Meanwhile, Luca and Emmy watch Mom and Eva’s interactions with narrowed eyes and tight smiles, panic brimming just under the surface. Actual panic, like Maggie’s going to swipe Eva right out from under their noses and go into hiding. It pisses me the hell off. And it worries the hell out of me. I can’t decide which emotion is stronger.
Still, I say nothing. Share nothing. Act like it’s no big deal.
But then at night, everything changes. We start at the lighthouse, eating peanut butter and laughing into the black air. Then we usually go on a bike ride or a walk on the beach. There’s a secretive quality to doing all of these things under the moonlight and stars that makes it exciting, makes it special. We talk about everything and everyone except our mothers.
Sometimes we dance around them, hinting at these two women—one dead, one alive, both lost—but we never quite land on them. Under the dark sky, we’re two motherless girls.
We’re whoever we want to be.
And apparently, who we want to be is friends who snuggle in bed until dawn, when Eva sneaks back to the Michaelsons’ before Emmy wakes up. Because every night, after our moonlighting, we’ve ended up back in my bedroom.
In my bed.
Under the sheets.
Legs entwined, backs pressed against chests, arms slung over waists, but never, ever more than that, and Eva’s always gone by the time I wake up.
So, as usual, on the morning of July fourth, I open my eyes to an empty bed and a tightly closed window. Also, as usual, I go through the previous night in my head—more specifically, the minutes right before we fell asleep, when I couldn’t tell where my body stopped and hers started—and wonder if the whole thing was a dream, some hallucination brought on by acute stress or acute exhaustion or acute what-the-fuckery that has been a staple in my life for the last fifteen years.
But there’s a little concave dent on the right side of my queen-size pillow. An Eva-shaped impression. And I know without a doubt that I fell asleep with her chin resting on top of my head, my back pressed against her stomach.
In the pale morning light, I stare at the ceiling. The dopey smile on my face slowly fades as my thoughts burgeon, because in all honesty, this whole thing Eva and I are doing is more than a little confusing. Every night our bodies wrap each other up, secrets are whispered, breath is shared—it’s like the world’s longest make-out session without ever actually kissing.
I’ve been here before—that weird zone after a hookup where you’re feeling each other out to see if it was just a one-time thing or has relationship potential. Except it’s always been the guy feeling things out, with me on the other end pretty much avoiding him. Eva’s certainly not avoiding me, but she’s not doing anything to confirm that what happened in the tree was more than a casual kiss to her. Maybe she just wanted to check her first kiss off her never-have-I-ever list.
So many times, I’ve wanted to just grab her and press my mouth against hers, dispel all these damn doubts. A few nights I got so bold as to brush my lips across the back of her neck, but she didn’t acknowledge it. Didn’t turn in my arms to kiss me. Once, she released a contented sigh, but that’s it, and the doubts continue to drive me nuts.
So, yes, Eva and I must be only friends. But this morning, the affectionate little friend zone we’ve got going doesn’t keep me from remembering the smell of her skin, the silky slide of her thighs against mine, or that kiss in the tree. It certainly doesn’t keep me from closing my eyes and letting my hand drift down my belly and under the waistband of my underwear. It doesn’t stop me from imagining Eva’s warm breath on my neck, her voice whispering my name as my hand dips lower. My fingers are her fingers, circling and seeking, gentle then rough. I give myself over to the whole illusion, whispering her name under my breath until the slowly building tension breaks and I bite down on my lower lip to keep from making any noise.
My body relaxes back into the mattress as my vision clears and my breath returns to normal. I lie there for a long time, listening to the house come awake, wondering what I’ll meet with when I walk outside my bedroom door. Mom drops a few eff-bombs as something that sounds like a coffee mug or a bowl crashes in the kitchen. I roll over and pull the covers up over my head. All of my nerves are still tingling, and I hug my pillow like it’s a lean, smooth-skinned body.
Yup. Totally just friends.
Cape Katie really pulls out all the stops for the Fourth of July. As I leave the bookstore and walk through town toward Luca’s, it looks like someone vomited red, white, and blue everywhere. Crepe paper snakes up lampposts, sparkly-colored streamers drip from store awnings, and the air smells like a mixture of hot dogs and sugar, which is not a totally unpleasant combination.
