Page 77 of The Summers of Us

“If you close your eyes, it almost feels like this is home,” Haven said, her eyes closed to imagine Piper Island.

“You don’t have to close your eyes, dumbass. It’s dark outside,” Holden said.

“Yes I do, it’s too bright out here to be Piper.”

It was true. The light pollution was an orange mirage steaming from the Boardwalk, the hotels,and everything else behind it like a sidewalk in midday heat.

We eased back into conversation, the broken light on the balcony listening to it all. We talked about our upcoming senior year, career goals we were too young to have to decide, where we saw ourselves in five years. Haven wanted to go into nursing. Holden wanted to study marine biology, somehow balance the ethics of fishing and sustainability. Mason wanted to go into some form of business that would take him out of board shorts and into black slacks. Everett wanted to become an astrophysicist.

I was mostly quiet, taking turns with Everett eating the hardened icing from the bottom of the donut bag. I held it out for him to finish off. He wet his thumb and picked up the last icing crumbs. He pulled his thumb out of his mouth with a pop, then poked the freckle on my thigh. “What do you want to do, Quinn?”

“I think I might major in English,” I muttered. “But I don’t know what I’d do with that after.”

“Whatever you decide, I know you’ll be perfect,” Everett said.

“Thanks.” A smile took over my face—a real one. It was an amalgamation of what was happening in my chest. Everett steadied the part of me that felt like it was always churning with cherry syrup in a slushy machine. He was the one whose cup finally caught me, the mouth that drank away my dizziness, even if only for a moment.

Down at the pool,Holden cannonballed into the glowing blue water. Mason splashed him with his own cannonball. Haven tossed her towel onto a mildewy lounge chair and dove off the diving board. Her legs were bent enough to make a slightly bigger splash than it should have.

“Last one in is a rotten egg!” she screamed at me and Everett.

We raced to make it into the water first. I was still wrestling my shorts off when Everett pulled his shirt off from his back the way only boys could. He jumped in, so I decided on the slow approach since I was already the rotten egg. I trudged into the water until it became too difficult to take the next step. The water inched up my waist, covered me in goosebumps, hugged me in cold comfort.

“Hurry!” Holden strode toward me.

“No!” I tried to run from him through the water, but it felt like running through Jell-O.

Holden grabbed me and lifted me over his shoulder. I let out small laughs between playful screams, pleading against a fate I knew I couldn’t prevent. He flipped me into the five-feet area. The freezing water hit the worst parts of me all at once, but I was already used to it by the time I emerged.

“Still smell rotten eggs?” I smoothed wet hair from my forehead.

“Yes, but it’s the ocean this time.” Haven laughed from the deep end.

I took a deep breath of the pinch in the air from seashells, salty seahorses, and whatever microorganisms in the water made up the coastal smell. It brought memories of my fingers around handlebars, dancing without a care, crying in aquinceañeracrown, my thighs clung to polyester seats, Hadley’s face changing colors with the fireworks, Sunset Scoop waffle cones I’d only ever let my nose enjoy.

Now midnight spent in a motel pool with my best friends.

And Everett.

“It smells like low tide,” Holden said.

I lay back on the surface of the water. Since Haven and Everett taught me two years ago, I had learned to trust the water. It caught me and let me lie on its surface. I let out breaths small enough to stay afloat, spread my arms and legs out to be as free as a moon jelly. The world was muffled under the water. I turned the world off, lost myself to the cool water.

The moon showed half of herself tonight; the other half hid in the shadows. The stars weren’t visible from the bright pool deck, but I knew they were with us.

They were one thing I could always count on.

Age 17, July 1

Sleep came quicklyafter we all showered off the motel chlorine, but waking back up came quicker, especially since the travel show we fell asleep to morphed into an alien conspiracy documentary.

I glanced at the other bed. Mason faced the wall. Holden slept flat on his back, both arms above his head. He looked so much like his younger self, which made me smile. Next to me, Haven was somehow still asleep despite the white UFO lights abducting her face. I giggled. She slept with her mouth wide open like Holden usually did.

The pull-out couch was empty, a wrinkled mound of sheets in Everett’s place. The curtain to the balcony was disheveled. My eyes did the math, and then I was upright to finish the equation.

The door whined on my way out. Thankfully, the room stayed sleeping, but the balcony was awake with Everett Bishop.

“Can’t sleep?” I sat in the empty lawn chair beside him.

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