by A. R. Perry
Maybe I could convince my mom to move…
A rattling knock on the door caused me to jump. I scowled at the wood. He had some serious balls to come right to me after acting the way he did. I glanced at my phone. How mad would my mom be if I charged two hundred dollars? If Madison would answer my damn texts, I wouldn’t need a car service.
“Lily, can you open up?” The handle shook, but thankfully I had the forethought to lock it.
“Go away.”
“Come on. Look…I’m sorry, okay?”
I sat up, gripping my phone hard enough to make my hand ache. Did he just say he was sorry?
“Lily, did you hear me?”
So he treats me like crap for years and thinks one apology makes up for it? Screw that.
“Go away, Parker. I need to pack. My Uber will be here soon.”
“You called an Uber?” His voice shot up a couple of octaves and I had to suppress a giggle. I hadn’t called it…yet.
“Cancel it. If you really want to leave I’ll drive you, but can you please hear me out?”
Against my better judgment, I unlocked the door and swung it open. He looked remorseful at least, but it didn’t affect my simmering rage. “Well?”
“I’m sorry for the beach. For the store. For everything. I’ll go down there and tell Milo right now that I was just messing around if that’s what you want.”
“Oh yeah, that won’t look desperate.”
Parker growled, his eyes darkening as they locked on to mine. “What do you want then? I can apologize till I’m blue in the face but I get the distinct impression that won’t make a lick of difference.”
What did I want? Well for one, I wanted to travel back in time and not go to that party. That’s where the summer went wrong. If I didn’t go, Madison wouldn’t have been able to screw me over and I would be at home enjoying my Parker-free time. All those thoughts bubbled right to the surface and when I was seconds away from voicing them, I caught on to the uncomfortableness in Parker’s posture. Rolled shoulders. Fidgeting feet. Tic in his jaw. He only did that when he was uneasy.
Could it be he had a conscious after all?
“What I want…” Parker shut his eyes, bracing for my answer. An answer I really wanted to use to rip him a new one. But, I didn’t. Couldn’t. One hundred percent pathetic on my part. “What I want is to have a peaceful week at the lake. And the only way that will happen is if we aren’t at each other’s throats. So, I propose a truce.”
Parker cocked his head, skepticism radiating off him. I didn’t blame him. “A truce?”
“For the week. We can go on hating each other when we get back, but for the next week all bad feelings are put to the side and we act civilized. Which means no calling me fat and no more twat-blocking me.”
Parker sputtered, his eyes growing wide before he collected himself. “Did you just say twat-blocking?”
“Yes. As in stop butting in where you’re not wanted. Do we have a deal?”
“I’m still hung up on the fact that you said twat-blocking.”
“Parker!” I threw my hands up in exasperation. “Not the point. The point is that we call a truce. Which includes being nice to each other and not jumping in the middle of flirting or flings or whatever you do when you’re alone with a girl.”
A girl who was stupid enough to be alone with him is what I wanted to say, but alas it would have gone against my whole truce angle.
“Just this week?” he asked.
“Just a week. Think you can handle that?”
He seemed to mull it over for a few seconds before thrusting his hand out between us. “Deal.”
I gripped his hand, ignoring the urge to inflict pain. “Who knows, maybe when you’re not being a jackass you’ll attract a nice respectable girl.”
Okay, I planned it to be my last low blow. I also planned on him retorting with some smart-ass remark about how he likes his girls less respectable… You know, the only kind he could attract. Instead he gave me a sly smile and pulled me close.
“That’s the plan.”
His thumb trailed over my skin sending a zing up my arm. It came out of nowhere, a feeling I hadn’t experience since I was younger. Fear laced through my chest and I quickly extracted my hand, praying that my face remained its normal pale color.
“So what should we do with the rest of the day?” I asked in an attempt to distract him.
If Parker noticed my uncomfortableness, he didn’t let on. “We can go back to the beach. If you want?”