Luca lives in a yellow ranch-style house near the marina. Before Paul Michaelson moved to California, he was always on the water, fishing, and had even started getting into lobster fishing. He had a beautiful boat ironically named after his wife, Emmaline, that Luca and Macon have impeccably maintained since he left. If Luca’s house is my one true home—and let’s be honest, Mom and I don’t stay anywhere long enough to make it a home—the Michaelsons’ boat is my second. We practically live on that thing during July and August. I love the feel of the cool sea air blowing across my skin. It’s freedom and comfort, and my feet itch to feel that weightlessness underneath me today.
And, okay, maybe I’m itching to see a certain someone, but only because she’s my first real friend other than Luca.
Right?
Right.
I can’t help but laugh at myself a little as I turn the knob on Luca’s front door. It feels damn good—being silly and giddy over someone I actually like.
My smile vanishes when tense voices spill out of the kitchen and into the foyer.
“—trying to give you your space,” Emmy says. “I understand that. What I don’t understand is this disrespect. We’ve done nothing to deserve this. If Luca knew, it would break his—”
“I told you I’d think about starting ballet again, but I need some time. I don’t see why it bothers you so much.”
“I’m not talking about ballet, and you know it.”
They’re quiet for a few seconds. Then Eva says, “I’m not trying to be ungrateful. I’m really not. I know this has been hard for everyone. I just want to make my own choices.”
“You don’t always have that option. Not when you’re part of a family.”
“This is not my family.”
There’s another beat of silence, and I hover in the hallway, out of sight, breath held painfully in my chest. Someone inhales deeply, then, quietly, Emmy says, “Well. We’re the closest thing you’ve got. And legally, this is where you belong. So the answer is no.”
“Fine. Whatever.” I hear some shuffling and then Eva appears, her eyes flaring bright, her hair wild, probably from twisting curls around her fingers the way she does when she’s stressed. She stops in her tracks when she sees me.
“Grace.”
“Hi.” I take a step closer, but she shuffles back a little. I’m not sure if it’s intentional, but it makes me plant my feet. “I came a little early to see if Luca needed help getting stuff down to the boat.”
“Right. I think he’s still asleep or in the shower or . . .” Her voice trails off as she moves toward the bedrooms. “I need to get ready. Meet you there?”
I nod and before I can get another word in, she’s gone, her bedroom door clicking shut and echoing down the hall. In the kitchen, Emmy is stirring up a bowl of some chocolate-flavored batter, which could be anything from a cake to brownies to pie filling. Her hair is pulled into a smooth ponytail, her mouth a thin line.
I clear my throat and she looks up.
“Hi, sweetie,” she says brightly. Too brightly, with a tightness around her eyes.
“Everything okay?” I ask, then wave my hand toward the bedrooms. “With Eva?”
Her expression falls a bit. “Oh. I think so.” She wipes her hands on her apro
n, which has a picture of a hamburger, the phrase Hands off my buns replacing the meat between the bread. Every Christmas, Luca and Macon buy their mom a new apron, each one more ridiculous than the last. This past year, the apron featured the curvy body of Wonder Woman from the neck down. Pretty sure that one got packed up before the tree ornaments did.
Emmy comes over to me and cups my cheek. “You’re a good girl, Gracie. Don’t worry about a thing.” Her eyes are a little misty, her voice a little thick. I’m about to press her, because while Emmy is usually pretty affectionate, she’s sort of freaking me out. Still, I can’t help but inwardly cling to her assessment of me, no matter how wayward it might be.
She opens the fridge and takes out a stick of butter. Unwrapping it, she plops it into a bowl and puts it in the microwave. “Now, tell me about you. How’s your mom?”
“She’s . . . she’s okay.”
Standard answer. I know Emmy would do anything for me—at least, I’ve always thought she would—which is probably why I don’t make a habit of going into too much detail around her about Maggie since their huge argument when I was thirteen. I’m sure Luca tells her stuff, but he’d never tell her everything. The whole town already sees too much for comfort. It’s embarrassing as hell, and I can’t stand the pitying glances.
