Page 28 of Beach Bodies

Her attempt at a smile is even sadder than a frown. ‘Oh, that’s really nice!’ Her accent is full Minnesota. ‘I’m Brianna. You’re one of the lifeguards, aren’t you?’

‘Lily. Nice to—’

‘Lily!’ Serena’s voice cuts into our little moment. ‘There you are! Get in the picture!’

I hesitate. I don’t want to piss Serena off by refusing her– I do need to get closer to her, if she’s going to be my next target. I’m also not going to waltz in and replace Brianna.

‘No,’ I say, waving a hand but smiling. ‘I’m good.’

Serena stomps her foot playfully in the sand. ‘I’m not taking this until you’re in it! Come on! You look great, we need you!’

I feel a light touch on my arm. Brianna. ‘You go ahead.’

I give Brianna a questioning look. She nods vigorouslyand gestures with both hands, like she’s trying to sweep me towards the action. Fine. At this point, resisting will just be a bad look.

‘Arms around each other!’ coaches Serena as I join the line. That’s the moment I spot Daniel, maybe thirty feet away from us, dressed in shorts and another white button-up, fending off a Mambotel employee dressed as a pirate who seems to be trying to coax a drink order out of him with a prop sword.

I flip my attention back to Serena’s phone and smile as she clicks away.

‘We’re having fun! Perfect, yes! Hold your drinks up! Now put them down in the sand. OK, now everyone jump in the air! Now let’s pretend we’re dancing, big smiles– we’re getting some video, this is so good, who’s got some moves?’

As Jason from London breaks it down in a twerky chicken dance, I recover my drink from the sand– yep, ruined– and slink back away, looking for Brianna. I still owe the girl a drink. But she’s disappeared.

Is she OK? Maybe she’s in one of the porta potties. They’re set up at both ends of the beach. I have no way of knowing which way she might have gone. I should be sticking close to Serena, but I’ll go back in a second.

It’s not long before I’m away from the stage. On this quieter section of the beach, people are sitting around fire pits in chill circles, smoking joints and passing beverages. Fireworks are still popping off above the water here and there. A cool breeze stirs the hem of my dress.

Suddenly, I spot not Brianna, buthim. Alone, sitting in the sand by the shore. His back is to me, and the murmur of his voice tells me he’s on the phone.

I slip off my flip-flops and hook them around my finger, then walk towards him quietly. It can’t hurt to say hello. Right?Oh, God.

The sound of the waves is hypnotic. Rhythmic. Relentless. And the sound of Daniel’s voice is even nicer– decisive, deep—

I’m finally close enough to make out what he’s saying.

‘… why here? Why any of this? If we can’t answer the why, we can’t hope to stay one step ahead—’ His head jerks around– he must have sensed my presence. ‘Lily. You scared the—’ He smacks a hand to his chest, exhales, then laughs as he lowers his phone.

‘I didn’t mean to sneak up on you.’ I gesture to his phone. Based on the angle he was holding it, it looks like he was recording a voice memo. ‘Sorry to interrupt.’

‘Don’t apologize.’

‘Taking notes for your article?’

‘Yeah.’

I make quotation marks with my fingers. ‘“Why any of this?”’ I mean it to be playful, but he looks uneasy. ‘Sounds serious.’

‘Yeah, well… you know…’ He gestures at the dark ocean in front of us, where a tiny glinting light represents the Riovan. From here, it feels like I could pinch my fingers and snuff it out.

‘The intense wellness culture deserves our curiosity, you know?’ he says. ‘What drives people to drop all this money on their bodies?’

‘Easy.’ I sit next to him with a light laugh, stretching my legs out in the sand. ‘The Riovan makes its money from people who desperately want to love themselves. The marketis huge, because people are taught to fear their own bodies, and fear breeds hatred.’

I’m impressed that I said that. Though… maybe not my smartest move, revealing to an investigative journalist that I don’t actually think the sun shines out of the Riovan’s ass.

He grins. ‘Can I quote you on that?’

‘Hell, no,’ I say with a grin of my own.

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