by Ivy Smoak
Someone that loved me might be up to such a long distance and long time apart. That wasn’t J.J. He was scared of long distance relationships and…did not love me. I swallowed down the lump in my throat. “J.J…” I couldn’t say the words. I couldn’t do it.
“Stay,” he said. But it sounded more like a plea.
I shook my head. “You don’t do long distance relationships.”
“I said I would for you.”
“I don’t want to make you do that. You’re starting a new job in a new city. I’d just be holding you back.”
“You’re not making me do anything. Just because summer’s ending doesn’t mean we are. And you could never in a million years hold me back. I…”
What? You what? Say it! You have to say it!
He cleared his throat. “I don’t want you to go. Please don’t leave.” He looked as deflated as I felt.
I stepped forward and hugged him, pressing the side of my face against his chest. His words weren’t enough. His actions weren’t enough. What we had wasn’t enough. I breathed in his perfect summery scent. The salt air and sunscreen on his skin. And tried my best not to cry. “I have to go. I have to.”
He held me a little tighter, like I was slipping through his fingers. “No, you’re choosing to. Stay another week. Stay with me. Don’t leave like this.”
I didn’t ever want to let go. I wanted to cling to this summer, to him. I couldn’t remember a time when I’d been so happy. Maybe that’s why it felt like there was a knife in my chest. I was giving up the best thing that ever happened to me. But J.J. wouldn’t be happy 3,000 miles away from me. Neither of us would be. I had to end it. For both our sanities. I thought about how Kristen had described her relationship with Reggie. “I think we both have to accept what this was. A summer fling.”
His arms fell from around me as he took a step back. “Seriously?” He was staring at me like I had just slapped him in the face.
The look in his eyes and the absence of his arms wrapped around me made me shiver. “You don’t do long distance relationships. And I need to focus on myself.”
His Adam’s apple rose and then fell. “So that’s it? That’s all this ever was for you?”
“We knew it from the start.”
He ran his hand down his face.
A car honked outside. “I have to go. Maybe I'll see you next summer?" I wasn’t sure why I said it. Like I was trying to hold on to a shred of hope.
He didn’t respond. He just stared at me. Because we both knew he wouldn't see me next summer. We were done. Whatever we had was over. And I was falling apart. I never thought I'd hurt more than when Aiden had dumped me. But this was worse. It was so much worse. Because I never felt this strongly for Aiden. I loved J.J. I loved him and he'd never know it. I tried to hold back my tears.
"I guess this is goodbye?” I said.
He shoved his hands into the pockets of his swim trunks. He was staring at me like he didn’t even recognize me. "Have a safe flight, Jellyfish Girl."
"Good luck in New York."
He shook his head like he didn’t understand anything that came out of my mouth. I didn’t either. All of it hurt. But I hoped he’d eventually see that I did it for him. I turned around and opened my door.
“It was never a summer fling to me,” he said from behind me. “And you know that.”
I finally let my tears fall as I closed the door and walked away without looking back at him. I wanted to stay. I wanted to be with him. But I couldn't. I had to go back to school. It was a summer fling. Nothing more. Why does it feel like so much more?
Chapter 29
Friday
Time made everything easier. I knew that. It had taken me a while to get over Aiden. A lot longer to give up on ever receiving love from my father. So the pain in my chest? It would go away. Memories of J.J. would fade.
My eyes were puffy from crying the whole flight here. I was pretty sure I was dehydrated, but the tears just wouldn’t stop. I’d skipped the cheap airport hotel and had come straight to the beach. I was already homesick and I thought that seeing the ocean might help. But now that I was standing here? It didn’t help at all. The sun was only just rising. It should have been a magical sight. But all I could focus on was how the ocean looked cold and brutal. The air smelled different here. It didn’t feel like the beach. My beach. I wanted the smell of sunscreen and sweat and salt air. J.J.
I sat down in the sand and I closed my eyes, remembering the way J.J.’s arms felt around me. How his lips felt against my skin. How his smile made the butterflies in my stomach multiply tenfold. And how he smelled like…home.
I opened my eyes and stared out at the Pacific Ocean. I knew my memories and feelings would fade if I gave it enough time. But what if I didn’t fucking want them to?
This feeling was different than when other men in my life left me. I wasn’t just sad. I felt…empty. Like a piece of myself was missing. I shook my head. What the hell was I doing in California when my heart was in Delaware? What the actual fuck am I doing?
I didn’t want anything about this summer to fade. The realization made my tears finally dry up. I’d shed enough tears over my mistake. Because that’s what leaving J.J. was. A mistake. It only took me flying across the country to realize it. And a super long layover. I was definitely sleep-deprived, but my mind had never been clearer. The sun was rising and I was not going to start a new day without being with the love of my life. Because J.J. wasn’t a summer fling. He was everything.
I’d finally stood up to my dad this summer. If was like a weight had been lifted off my shoulders. But maybe this whole time I’d just needed to stand up to myself. To get over how I’d let every man in my life treat me in the past. J.J. wasn’t them. And yeah, he had commitment issues. But so did I, or else I wouldn’t be sitting in the sand on the wrong beach.
