Page 56 of One Happy Summer

“Wow, you’re even tougher than I am.”

I think about all my past summers; most of them are blurry, or not very memorable. This summer could have possibly been listed under one of the worst ever, having had to return to the island with no plan for what to do with my life, and yet, it’s been kind of the best. If I had to base it on the part since meeting Presley, it’s a ten for sure. Or maybe a nine point five since I can no longer kiss her. Why am I so sensible, anyway? What a stupid way to be.

“We’ve packed a lot in already. I’ve never had a summer like this,” I tell her. “In fact, if we keep up this pace, we’ll run out of things to do.”

“We’ll just start the list over again,” she says.

“I like that plan,” I say, feeling something warm settling along my shoulders that’s not from the humid air. It’s just, simply, Presley.

I don’t want to think about the summer ending and us going our separate ways. I want to think about endless summers and infinite possibilities.

But I know that’s not how life works. So, I’ll just take what I can get and try not to fall harder than I already have for the woman smiling next to me as we walk along the beach.

Presley

“How dare you disrespectme, Falgon. I’m the leader of this team, and you will do as I say,” I recite the line to Briggs, who’s leaning against the counter, a screenplay in front of him, as I pace around the front part of the bookshop.

It’s the next Monday and Briggs had to work all day, so I came over an hour before closing to keep him company. It was a slow day, so he closed the store after I got here and now he’s running lines with me, something he offered to do yesterday when we took a bike ride up to the lighthouse on the opposite side of the island. The bike ride was fun and the lighthouse was . . . just a lighthouse. But I was with Briggs, so we could have been looking at a random palm tree or counting blades of grass and I’d have been happy. Okay, maybe not counting blades of grass. Or maybe even that? Briggs can find a way to make me laugh no matter what we’re doing.

“But what do you even know of the Syndarians, Callis? They will trample all over us with this plan.” Briggs says his line with a strange alien voice that sounds a little like he’s sucked on some helium.

“Stop,” I say through a laugh. “Falgon is this like massively huge battle warrior.”

“Who’s playing him?”

“Landon West,” I say, picturing the popular Australian actor, with his dark-blond hair and light-blue eyes. He’s mainly done superhero movies up until this point. Not that an intergalactic warrior is all that different.

“Oh, right,” he says, pushing his glasses up his nose. “Of course. He’ll make a great battle warrior.”

“And Callis’s love interest.”

“So, like an enemies-to-lovers sort of thing?”

I cock my head to the side. “Well done, knowing your tropes.”

“You can thank Marianne McMannus for that.”

“I suppose growing up with a mom who owns a bookstore, it would be a shame if you didn’t know at least some literary themes.”

“It would,” he agrees.

“Impressive, Briggs Cyrano Dalton,”

He snorts out a laugh. “Nope.”

“Drat,” I say, stomping a foot for added emphasis.

“Okay, let me try the line again,” he says, clearing his throat and saying it once more with a deeper baritone this time around.

“Better?” he asks after he’s read it.

“Much better,” I say.

I’m not even sure why I’m running lines with Briggs right now. I usually do it when I get a script so I can familiarize myself with the character and figure out how much time I’ll need to memorize it. But I haven’t done it yet, because when I first got this script I was busy shooting another film, and then I went and had a breakdown for all the world to see. So, trying to work on this script right now may be completely pointless.

Briggs looked online for any news when I first arrived at the bookshop, just in case. There was nothing new. No articles saying I’d been dropped. For all the general public knows, I’m still playing Callis Astron. No matter how many petitions have been sent in hopes of that changing.

Not that I know about any petitions in particular, but I can safely assume there are some. There would be, even if I didn’t have a viral video of me losing it out there. People always have opinions, especially about such a well-loved story. No one could possibly measure up to how they pictured it in their head.

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