Last Summer (9 page)

Beth loved the cold, wet snap of the early morning in Pebble Beach. She got up when the light was just sneaking in through the pine trees. She liked to imagine the sun hitting Cadillac Mountain up north in Acadia National Park, then slipping down the coast to heat up the gray air just as she stretched outside her cabin and began her run.

This morning, Beth headed down the dirt road, then swung away from the main village of Pebble Beach. Once she passed the mile marker, she turned toward the forest trail.

That was where she met up with Jimmy each day.

Beth grinned widely when she entered the forest, because it was always so much fun to see him there. Waiting for her, his eyes bright, equally pleased to see her.

So far, everything with Jimmy was going great, which Beth almost didn’t want to let herself think about for fear of jinxing it. They’d had a bunch of very casual, friendly activities. Not dates, Beth thought, because there had been no kissing, or even a hint of kissing. Just a lot of hanging out, doing the healthy, sporty things Beth loved.

Jimmy could swim for ages in the chilly ocean without getting winded. He knew some cool hiking trails that led to secret lakes Beth had never seen before. And he still wanted to meet in the woods every morning and start the day with a few miles.

“Looking good,” was all he said this morning, as he fell into place beside Beth.

“You, too,” she replied, and then they just ran, letting the woods wake up all around them.

They were almost finished with their loop when Jimmy turned to look at her, his eyes glinting with mischief.

“I’ll race you back into town,” he said. “Loser buys coffee.”

“I don’t feel like racing,” Beth lied casually, and then took off with a burst of speed, laughing when she heard Jimmy’s shouted protest behind her.

“That was unfair!” he yelled.

“You only think so because you can’t catch me,” Beth threw over her shoulder.

But those were words she was forced to eat two miles
and a defeat later. When she finally caught up with him outside the Wharf Café, Jimmy was looking especially smug. He handed her an iced latte.

“I thought
I
had to buy the coffee,” she said. Or tried to say, as she was still out of breath.

“Nah.” Jimmy tilted his head to one side. “I think it’s cute that you thought you could beat me.”

He smiled before she could protest, and Beth’s annoyance died a quick death. He had such a great smile.

“Well, thanks,” she replied with an eye roll, reaching for the latte.

“And in general,” Jimmy added softly, “I just think you’re cute.”

Beth smiled back at him, sipping her latte and feeling her heart give a kick.

And with a perfect summer day all around them and the smell of the sea on her skin, Beth almost forgot that she’d lost the race.

“Where’s Jimmy Neutron?” George asked later that day, while the two of them sat on the edge of the pier. They had stolen Beth’s uncle’s fishing poles and were casting lines off the end of the wooden walkway. George called it “Making like Huck Finn,” which Beth thought was funny, even though she now sort of wanted to push him into the water.

“Excuse me?” she questioned, raising her eyebrows.

“Your new pal,” George replied. “Isn’t he surgically attached to you throughout the day?”

“Unlike some people,” Beth said pointedly, “Jimmy actually works. He’s a camp counselor at that baseball camp out on the coast road.” She flicked some hair out of her eyes. “And your new girlfriend? What does she do again?”

“Well, she tans,” George replied. “She applies enough sunscreen to block out the sun entirely, and then she lies on the beach. I don’t actually see the point.”

Beth kept her gaze on her fishing line, and the dappled water below. She’d hung out with Larissa a few more times, and thought she was okay—in a hyper, giggly sort of way. Beth didn’t see any particular spark between George and Larissa—she just saw that Larissa thought George was funny. And George
was
funny, so she guessed that worked out.

“It makes perfect sense to me,” Beth told George with a shrug, even though she secretly agreed with him.

George rolled his eyes and wiggled his fishing pole between his palms.

“Girls are weird,” he said.

“Hey, guys,” came a voice from behind them.

Beth turned to smile up at Jimmy, who was freshly showered after his long day of summer camp, and looking extra cute in his long-sleeved T-shirt, cargo shorts, and flip-flops.

Jimmy smiled at George.

George smiled back, but it didn’t make it to his eyes.

“Catch anything?” Jimmy asked George, sitting down between the two of them.

“Not yet,” George said. “But I’m working on my lies. You know, to tell my family. You can’t fish if you don’t lie.”

Beth laughed. Jimmy looked at George for a moment, then turned his head and looked at Beth.

“What are you doing tonight?” he asked.

“I’m up for anything,” Beth replied happily. “George said there’s this outdoor concert out by—”

“Because I have two tickets to the Portland Sea Dogs game,” Jimmy said, his excitement coloring his voice. “Want to go with me?”

Later, it occurred to Beth that George might not have completely enjoyed watching some other guy ask out his ex-girlfriend. Not because he still had feelings for Beth, of course, since he was with Larissa, but because…well, it was weird. But by the time Beth thought of that, she was sitting in Hadlock Field in Portland, staring at a replica of Fenway’s Green Monster from across the baseball diamond.