I left because I was scared. This whole summer was about bettering myself. And I was strong enough to face whatever life handed me. Right now it was handing me the man of my dreams. I just had to go back to Rehoboth to get him.
I stood up and brushed the sand off my ass. Fuck you California. Fuck you SMU. Fuck you fear. I was not going to run away from a good thing just because I was scared of walking away from tuition paid for by a shmuck. Not because I was scared of starting my dreams of starting a restaurant one year sooner than expected. And most certainly not because I was scared of love. I’d never give Aiden and my dad the satisfaction of making me scared of love. Not in a million years.
And so what if J.J. hadn’t said those words? He’d said it in his own way. “It was never a summer fling to me. And you know that.” That right there? Love. He loved me too. But I was finally going to go tell him how I felt. I’d say it first. I’d say it as many times as I had to before he said it back. I didn’t care if it took him longer than me. I just needed him to know that it was true.
I wheeled my suitcase back to the street as I scheduled an Uber. There was no money left in my accounts after my flight here. But I’d max out my credit card to get back to him. Whatever it took.
My Uber driver wasn’t pleased with me as I kept pressing him to go faster. When we finally pulled into the terminal, I grabbed my luggage and ran as fast as possible. I got the earliest ticket despite the long layover. And if I thought crying through a flight was bad, being eager to get to my destination was worse. Planes were supposed to be fast, but they felt impossibly slow today. I was sitting impatiently at my layover in Dallas debating whether or not to rent a car instead when I heard the most intoxicating voice losing it on an air flight attendant.
“And I’m asking what’s causing the delay?” he said. “There’s not a cloud in the sky. I even checked the forecast in LA and it’s all clear. I’m just trying to understand what’s taking so damn long.”
“Sir, I’m not going to ask you again to please take a seat.”
“I’ve been sitting here for hours waiting for a connecting flight and…”
“J.J.?”
He turned at the sound of his name. For a second we both just stared at each other. I thought I might blink and he’d disappear. But I blinked several times and he was still standing there staring at me. Of all the layover locations in the country and he was here with me. God, it was him. My heart skipped a beat. And then I ran toward him. I jumped into his waiting arms, wrapping my legs around his waist.
“I’m sorry,” I said. “I didn’t mean any of it. I was just scared of getting my heart broken again.”
“Mila…”
“But I love you. I love you so much that it hurts.”
“Mila…”
“I have a hard time trusting people. You overheard that conversation with my dad. He doesn’t care about me and I’ve always felt so unworthy of love because of him. But all of that’s in the past and I don’t want it to affect us. If there even is still an us…”
“Mila…”
“Please let there still be an us. Please forget about everything that happened this afternoon. We were never just a summer fling. You’re everything to me. I came back here this summer so I could be home. I thought being there would fix me. But it wasn't being there that did it. It was you. You're home to me."
“Will you let me get two words in, Jellyfish girl?”
I laughed against his neck.
He held me a little tighter. “I never should have let you walk away,” he said into my hair. “I just felt…I was shocked that you were ending it. I didn’t have enough time to react. But I’ve had a really crappy flight and an even crappier layover to figure out what you needed to hear. And maybe a little help from Kristen too.”
I laughed again.
“I love you. I love you so much it hurts. And I was scared to tell you. I was scared that we wouldn’t work out and I’d get hurt. But it hurt a hell of a lot more knowing I never told you how I felt. And watching you walk away? It nearly killed me.” His hot breath on the side of my neck was just as soothing as his words. “Ever since you walked away it felt like a piece of me was missing. And now that you’re back in my arms, I’m never letting you go again. When I’m with you, nothing else matters.”
It was everything I needed to hear and more.
“Maybe you thought we were just one summer and you were making the best of it,” he said. “But I never saw it that way. I thought it was the beginning of us. I never saw the timer on our relationship. I never saw it. And if you felt it, it’s gone now.” He unwrapped my legs from around his waist and I let my feet slide back down to the floor.
He looked so nervous and excited at the same time that for a second I thought he was going to get down on one knee. And I loved him, but I didn’t need that. This whole time I just wanted him to say that he loved me back. My heart was too full already. I couldn’t handle anymore.
“Can we go back to the beach now?” I asked. It didn’t matter that Rehoboth could only be until the end of summer. I’d start my restaurant anywhere with him. But I wanted to soak in as much time as possible in the place where we met.
“You’re not going back to SMU?”
“I hate California. And like you said…I don’t need a degree to start a restaurant. I’m already a great chef.”
He smiled. “You know that business degree I thought you needed? I had a lot of time to think on the way back to you and…I already have that degree. We can start a restaurant together. I can handle that side of it and you can handle all the cooking. I think we’d make quite the team.”
That was what he was excited to talk to me about. A business proposal. Not a marriage proposal. I smiled. “You want to start a restaurant with me?”
“More than anything.”
“But what about your job?”
“I quit.”
“You quit?” I was pretty sure I was beaming.
“We both know it wasn’t exactly a good fit. Besides, I wouldn’t have enough time to do both. And I was kind of hoping we could open our restaurant in Rehoboth.”
The man of my dreams wanted to start a life with me in the location of my dreams. “Are you sure you want to give up your job?” I asked.
