Page 74 of Deep End

“It’s fine. I’m not—”

“Scarlett,” he repeats. It’s a harsh, frustrated command. I’m lost as to what he might want from me.

“Lukas, I’m not sure what the protocol is.” I’m unable and, frankly, unwilling, to be anything but honest. “We had sex, or—or whatever, and you didn’t call me back. I’m trying to take my cuesfrom you, and Ithinkyou want to pretend it never happened?” I shrug one shoulder, the one not attached to the arm he’s still holding. “This is baby’s first ghosting, I’m going to need some direction,” I add, just to lighten the mood.

Lukas’s mood, though, is nothing but dark. The more I speak, the angrier he looks.Always unfazed, Pen said. She was wrong, but I can’t pinpoint the object of this rage.

Unless there was a breakdown in communication? I hate the hopeful little spark that lights up my chest. “Is that an inaccurate read of what happened between us?”

“No.” He finally lets go of me. “It isn’t.” That impatience, though, is still there. The set of his shoulders, the lines in his brow.

“Is there a good reason you didn’t contact me?”

He looks away, jaw clenching. Then back to me. “No.”

Irritation pops through me. “Then I—”

“Lukas!” a man calls. He’s walking toward us, at once familiar and unknown. His eyes settle on me, inquisitive, and when I notice the unique blue of his eyes, something clicks in my brain.

“Jan, right?” I ask. “Lukas’s brother?”

Iimmediatelyregret it. Is it pathetic that I recognized him after one single photo? Does Lukas think that I’ve been sequestered in my room, drawing his genealogical tree, making collages out of used Q-tips pilfered from his trash can?

Hard to beat myself up about it with Jan grinning at me. “I amflattered.” He throws an arm around his brother’s shoulders, delighted. He has the body of a retired athlete—big frame softened by time and real life. There may be over a decade between them, but with Lukas having put off shaving for a while and Jan’s full beard, they look like they could be twins. “Does he talk about me all the time? Scrapbook about our imaginary lives together?”

“I only ever saw one picture, but it was prominently displayed on his lab bench.”

“I knew it.”

“It’s not a giant picture of your ugly face,” Lukas says flatly. The tension of whatever was happening between us has relaxed. “This is Scarlett, Jan. Do leave her alone.”

“Swimmer?”

“Almost,” I reply. I don’t feel intimidated by Jan, probably because of his similarity to Lukas. “Diver.”

“Wow. Those things you guys jump off of, they terrify me.”

“Me, too.” I keep my laughter as non-bitter as possible. “Were you a swimmer?”

“Almost.” He winks at me. “I came to the US on a water polo scholarship, back when you weren’t even born.”

“Jan, she’s twenty-one.”

“Or conceived.”

“Jan.”

“Not even an idea in god’s beautiful mind.”

A deep sigh. “Scarlett, you do not have to listen to this.”

“Of course she does. Hey”—Jan turns to me—“did he mention that I taught him everything he knows about swimming?”

“He taught me to play dead in the pool to scare the lifeguard.”

“And it washilarious. Scarlett, do you hike?”

I blink at the abrupt change of topic. “Yeah?”

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