Page 92 of Awestruck at Dusk
“I am.” He smiled at me and drained his beer. “It’s just complicated, you know. But thank you. I know how much you care, and—I really appreciate it.”
“Thirsty?” I laughed. He finished that beer in a few minutes.
“You have no idea.” Tobias laughed. “I should be drinking water after my run, not beer, but fuck it.”
“Do you want me to get you another one?” I offered. “It’s Midsummer weekend after all.”
“See?” Tobias said out loud in Zara’s direction. “That’s why Billie’s my favorite sister!” He was trying to tease Zara about it. And she took the bait because I heard her complaining as I walked back to the kitchen. Joel shouted that he wanted another one too.
I walked back, handed them their beers, and sat next to Lily.
We were all just hanging out and talking when Tobias finished off his second beer in under five minutes.
“You should try mixing it up with water,” I told him with a laugh.
“I know,” he replied with a burp—a loud and long burp.
“EW!” Lily and I said at the same time. I waved my hand in front of my face, trying to fan away any suspicious smells before they reached me.
“That’s absolutelydisgusting,” Zara said with a grimace.
“That’s it,” Tobias said, jumping out of the pool. Lily and I pulled back reactively, and before I even blinked, Tobias had Zara by the waist and dropped her into the pool. The scene was all too familiar to me. But I was mostly glad to be dry.
“ARE YOU MAD?” Zara yelled, completely drenched. “The water’s freezing!”
Tobias jumped back into the pool. “You called me disgusting twice,” he said to Zara. “I couldn’t let this one slide.” He laughed and closed the distance between them. Zara splashed him, and he splashed her back.
“Stop!” Zara cried. She was chuckling too—somewhat. But she seemed annoyed.
“Well, you started it,” Tobias said, getting closer to her, still laughing. Joel asked Lily to bring towels, so she fled into the house. Joel and I couldn’t stop staring at Zara and Tobias’s dynamic in the pool.
Tobias looked like he was enjoying making Zara angry. He splashed her again and kept walking in her direction, basically cornering her against the far wall of the pool. But again, it all seemed harmless, like he was just playing around with her.
“Back.Off,” Zara warned in a grave tone. She pushed Tobias back and tried swimming away from him. But he was on a mission to tease her, and he probably thought she wasn’t serious because he grabbed her arm and pulled her back.
“Get your bloody hands off me!” she yelled.
“Whoa!” Tobias returned, raising his hands. “I was just playing around.”
Zara didn’t reply as she moved toward the stairs. She looked over her shoulder at him as if about to say something, but she turned around and walked out of the pool.
“I know you’re into Billy okay, it’s not like I was hitting on you or anything. I was just messing with you.”
“You knownothingabout my relationship with him,” she spat back, pointing a wet finger at him as she stood at the edge of the pool, glaring at him.
Shit, this was getting tense and uncomfortable.
Lily came back with the towels and offered one to Zara, who immediately used it to wrap herself with it as her gaze dropped to the floor.
“Why are you being weird about this?” Tobias asked with a grimace.
“As I said … becauseyouknow nothing.” Zara stormed into the house, and we didn’t see her again for the rest of the night.
“She’s sleeping in William’s bedroom, and she wants us to think nothing’s going on between them?” Tobias said to Joel. “I don’t get why it’s such a huge fucking deal. And then she acts like I was trying to come on to her or someshit like that. We’ve always gotten along like that. So what’s changed?”
Yeah, I was most definitely going to need a full dose of my sleeping pills if I were planning to fall asleep at some point. And that’s precisely what I did because knowing Zara was getting her z’s upstairs in William’s bed was enough to keep me up at night.
Seeing how obvious it was for everyone that she was so into him … it’s what nightmares are made of, and I didn’t need any more horrors invading my dreams.