Oh, yeah, and be the main attraction to everyone who witnessed our blowup. No thanks. “Umm, those people who saw us screaming at each other are probably still there. Maybe we can hold off on the beach until tomorrow?”
Parker nodded in agreement. “I was out on the Jet Ski earlier and the water was nice. Not too many boats. Wanna go out?”
I hadn’t been on a Jet Ski since I was in middle school. Excitement replaced my unease. “Will you let me drive?”
“Do you have a license?”
Crap. “No.”
“Then it looks like you’ll just have to tag along with me. Ride bitch just like you did as kids.”
Parker yanked on the sleeve of my cover-up and dragged me to the stairs. I attempted to push him off me, but he threaded his fingers into the crochet fabric that adorned the edges. Somewhere along the way I gave in to a fit of giggles. It made no sense how I could go from hating his guts to a giddy child, but the more I thought about the lake the more images of us as kids popped into my head. We used to have the best time out on the water from sunup until sundown, reluctantly coming in when our parents made us.
Like I said, Parker was interwoven into my entire childhood. The good memories and the bad.
He let me go once we reached the dock. As he bent down to untie the Jet Ski, I noticed that it floated in place of the boat his dad loved almost as much as Mrs. Hayes. Either he sold it to help pay for the renovations or he had it stashed away somewhere. My guess considering how much it would have reminded him of his wife, he stored it in the gigantic shed off the side of the house.
I leaned sideways, catching a peek before I felt Parker tug on my hand. “Come on, princess. Let’s see if you can hold on as good as you used to.”
I pinched his shoulders as I settled behind him. “One time I fell off. You caught me off guard. You made up some big story about how you saw the Loch Ness Monster and when I let go to look over the side you took off. Total cheap shot and doesn’t count against my perfect score.”
“Uh-huh.” Parker attached the key to his wrist and turned around so he could see me. “You gonna ride with that cover-up on?” He hauled his shirt over his head then tossed it onto the dock.
Heat radiated off his back, penetrating through to my own skin. Yeah, I wasn’t about to wrap around him practically naked. “I might get cold out there.”
Parker shrugged and slipped the key into the ignition. The Jet Ski bobbed in the water as he took his foot off the dock and a few seconds later the roar from the engine blocked out the peaceful sounds of the lake.
I wrapped my arms around his waist, locking my hands around my forearms and noticing that to do so I had to lean a lot closer than I did in the past. My cheek was practically resting on his ripped back. Yes, ripped. Not an area I generally thought about on a guy, but all the swimming had done his muscles good and for a fleeting second, backs became the number one hottest muscle group on a guy, smacking abs right out of the way. Then I realized who I was thinking about and I pushed that thought right out, instead focusing on my celebrity crush, Ryan Reynolds. Hello, abs.
Parker maneuvered the Jet Ski out of the dock and away from the five-mile zone.
“Ready?” Before I could answer, he punched the gas, whipping me backward and almost throwing me off the back.
I squealed and gripped on to him tighter. I may have been untossable when we were little, but it looked like I was a bit rusty. Parker let out his own cry of excitement and maneuvered to the left
, sending both of us sliding as he aligned the tip of the water ski at the rolling waves a passing boat created.
Without hesitation, he gunned it, lifting up off the seat at the last second. I followed suit, falling into a rhythm. Parker loved the big jumps. He used to say it made it easier to toss me when I wasn’t planted on the seat. I don’t know where he got that idea from because as I mentioned earlier, he had only ever thrown me once.
Parker veered to the right, spraying our legs with icy water as he searched out another set of waves. As he had mentioned, the lake wasn’t as busy as I would have expected. Then again, it was early in the summer. Come Fourth of July, the lake would be so packed that there would hardly be any room for the amount of watercrafts on the water.
By the second set of waves, my arms ached from how hard I held on to him. When we were little, our parents forced us to wear life jackets. They had so many straps it was easy to find something to grab on to. Sans life jackets and a shirt, I didn’t have much to secure myself to unless I wanted to use his pecs. The thought alone made my face burn. I wiggled in my seat, lowering my arms to the narrower part of his stomach. Unfortunately, doing so brought me closer to him, forcing my chest into his back and squeezing my thighs tighter to the outside of his.
