Page 43 of The Summer I First Saw You
Over a bottle of wine, Oliver and I get reacquainted. We talk about the plans for the vineyard and Matthew’s doomed relationship with a girl in Portugal.
And then we talk about my divorce, though I’d prefer not to. I’d probably have lied to my family about the situation just like I lied to everyone else, but Matthew was due in London a week after I’d arrived and I’d had to explain why I wasn’t there. This topic inevitably leads where I knew it would: how wrong Audrey was for me, and how therightgirl is currently one floor above us.
“You watch her constantly,” Oliver says. “You realize this, yes?”
I swallow down a hit of irritation. “It’s just a habit. Wedidhave to watch her constantly when she was small, and that’s hard to shake off. Plus, she’s terrifying.”
“Terrifying? In what way?”
“Have you not been paying attention, Oliver? We can’t even walk into the fucking store without some creep following her down the aisle. She surfs until she’s exhausted and tomorrow, Iguarantee she’ll be standing on one leg stretching next to the deep end of that pool. Anything could happen to her.”
I don’t miss the grin he bites down on, the flash of those dimples my mother is so enamored of. “Audrey flew to a foreign city and didn’t see you for five months. You have no idea if there was an obsessed neighbor watching her during that time or if she was stretching next to the pool.”
“Audrey didn’t stretch,” I grumble. “Nor did she have a pool.”
“You are quite intentionally missing my point, which is that you’re not worried about Daisy because she’sreckless. You’re worried because a world without her seems too painful to bear. But Harrison…fear of losing someone is part of the deal. It means she matters to you. Stop torturing yourself and give in.”
I can’t. Even if no one ever knew, where would it stop? Am I really going to sleep with Daisy for a week or a month and then go through the rest of my life pretending it didn’t happen? “We’re in completely different places, Oliver. I wanted to start a family years ago while she still doesn’t know what she’ll do when she graduates. Even if I was willing to risk two of my oldest friendships, even if I was willing to risk hurtingher, there’s no point in starting something doomed to end badly.”
“You know why I didn’t share my thoughts on Audrey when I met her?” he asks, pouring the last of the red wine into my glass. “Because I knew, no matter what I said, it was your little checklist for a successful life that would make the decision for you. You have always been too consumed with your plans, with staying on track, and where has it gotten you? For once in your life, I wish you’d just take what you want and let the consequences sort themselves out.”
Except I’m not leading his charmed life, nor am I leading Matthew’s.
And those consequences he’s referred to so ambivalently?
They’d be terrible for me, but they might be even worsefor her.
I’m wokenby the sound of the blender.
I enter the kitchen to find Daisy making smoothie bowls while Oliver begs her not to make him try it. While I wish she wasn’t making so much noise this early in the day, and I definitely wish she wasn’t wandering around in a tiny brown bikini while doing it, it’s impossible not to smile at the sight of her.
She’s so…herself. She’s got the doors wide open, the breeze blowing her blonde hair while her hips sway to the music coming out of her phone.
“Stop her,” says Oliver. “She’s insisting on making me healthier, and I don’t care for it. Explain to her how anti-French this is. She’s putting peanut butter in it, for God’s sake.”
I grin. “Has she claimed she’s doing this for our health? She’s really doing it because she wanted us both to get the fuck out of bed.”
Daisy glances up, fighting a smile. “Well, since youareboth up, I see no reason for us to lollygag inside.”
My eyes meet hers.She’s perfect. She’s exactly who I’d choose for myself if the timing was different.
“Daisy, when I marry you and bring you back to France, you must promise to never tell anyone I ate this,” Oliver says.
“You’d have to kill me first to make that happen,” I tell him. “That would be the harder secret to keep.”
“We can kill him. It’ll be fine,” she says to Oliver, shooting me a grin over her shoulder. “I’m good at keeping secrets.”
I’m good at keeping secrets.
The words hit my stomach like a filthy promise, a delicious ache. If I truly believed something with us could stay a secret…I wouldn’t be able to stop myself. I know it’s impossible. Yet here I am, still trying to wish it into existence.
24
DAISY
I’m so exhausted that my legs are sludge as I carry my board out of the water. I barely have the strength to peel off my wetsuit.
“My God, how long were we out there?” Oliver asks as we collapse on our towels. “I don’t have the energy to check my watch.”