“She and Eva seem to be getting along pretty well,” Emmy says, eyes on the wooden spoon swirling the batter into chaotic circles.
“Yeah.”
I don’t know what else to say, so I say nothing and the silence gets thicker and thicker. Finally, Emmy cracks. “So. Tell me all about this upcoming piano audition.”
“Oh.” Nerves flare in my stomach just thinking about it. “Well. It’s in about a month. Though I haven’t decided if I’m going or not.”
She stops mid-stir, one eyebrow lifted. “To the audition?”
“No. I’m going to that.” There’s no way I can’t go to that, no matter how conflicted I feel about it. Last winter, after I pulled Mom out of the fray of men at Ruby’s and decided to bail on college, Luca pretty much kidnapped me and drove me to Portland.
“For Manhattan,” he’d said as he all but shoved me into a video-recording studio that belonged to some friend of Macon’s. The guy looked like a black-haired Chris Evans, so I didn’t complain at the time. Plus, Luca literally beamed while I recorded.
He also paid for the whole thing.
Then Manhattan invited me to audition, and things started happening so fast. It’s all blurred in my mind and heart and gut, a swirl of nerves and confidence and insecurities.
There’s also this trip Mom planned . . . I try not to think about the fact that she hasn’t mentioned it since the day I got home from Boston.
“I just mean, if I get in and get a scholarship,” I tell Emmy. “If I moved to New York, I’d be like five hours away, and I’m not sure if Mo—”
“One step at a time.”
“I’m trying, but you know it’s not that simple, Emmy.”
She nods as the microwave dings. That delicious melted-butter scent fills the room as she pours it into the batter. “Nothing ever is. The question is what do you want, Gracie?”
I stare at her. “What do I want?”
She smiles, but it’s a sad smile, full of years of Maggie drama and pity over the fact that I’m clearly shocked by the question.
Because what the hell do I want?
Life with Mom has never been a matter of want. It can’t be. It’s a tangle of needs and necessity, paycheck to paycheck, the future like a distant city on a map in the middle of some foreign land. All those wishes pressed into my fingertips were just that—wishes. And no one really expects a wish to come true.
Do they?
Chapter Twenty-One
JANELLE MICHAELSON LOOKS LIKE A BALL HAS BEEN surgically attached to her stomach. A huge perfect-for-dodgeball kind of ball. She waddles onto the boat, a few packs of hot dog buns in her arms.
“Hi, Grace,” she says, her face red, like the simple greeting totally drained her.
“Hey. Here, let me.” I take the buns from her and toss them into the laundry basket full of bags of chips and ketchup and mustard bottles. “Haven’t seen you in a while.”
“Yeah.” She collapses onto the cushioned bench seats near the stern and rubs her belly. “I’ve been setting up the nursery for Emily, and considering I move about a foot an hour, it takes me all day.”
“Emily? Is that what you’re naming her?”
Janelle nods. “After Emmy, but still different enough to be her own, you know? Macon was very insistent, and I love the name, so I didn’t fight him.”
“That’s sweet.” And it is, but for some reason, a knot rolls up my throat and I have to look away. I distract myself with unwrapping packages of hot dogs so Macon can grill them on the little stove down in the boat’s cabin.
“Did Luca tell you he designed her crib?” Janelle asks, pulling her gold-brown hair off her neck and fanning.
“No. That’s awesome.”
“It’s shaped like a boat. I mean, sort of. As much as a crib can be shaped like a boat. Macon’s building it and taking his sweet time.”
I laugh. “He does like to do things right.” When we were kids, Macon always made Luca’s and my Halloween costumes and was beyond meticulous. He enjoyed doing it, but I think Emmy mostly put him up to the whole thing. She knew Mom could never afford to buy me one. The time I went as a rain cloud—sparkly silver rain included—and Luca was the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man from Ghostbusters and kept falling down porch steps because he couldn’t bend his legs remains one of the best nights of my life, which is laughingly depressing when you think about it.
“Don’t worry, Nelly, I’ve got this,” Macon calls, stepping aboard with a flowery canvas bag overflowing with food hanging from one arm, a pile of blankets in the other.