Parker stiffened, and judging by the way his ribs expanded into my forearms, his breathing sped up. The Jet Ski slowed and Parker turned his head to see me. “Doing okay back there?”
I knew for a fact my face reddened by the way Parker grinned. Stupid body. “Yeah, just trying to find a place to hold on to. It was so much easier as kids with how scrawny you were.”
As soon as the words were out of my mouth, I realized how they sounded. Yes, anyone with eyes could see how built Parker had gotten from the many, many hours he spent swimming. But my eyes were not supposed to notice those things about him. And since I had already noticed it three times in two days, I figured the shock of being around him again was making me a tad bit insane.
Parker shook his head no doubt at my expense. “Wanna do another lap?”
I scooched in a little closer, trying and failing to break our gaze. “Sure.”
What was I doing? What I should have said was no, please take me back to shore so I could recenter my thoughts back on hating you.
Parker didn’t wait for me to change my mind. He accelerated so quickly, I lost my grip. My limbs moved of their own free will. My right leg jumped up, stacking my thigh on top of his and tucking my foot under his calf. My hands did exactly what I thought about earlier, and gripped on to his chest muscles, my fingers digging in for dear life. I was pretty sure my whole spider monkey movement caught him off guard because Parker let out a gasp, his fingers loosening on the hand grips.
Two seconds later both of us plunged into the freezing cold water. Yup, one week into summer wasn’t enough to warm the water. It felt like a thousand razor blades sliced through my skin at the exact same time. Almost enough to make me gasp underwater, which would have been bad news for my lungs.
I broke the surface first, sputtering and wiping water droplets out of my eyes. The Jet Ski bobbed in the water not far off. Luckily for us there were no passing boats because without a life jacket and no way to alert them that could have spelled danger.
Parker bobbed up next to me on a deep inhale. He blinked a few times before locking on me. “Trying to murder me?”
“What?” I laughed and slapped my hand onto the surface of the water sending a spray in his direction. “You’re the one who took off like you were being chased. I simply did what I could to remain dry. Taking you with me was just a bonus.”
Parker shook his head and ran a hand through his matted hair. “I think that’s the first time you managed that.”
“Well considering it was only the second time you sent me off, odds were in my favor.”
I boat passed by in the distance rippling the water. “Come on.” Parker thumbed at the driverless ski. “Let’s get out of the water before we get killed.”
I hung back, taking a moment to admire the effortless way he swam through the water. Water god for sure. I swear he sliced through it like a knife through butter, hardly making a splash.
Parker pulled himself up first and offered me his hand. I had half a mind to yank him in with it, but the chill running through my body made me rethink that. It would just delay us getting back to the dock. Out of breath, I slipped my hand into his. I wanted to blame the warmth that spread up my arm on the sun shining on us. But when he smiled down at me and yanked me up in one fluid motion, the warmth spread to my stomach and I knew I would be lying to myself. Being around Parker alone was dangerous for my heart especially when he was acting like my old friend.
Parker directed the Jet Ski toward the dock and a few minutes later he backed us in and cut the engine.
Silence fell over us and since my stupid heart wasn’t to be trusted, I said the first thing that popped into my head. “Next time, let’s make sure to wear life jackets.”
Parker let out a rumbling laugh, tipping his head backward. Water droplets fell from the strands and splattered on my thigh. “Agreed. I forgot how much work it was getting back after being thrown.”
He had to have said that for my benefit. Nothing about being in the water was hard for him.
“The water is a lot colder than I remember.”
“We used to come up during Fourth of July. By then, it had plenty of time to heat up.” Parker set his foot down on the dock and cleared his throat.
That’s when I realized I was still holding on to him. I let go like he was on fire and scooted back so he could hop off. Once the Jet Ski had been tied up I stood and jumped to the dock before he could offer his hand again. I was pretty sure I would need to instate a no-touching rule if I was going to survive the week.
