Page 75 of The Summers of Us

“Dude, I’ve been telling her this all summer!” Adriana exclaims.

“Are you kidding me? We both agreed it was awkward. We only kissed because we were drunk on the beauty of graduating high school or some bullshit like that.” Mia laughs, splashing one foot in and out of the water like a nervous tic.

“Yeah, in the gas station parking lot.” Adriana snickers. “But seriously, that kiss meant something to Tanner.”

Haven sprinkles water on her chest. “You could see it on his face when you were talking about it earlier. I see it on Everett’sallthe time. You and Quinn are just alike.”

“Okay, we don’t have to bringthatup.” I splash Haven who doesn’t seem to mind.

“I was going to ask you about that.” Mia looks at me. I don’t know if she really was going to ask or if she just wants the heat off of her, but she persists. “You like each other, don’t you?”

“Everett and I are...complicated. Well, it’s more likeI’mcomplicated, but that sort of makes us both complicated.”

“Yes, they like each other,” Haven says, filling in my story gaps like she’s reading from her book on the dock. “But Quinn has her reservations and we forgive her for it.” She leaves it at that.

“It’s hard to be vulnerable.” I nervously trace shapes on the surface of the water—a sea turtle riding a bike.

“I get it.” Mia looks at me. “Sometimes I feel like I’m floating outside my own body, but it’s easier to float than let anyone catch me.”

Nobody’s ever put it that way, but that’s how it feels to be the girl who sees thorns before roses, clouds before a blue sky. The girl whose parents spun pain into her bones.

Sometimes it’s easier to float.

As the sun says its official goodnight, the warm cloak of summer strips down to an outfit reminiscent of a brisk autumn morning. Cicadas chirp the trees’ steady heartbeat. Frogs sing ribbit songs from the marsh.

After an intense dragonfly-catching competition and a tiebreaker round of cornhole, we sit at the edge of the dock for the last snatches of sunset.

I cross my legs over Everett’s lap on the swinging bench. Adriana, Haven, and Jorge sit with their toes in the water. Holden and Mason are both cross-legged on a towel. Tanner lies with his head in Mia’s lap as she brushes her hands through his brown hair. I raise my eyebrows at her. She does the same to me.Touché.

The sky casts a purple haze on Everett’s face. Everett strokes his thumb over my ankle and asks me if it hurts. It’s still humming from earlier on the jet ski, but I’ve been using it all day so I tell him it’s okay.

His absentminded touch makes me feel like I’m floating.

I study how he watches the lake with such intent. I look at the low-hanging band of indigo clouds on the horizon and try to guess what picture he’s imagined from them.

Everett must have read my mind, because he turns to me, smiles softly, then whispers, “They’re quill pens.”

“They certainly are.” I smile, my voice a soft purple dusk.

This is about as close to a perfect moment as I’ve felt since last summer, one of those moments I have to remind myself to be fully present in. If I don’t, it’ll pass me by like a dragonfly zipping through dusk before I have the chance to trap it in a mason jar. But I don’t need to catch the moment yet, only sit inside it and feel the lull of tired conversations between lake people and beach people.

We take turns swatting mosquitoes off our skin, listening to Adriana strum “Brown Eyed Girl” on her guitar.

Dock lights turn on in the distance like earthly stars, signaling that it’s time to go inside, shower, and make our beds in the living room.

When I stand up, pain seethes an angry snarl in my ankle. It’s an unbearably loud sensation that forces me to lift off my foot as soon as it strikes. In one motion, I fall on the dock with only my palms to brace my fall.

“Are you okay?” Everett pulls me up.

“I think I sprained my ankle on the jet ski.” I lean into Everett as we walk into the house, butonlybecause I can’t stand on my own.

Pinky promise.

Age 17, June 15

Mason started our tourof the sound with the inspiration behind his boat’s name,Kingfish. It was named after his memories with Holden, who not only helped him fix it up, but became his boyfriend shortly after his seventeenth birthday. Jorge’s and Haven’s secretive nudges had finally paid off and both of them stopped playing games.

I was trying to do something similar this summer.

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