And the truth was, she was having a great time.

There were warm hot dogs covered in yellow mustard and occasional sips from Jimmy’s cold beer. Jimmy knew the complete stats of every single player on the field, and managed to share all that information without sounding like
SportsCenter.
It was a beautiful summer evening, the home team was kicking butt, and she was out with a boy who looked at her like she was the only girl in existence. When he wasn’t shouting along with the crowd, that is.

It seemed like every time their eyes met, they held on to each other for a few extra moments. Like it was hard to look away. Beth had to remind herself to keep breathing, and she couldn’t get the smile off her face.

The Sea Dogs were ahead at the seventh inning stretch. Beth jumped to her feet and threw her arms over her head.

“Come on!” she cried, tugging at Jimmy’s arm. “You have to sing!”

“I have a terrible voice,” he protested.

“That’s the whole point!” Beth tipped her head back and shouted out the words to “Take Me Out to the Ball Game,” which she thought must have been imprinted on her brain when she was very little, because she might not have been to a baseball game in a long time, but she could remember every single word. Not only that, she
loved
singing it.

Jimmy stood next to her, adding his voice to the crowd’s, and Beth loved the feel of his strong arm around her shoulders. It made everything seem magical.

As the last notes of the organ died away, Beth leaned over to watch a commotion near the dugout. The Portland players had released a pig onto the baseball diamond. Which
would have been strange and silly enough, but this particular pig had a rake attached to its back, so it could rake the dirt of the infield.

Beth laughed so hard she felt tears well up in the corners of her eyes, and had to sag against Jimmy for support.

“How could you not tell me this was coming?” she asked when she could finally speak again. “What
is
this? Is it, like, a Portland tradition?”

But when she wiped at her eyes to clear them, she saw that Jimmy wasn’t laughing. He looked serious and had a weird look in his eyes.

“What’s wrong?” she asked, sobering.

“Nothing,” he replied, and smirked. “I just don’t think it’s very funny, that’s all. But you look pretty when you laugh that hard.” He smiled and turned back to the game, but Beth winced. She didn’t know how someone couldn’t find the humor in something so inherently ridiculous. She smiled briefly, thinking that George would have thought the pig was hilarious. Then Beth looked over at Jimmy, sighed, and finished watching the game.

“I’m so glad we won!” Beth rejoiced, walking out of the stadium and into the heat of the packed parking lot to Jimmy’s car. She had a good time at the game and had mostly forgotten the earlier incident about the pig.

Beth looked over at Jimmy who was, once again, strangely silent. “Wasn’t it a great game?”

Jimmy grinned. “I can’t believe that you want to talk about the game. Right now, I don’t care about baseball at all.”

“What do you—” Beth started, confused. But then he slid his palm around to the nape of her neck, pulled her close, and kissed her, hard.

Beth gasped. And then she kissed him back. Electric heat shot over and through her like she’d been hit by lightning, and she moved closer, angling her head for a better fit.

As people swarmed around them on the way back to their cars, Beth and Jimmy stumbled and he gently pinned her against the car for support. Jimmy kissed her lips again, gently this time. Then he followed the line of her chin down to her neck, which he kissed very softly, taking Beth’s breath away. When he pulled back, he was smiling.

“We should go…somewhere else,” Beth said. She shivered from the kisses and the sudden lack of body heat.

Jimmy grinned and kissed her again, knowingly. “Sure. Only if you promise not to talk about baseball.”

Kelsi was pretty sure that she knew every single inch of I-95 that stretched between New York City and Maine, and could, if asked, draw the route in extensive detail from memory.

Which, she realized as she sat in Bennett’s apartment, did not make the prospect of making the trip again appealing in any way.

When Bennett came out of the kitchen, Kelsi was sitting on his bed in the direct path of the air conditioner in the window, staring glumly at her backpack.

“I know,” he said at once, coming over and climbing onto the bed next to her. “I don’t want you to go, either.”

Kelsi smiled at him, but she wasn’t sure she managed to hide the weariness she felt. She didn’t want to make the long drive back to Maine. She didn’t want to wake up tomorrow
morning and start missing him all over again. It seemed like everything was way harder than it should have been this summer.

But she knew that getting upset about it would only make their good-byes worse than they had to be. Kelsi took a deep breath and forced herself to smile.

“It’s okay,” she said. She reached over to touch his cheek, and then lay her head on his shoulder. “I’ll see you next weekend.”

But before he said anything, she knew, because he went silent and still.

Slowly, she sat back up, and searched his face.

“What is it?” she asked. She didn’t get hysterical. She didn’t even really change her expression. If anything, she just felt kind of numb.

