic decision to leave the room without makeup—not that she’d ever leave the house that way, of course, but she didn’t think it was necessary to have a layer of foundation and a dozen other products on her face while she went to talk to her mother.
As she padded down the hallway, she heard another loud crash from the kitchen, followed by a softer expletive. Yes, it was Uncle Carr, making his breakfast. He made amazing scrambled eggs—they made the ones at Balthazar seem about as flavorful as yellow packing peanuts—but still, Greer couldn’t understand why he insisted on using a pan so heavy he seemed to drop it every time he tried to pick it up.
Not that that was her problem, of course. Her problem was much more complicated. But she aimed to make it better, starting with Cassandra Hallsey.
As she climbed the stairs to the house’s top story, she saw a large ficus tree positioned outside her mother’s door like a sentry. Brushing past its shiny leaves, she knocked gently.
“Clare, is that you?” Cassandra Hallsey called. “Because I already told you, I don’t want to go to that flea market you’re so fascinated by. I went to a flea market once when I was a kid, in New Jersey, and that was more than enough for me. People setting up tables to try to sell their trash to other people? I just don’t get it. Now, if you were offering to take me to a Neiman Marcus, say, I could probably find something I wanted.”
Greer felt a little smile tremble on her lips. Her mother was…Well, she just was who she was. She pushed open the door. “Mom?” she whispered.
Cassandra was curled up in a deep armchair underneath one of the skylights. The rays of the sun slanted down on her coppery hair, making it glow, but Greer could see that there were dark shadows under her eyes.
“Oh, it’s you,” her mother said, her tone unreadable.
Greer watched as her mother rose and walked over to the dresser, where she pulled out a sweater and tied it around her shoulders. Cassandra was wearing an outfit the likes of which Greer had never seen on her before: heavy cotton yoga pants, a high-necked, long-sleeved, blue T-shirt, and what looked like a pair of orthopedic sandals. With socks.
“Oh, my God,” Greer said. “What—” She was going to say, “What happened to you?” but she realized that might not sound very nice. She cleared her throat and began again. “You look, um, comfortable,” she offered.
Cassandra gave her a mirthless smil
e but said nothing. She returned to her chair and folded her legs underneath her. Beside her on the table was the latest issue of Town & Country and a copy of a book called WTF?: Speaking the Foreign Language of Your Teenage Children.
Greer pointed to the volume, which had a lurid pink cover. “Does it tell you that ‘sick’ means awesome? Or that ‘crib’ means house?” she asked lightheartedly.
Cassandra gave her a long look. “It says that in teenagers, the frontal lobes of the brain are undergoing a process of maturation, which renders them essentially useless until they get a little bit older. The frontal lobes, in case you didn’t know, are the brain parts that help you control your impulses and make good judgments. In other words, they’re what makes you a good, kind person.” She stopped and raised her eyebrows at Greer expectantly.
Wow, Greer thought. Mom sounds like my shrink. She sat down on the bed across from her mother and folded her hands together. “I guess my frontal lobes are still under construction,” she admitted. Cassandra nodded slightly, and Greer took a deep breath and went on. “If I’d stopped to think about it—which I didn’t—I would have known that you’d never hit on Hunter. I never should have accused you like that, and I’m sorry. I wish I could take it back.” Because I hurt you, Greer thought, but also because I hurt Hunter. And I can’t just walk into his bedroom and apologize.
Her mother took a sip of her coffee and then set the cup back into its saucer with a clink. “I appreciate your apology,” she said softly.
“Actually I’m not done,” Greer told her. “I want to apologize for being sort of hard on you all summer. I mean, I know you were just trying to have a nice time out here. And I should have been better about letting you do that.”
A faint smile began to dance across her mother’s lips. “Well, you did have a point when you told me that I shouldn’t wear your miniskirts. I mean, let’s face it, I’m a far cry from eighteen.” Cassandra paused. “But more seriously, Greer, I realize that I was not on my best behavior this summer, either. I shouldn’t have been so…flirtatious. For instance, I should have done a better job of covering up these.” Here she pointed to her chest and smiled. “I mean, I don’t have to act like a total man-eater, right? I can be a little more subtle? Just because your father turned into a middle-aged man-slut doesn’t mean I have to act in a similar fashion.”
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