“Up for some lunch?” Park brushed a few water droplets off his shoulder. My eyes tracked the movement, taking in the way his shoulder flexed and the vein in his forearm popped out.
Bad Lily.
“Um, no I think I’m going to lay out on the deck and dry off. Then maybe take a nap or something. I didn’t sleep well last night.”
Parker nodded his head looking like maybe he wanted to say something. Instead, he backed up toward the house. “I’m kinda tired too. I’ll grab a shower and take a nap as well. We’ll meet up for dinner or something.”
Parker left me standing on the dock staring after him. Heat from the sun-soaked wood started to burn my feet, but all I could do was think about Parker in the shower.
It would be a miracle if I made it through the week and this time it wouldn’t be because I wanted to kill him.
“You’re a dirty little cheat!” Lily tipped her cards back as I reached for them, confirming my suspicion.
“You can’t cheat at Bullshit because the whole point of the game is to cheat.”
I shot her a dirty look and picked up the stack of cards that somehow became mine even though I knew for a fact she wasn’t holding two sevens.
Lily winked and rearranged her six cards in an over-the-top fashion as I tried to get my twenty in order. After the Jet Skiing the day before, we avoided each other like the plague. Which was fine by me. Both of us stayed in our rooms and I was fairly certain we both kept an ear out for when the other emerged to grab food because we managed to not cross paths. If I hadn’t mistaken the sound of the shower door, we might not have seen each other for the rest of the trip.
Kind of went against the whole winning her over plan, but the spark I felt—the spark I know for a fact she felt—became overwhelming. Especially considering our surroundings.
I had half a mind to hide out until my dad was there as a buffer. With him talking nonstop there wouldn’t be any weird, uncomfortable lulls much like there was when I caught her off guard in the hall. Which is how we ended up sitting around my family’s old kitchen table well past sundown playing Bullshit. I had found the deck of cards earlier when out of pure boredom I organized the guest room closet. It was
the first thing I thought of after bumping into each other. Thankfully, she agreed.
“Have you tried out the Jacuzzi yet?” Lily asked.
“Not yet. Been too hot during the day and I’ve been keeping my grandpa’s sleeping schedule. I don’t even go to bed this early during the school year.”
Lily laughed and shuffled her cards again. “The sun gets to you after a while. I remember as kids we would pass out five seconds after our heads hit the pillow after spending all day out in the sun.”
“Two eights.” I tossed down the cards. “Might also have to do with vigorous games of tag and the many hours kneeboarding.”
“That too.” Lily chuckled. “Three nines.”
Flat-out lying again, but I let her have it. The best way to beat someone at Bullshit was to let the stack get big enough where recovery was near impossible.
“Do you remember how your mom would sneak us ice cream even if we’d already had dessert? Your dad would get so mad and go off on one of his healthy food kicks. And how we were—” Lily stopped laughing and her face fell when she realized what she said. “Oh, Parker, I’m sorry. I wasn’t thinking it just came out.”
With a shrug, I turned to my cards. It stung talking about her especially in the house. Like I could feel her. Or what was left of her after Dad gutted the place. But even worse was I remembered that argument like it was yesterday. The night before my mom died. Every word would forever be etched in stone on my heart because it was the same year that I stopped loving to swim.
“Really, I’m so sorry.” Lily dropped her cards and reached for my hand, eyebrows pinching together with genuine concern.
We’d never talked about it. Not once. Lily was there. She watched in horror with me as the ambulance loaded up my mom. She was there for the funeral a few days later. She even tried to be there for me the following weeks before school started up. But my shattered heart just couldn’t deal with it. I didn’t want to talk about how empty life felt—not with the girl who suddenly didn’t belong in the darkness. Not with the girl who I considered akin to sunshine. So I shut her out figuring that instead of dragging her down, I would let her move on. It wasn’t as if she lost a parent.