“I don’t think I’ll be able to come up to Maine this weekend,” Bennett said. He looked at her, then down at the floor. “Carlos is freaking out over this exhibit we’re putting together. He thinks everything we have so far looks totally collegiate. I don’t see me getting away for at least a few weeks.”

“A few
weeks
,” Kelsi repeated. As if repeating the words would help her make sense of them.

“The exhibit is coming up fast, and Carlos is determined to get that prima donna from Artspace to write him a good review,” Bennett explained, his brow slightly furrowed.

Kelsi didn’t necessarily know exactly what he was talking about, but she recognized that scornful tone of voice. It seemed like she was hearing it more and more these days. When had Bennett become so judgmental?

“Okay,” Kelsi said, feeling as if she might just break down and sob. “You have to concentrate on work stuff. I guess I’ll just see you when I see you.”

“Don’t worry,” Bennett said then, kissing her. “It’s all going to be okay.”

And for a while, sitting on his bed and kissing him, wrapping herself around him, it was.

But then, inevitably, Kelsi found herself behind the wheel of her car, inching up I-95.

Don’t worry,
he’d said. The fact was, Kelsi worried over everything these days. What Bennett was thinking when he made his snide art observations, for example. Somehow it made Kelsi wonder if he’d started seeing her differently, too. At some point, he was bound to think she was
collegiate
, too, wasn’t he?

Or maybe he just wished she were around more.

Kelsi felt completely torn. On the one hand, she loved her lazy summers in Maine with her cousins and wouldn’t want to trade them. But on the other hand, there was no particular
reason
for her to be there. She could just as easily be spending her summer in Manhattan with Bennett—and for
all intents and purposes, she was. She just seemed to go back up to Pebble Beach to do her laundry.

A twelve-hour drive to do laundry and look at the bay? Ridiculous. Not to mention, it was getting harder and harder to leave Bennett. It actually hurt physically. Especially when she had no idea when she’d get to see him again.

Kelsi plugged in her iPod, cranked up Joan Baez for some old-school angst, and tried to concentrate on the drive.

Many hours later, Kelsi tried to shake off her blue mood as she turned onto the coast road that led into Pebble Beach. She still felt exhilarated when she rolled down her windows and let the salt air rush into the car. The Maine night was inky. As she turned the car away from the water and headed toward the Tuttle cottages, she could hear the lonely spooky sounds of the loons calling to one another from the inland lake, and it made her sigh.

It was so beautiful, and yet she wished she were back in New York City.

She pulled her car in behind the cottage, got out, and stretched.

When Kelsi went inside, the cottage was hushed and empty. It was late, so Kelsi supposed her dad was sleeping. There was no sign of Ella, which wasn’t surprising. Taryn had told Kelsi that when Kelsi was away, Ella practically
lived at her boyfriend’s house. It still surprised Kelsi that Ella had managed to hold on to one boyfriend for so long, but she was happy for her sister. She liked Jeremy.

Kelsi walked back into the bedroom, and was surprised to find Taryn there, just sitting on the bed.

“Are you meditating?” Kelsi asked, laughing. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen you sit so still.”

Taryn looked up at Kelsi with a strange expression on her face, but almost immediately she wiped it clean and went blank instead.

“I’m running out,” she said quickly, tucking her cell phone into the pocket of her cargo pants. “I’m already late.” She jumped to her feet.

Confused, Kelsi put out a hand as Taryn charged past her. Taryn stopped, and looked at Kelsi with that same blank expression.

“Are you okay?” Kelsi asked. “Did something happen?”

“I’m late,” Taryn repeated, and there was no mistaking the coldness in her voice.

Bewildered and still wound up from the drive, words failed Kelsi.

So she just moved aside and let Taryn go.

Kelsi slept for almost fourteen hours, and when she woke up, she felt like a different person.

Puttering around in the kitchen, she decided to make breakfast while she mulled over Taryn’s weirdness the night before.

Probably nothing
, she concluded. Everyone got a little weird sometimes, and Kelsi had discovered that when Taryn got stressed, she often got a little crazy.

That was what she told herself right up until her best friend walked into the kitchen, visibly flinched when she saw Kelsi standing there, turned on her heel, and walked right out.

“Taryn!” Kelsi called out in disbelief, leaving her tofu scramble to burn on the stove.

She ran over to the door and saw that the other girl had stopped walking, though she didn’t turn around.

“What’s going on?” Kelsi asked Taryn’s back. “Did I do something to piss you off?” But that was ridiculous—they hadn’t even been in the same state for days.

“I forgot that I have to meet someone,” Taryn said, still without turning. “I have to go.”

And, again, she did.

Kelsi barely registered the fact that Ella had appeared from the sunporch, looking rumpled and sleepy-eyed. She watched Taryn walk away, and then she looked at Kelsi.

“What’s up with her?” Ella asked with a frown, slipping into the kitchen.

“I have no idea,” Kelsi murmured.