“Oh, I’m not worried,” Janelle says, winking at me. She and Macon have one of those relationships where they’re constantly heckling one another, all of their jokes eventually leading to massive and very public make-out sessions.
Kimber and Luca come up from below deck, her cheeks flushed and a grin on his face. Speaking of massive make-out sessions. The three of us walked here together, Eva still in the shower when we left, and I don’t think there was a single second when Luca wasn’t touching Kimber’s shoulders, waist, neck, hair, hand, whatever. Now they’ve both stripped down to bathing suits only, and it seems like Kimber’s hot-pink bikini is about to make Luca combust. He keeps glancing at her ass and then her boobs and then ripping his gaze away like he thinks he shouldn’t be glancing at her ass and her boobs because he’s a gentleman. Kimber’s doing her share of ogling Luca’s slim and toned chest, his tanned skin golden under the sun, so I think it’s okay. The two of them would be pretty damn cute if I wasn’t slightly annoyed with both of them.
“Did you remember your suit?” Luca asks, elbowing me.
I pull my tank top over my head, revealing my faded black halter-style tankini top that’s bordering on too small. He shoots me a thumbs-up, but that’s it. No threat about tossing me to the dolphins, a joke he cracks nearly every time we board Emmaline.
We haven’t really talked about our argument two weeks ago, nor have we argued again. We’ve just . . . existed. We’ve been polite, laughed a little about picky or crabby customers, helped each other cover tables when a rush hit LuMac’s. Once he asked if I’d told Eva any more about Maggie. I offered an ambiguous shoulder shrug that Luca clearly took as a no, because he shook his head and silently refilled sugar dispensers, a muscle jumping in his jaw. This new awkwardness sucks, honestly. I’m not used to this sort of surface-level crap with Luca, both of us completely wrapped up in other people, barely talking to each other about it all.
Fifteen minutes later, we’re waiting for Eva before we can set sail, and I’ve got a beer in my hands. I tuck myself into the seats near the bow and sip on something Macon microbrewed or whatever you call it. The amber liqu
id is cold and slightly less pissy-tasting than any beer I’ve ever had before. In fact, it goes down just fine.
“Grey Goose!” Macon calls, a ridiculous name he’s called me ever since Luca and I were ten and got violently ill off a bottle of Grey Goose that Emmy had neglected for too long in the freezer. Everyone’s got their precious little nicknames for Grace.
He comes up from below deck, where Emmaline sports a cozy cabin, complete with nautical-themed bedding and a mini-kitchen. “Leave some for the fishies, huh?” he says, flopping down next to me.
“Oh, the fishies’ll get plenty when she pukes it all overboard later,” Luca says. Like he’s even seen me drunk more than once or twice. Like I’ve even been drunk more than once or twice. I may like jumping off balconies here and there and rearranging beach gnomes, but, dammit, I do it all with a clear head.
Luca doesn’t look at me, focusing very intently on a bottle of SPF 55. He moves down the boat toward the stern, where he hands the sunscreen to Kimber. They smile at each other as she squirts a white glob into her hands and spreads it over his bare shoulders.
“He’s touchy lately,” Macon whispers. He’s a stockier, darker-headed version of Luca. Same curly mop, same easy grin, same fierce loyalty. “You’d think he’d be a little more relaxed since he’s finally getting some.”
Janelle joins us, a water bottle the size of my thigh in her hands. Her blue-and-white polka-dotted one-piece looks adorable over her round stomach. She smacks him on the shoulder.
“Ow, what?”
“Don’t talk about Kimber like that.”
“Hey, I love Kimber,” he says, reaching out and pulling Janelle close to his side. “I adore Kimber. Worship her, in fact.”
“High praise,” I say, taking a swig of beer.
“She makes him happy. We’ve all been a little tense since Eva joined us. Everyone’s adjusting.”
I frown but say nothing. Tense is mild for whatever vibe Eva and Emmy were putting off earlier.
“Plus, Kimber tells it like it is,” Macon says, shrugging. “I admire that.”
How to Make a Wish Page 14