He nodded. “Are you sure you don’t want to finish up school at SMU?”
God, yes. He was offering me a life at the beach. The restaurant of my dreams. And most importantly…he was offering me his heart. And I’d never give up on us again. I stared into his eyes. I used to think I got lost in them. But maybe I felt more found than anything. “I’m so sure.”
“Then let’s go home. After all, we still have a few more weeks of summer left.”
I smiled up at him. He was right. And all those summer nights we’d shared up until this point hadn’t been on a timer. They’d been the start of us. I’d wanted to find myself this summer. And I had. Because of him. He encouraged me instead of bringing me down. He believed in my goals as much as I did. And he loved me for me. Quirks and all.
I stood on my tiptoes and kissed him. It didn’t matter that we were in a crowded airport. Or that neither one of us had slept last night. All that mattered was that we were together.
“I love you,” he whispered against my lips.
“I love you…Jaime Jamison.”
He groaned.
“My lifeguard,” I corrected and ran my fingers along his scruff.
“Better, Jellyfish girl,” he said with a smile.
I smiled back and the aroma of summer that clung to his clothes hit me.
Kristen had been right about a lot of things. But mainly that a man’s smell was of the utmost importance. One whiff of my lifeguard and I was a gone. And now no one would ever be able to erase the smell of summer from our skin.
Epilogue
9 Months Later
“I think I made too much,” I said, looking down at the piles of spanakopita. “Is anyone even going to come? Who comes to Rehoboth in May?”
J.J. rubbed my back. “I have a feeling we’ll at least get a few customers. Let’s go open up.”
“But what if we run out of Tzatziki?” I was spiraling. Opening a restaurant was the most stressful thing in the world. Now I knew how the contestants on Project Runway felt when they only had one day to design an avant garde outfit.
“It’ll be fine. Come on, our hungry customers await.” J.J. pulled me into the dining room of the Greek Jellyfish.
I took a deep breath and was about to flip the CLOSED sign to OPEN when someone grabbed my shoulders.
“Congrats!” yelled Kristen.
“Ah!” I screamed. “You made it!”
“Of course I made it. You think I was going to let some random person be your first customer? You must be crazy.”
“But what about volleyball?” Kristen had just learned that she was going to be part of the U.S. volleyball team at the International Tournament of Athletes.
“What about it?” she asked. “Stuffing my face with gyros isn’t going to make us miss out on winning gold.” Kristen walked over to the counter. J.J. was standing there looking like a Greek god. Seriously. He was wearing a toga and everything. That was as close as I could get to making him wear a shirt during work.
“What can I get for you today, miss?” asked J.J.
“One gyro. And a spanakopita. And some souvlaki. Hell, just give me one of everything.”
He laughed. “One Gluttonous Kristen coming right up.”
“Is one of everything seriously called the Gluttonous Kristen?” asked Kristen.
J.J. pointed to the listing on the menu.
“Don’t look at me,” I said. “That was all J.J. He assured me that you’d order one of everything the first time you came.”
“Well of course I would. But I would have preferred that you called it the Beautiful Gold Medalist. Or really anything without the word gluttonous in it. You try going through a week of volleyball practice and not consuming 8000 calories a day. It’s literally impossible.”
“Bring home a gold for the U.S. and we’ll change it,” said J.J.
“Deal,” agr
eed Kristen. “Now go get my food. I have to talk to Mila in private.” She shooed J.J. away.
We took a seat at one of the adorable white and blue tables I had picked out.
“God, this place is amazing,” said Kristen. “I feel like I’ve been teleported to Santorini.”
“That’s exactly what I was hoping to hear. But save that for when J.J. is back. I want the juicy details on whatever you had to send him away to talk to me about. Oh my God, you have a new boyfriend, don’t you?”
“I have lots of new boyfriends.”
That makes sense to me.
Kristen pulled a binder out of her purse.
“Please tell me you don’t actually have a binder full of men.”
Kristen’s face lit up. “I do. And not just any men. The hottest men.”
“I thought you were supposed to be celibate during training?”
“I am. Which is awful, by the way. But the reward at the end will be so worth it.”
“Winning gold would be pretty awesome.”
“Psssh, who cares about winning gold? These are my rewards.” She opened the binder and showed me the first page - a picture and bio for some Spanish soccer player. “In just a few weeks I’m going to be surrounded by all the hottest athletes on the planet. And I’m pretty sure they will have had the same sex ban as me. Now, help me choose my targets.” She flipped through a few more pages.
“Is that a binder full of men?” asked J.J. as he approached with a platter full of food.
“It is,” said Kristen. “I guess you can help me choose too.”
“Looking at men isn’t really my thing, but I’ll tell you right now...that guy is definitely gay.”
“What?” squealed Kristen. “There’s no way Tim Wood is gay.”
“How about Bryce Walker?” I suggested. “He kinda looks like J.J.”
“Oooh, he’s yummy. And speaking of yummy, this gyro is freaking fantastic.”
We flipped through the rest of the athletes as Kristen finished her feast. By the end she had narrowed it down to a dozen that she was going to try to “get to know.” Which definitely meant bang.