28. “Boys” - Alfie Jukes
“Boys” - Alfie Jukes
Walker
There is something to be said for having an entire three floors to yourself.
I love Oxford, but sometimes I want to pull out my hair when Mrs. Greenwich bangs on her ceiling from below, mistaking my flat for that of my heavy-metal-playing next-door neighbor, or when the couple upstairs is having yet another go in their bed, which should be fastened to the wall.
I take my time coming downstairs, enjoying the feel of the smooth wooden banister beneath my hand and the plush carpet runner under my bare toes. I’m going to miss this house when I leave. And I’m going to miss my mum.
Our conversation on Wednesday made me question a lot of things, namely my propensity to define a person based on one action. Does a single lie make a person a liar, or an accident make a person a killer?
She’s right about these things being multifaceted. Slapping labels on people because of something they’ve done isn’t right. But neither is intentionally cheating so that your girlfriend will break up with you.
Heath and I visited the Archives on Thursday, but it was so awkward and painful that I told him I had other things I needed to do the rest of the week. We left after only two hours.
I’ve spent the last two days staring at the notes on my computer screen and wandering the rooms of this house, wishing for a secret passage to get my mind out of all the places it wants to wander to.
Namely, Heath.
Things have been weird between us since we had sex. Not just awkward, but tense, knotted with friction. I can’t tell what he’s thinking. He’s put up a wall that I don’t have a clue how to scale.
I end up in the library, scanning the shelves for a book enticing enough to delve into for the rest of the day. My phone buzzes in my pocket.
Lux : BEACH DAY BITCHES!!!
Oh boy.
The responses immediately start rolling in.
Maeve : I’ll plan an itinerary. x
Maeve : Which house?
Rhett : FUCK YES
Pierce : I’ll check my schedule.
Lux : Villa Rosita! xxxx
Maeve : Perfect. Can everyone be ready in an hour? We can miss the noon traffic that way. x
Rhett : I was born ready baby
Maeve : Oh god.
Rhett : Pierce, I will drag your ass out of the city myself.
I wait a few minutes to see if Heath will respond. The beach isn’t usually my preferred way to spend a Sunday, but I had a lot of fun surfing earlier this week. Besides, it’s summer, and I should be enjoying myself.
Me : Count me in. x
Lux : YAY!! I thought we were going to have to strap you to the top of the car! xx
Heath : I’ll be there
My heart does a strange little dance around my chest. I send Lux a separate text.
Me : Do you have a bathing suit I can borrow? x
She’s both taller and thinner than me, but our boobs are roughly the same size.
Lux : I have enough suits to outfit an entire runway show, love. Of course you can borrow something!! x
Me : One is fine. Not planning on walking the runway any time soon.
Lux : All the same, I’ll pick something extra special! *wink* xx
That wink makes me nervous. I will have to steer clear of Lux and any matchmaking fantasies she tries to enact.
I’m tingling with excitement as I pack. The sunscreen slips out of my hands and onto the floor. It’s been forever since we’ve all hung out on the beach, and I’m looking forward to it more than I would have thought possible a few weeks ago.
I grab a few G.R. Huntington books and stuff them into my bag. I can do a little research-based reading while we’re there. It’s like writing a vacation off on your taxes.
By the time my bag is packed, a three-page itinerary is sitting in my inbox, and Lux and Maeve show up in my driveway as I’m dragging my suitcase downstairs.
I offer my car as long as I don’t have to drive.
Maeve says she’ll do it (naturally), and Lux volunteers to play DJ, since she has the best taste in music. Her words, not mine.
“Remind me again why you didn’t get the e-tron?” Maeve says as she slips into the driver’s seat.
“I will never drive an electric vehicle.” I shudder. “Someone could operate it remotely.”
Lux and Maeve look at each other in the front seat and burst out laughing .
“God, I’ve missed you, Walker,” Lux says as she connects her phone to the Bluetooth.
Lux’s grandfather owns at least six vacation homes, several of them on the beach. The only requirement for his family members to use them? Spend an hour with the old man doing whatever he wants. It’s creepy as fuck, but the perks are pretty sweet.
“What did he want this time?” Maeve asks as we pull out of the driveway.
“A game of checkers and a shoulder massage,” Lux says, eyes on her phone. The choir voices at the beginning of “So Long, London” echo through the car speakers.
Maeve makes a disgusted sound. “Gross. You had to touch him?”
“That is typically how one gives massages, yes,” Lux says.
“Is that how you got that?” I ask, pointing to a deep purple bruise near her shoulder.
Her fingers brush over it instinctively. “No, Pops isn’t violent.”
The car is silent for a few beats, then Maeve says, “So who is?”
Lux doesn’t say anything.
“Lux?” I say.
She flashes that breathtaking smile at both of us. “No one, silly. I just happen to be exceptionally clumsy.”
This is a lie. Lux is the most graceful person I know, fluttering around like a ballerina butterfly. But she clearly doesn’t want to talk about whatever is going on, and I’m not about to press her.
Maeve, however, does not have the same reservations. “Is it Carter?”
Lux’s head snaps sideways to glare at her. “Is what Carter?”
Maeve keeps her eyes on the road. “Did he give you that bruise?”
“Of course not.” Lux scoffs and turns toward the window. Less than a minute later, she spins around, anger already forgotten. “Tell us everything about you and Heath.”
I blink in the face of her sudden attention. “Uh,” I start, “there’s nothing to say?”
“No way.” Maeve shakes her head, flashing me a look in the rearview mirror. “That’s not going to work. We’ve got an entire hour ahead of us to dissect every little thing between you and Heath.”
Oh god.
Kill me now.
* * *
When we pull up to Villa Rosita an hour later, I’ve managed to keep the details of what happened between Heath and me to myself. Lux and Maeve don’t know that he cheated or that we had sex. They do know that I am struggling to determine my feelings for him.
This last piece of info was dragged out of me with the precision of a professional. Maeve should consider a career in interrogational torture.
The beach house makes the mansions back in the Hills look like dollhouses. It’s a humongous three-story affair made of white stucco and wide pillars, with balconies holding potted trees in front of every window.
The front of the house is surrounded by stone pools of various sizes, all of which are filled with turquoise water and look like they’ve been placed there by Mother Nature herself. An arched stone bridge allows us to cross to the sprawling six-car attached garage.
The guys are already here. Pierce doesn’t believe in driving in the vicinity of the speed limit when your car can go over two hundred miles an hour. Maeve, on the other hand, has an unnatural fear of being pulled over.
Our itinerary allows for several hours of relaxing before the caterer brings tonight’s dinner. Everyone scatters to their assigned bedrooms (again, courtesy of Maeve) to change into beach-appropriate clothing .
Lux gave me a Christian Dior tote full of swimsuits and told me I’m welcome to wear whatever I like. I end up choosing a simple navy-blue bikini with a tiny floral print. It’s alarming how well it fits my body and my style.
I look in the mirror and freeze. Maybe I should have opted for my surf suit. The strings holding this thing together suddenly seem as thin as threads.
The back of the house opens onto a huge stone terrace that juts out over the ocean.
Part of it is under the roof of the house, and gauzy white curtains tied to the pillars flutter in the breeze.
The terrace is as large as the main floor and holds two swimming pools, a hot tub, several gazebos, a tennis court, half a dozen umbrella-covered tables, and a handful of scattered sofas and chaise lounges.
But, beautiful as the house may be, the main attraction for everyone is the beach, which can be accessed via a set of stone steps leading from the terrace.
I descend the staircase. It twists its way down, large-leafed plants obscuring my view until I reach the bottom. The magnificent white sand and the rolling waves of the ocean stretch out like a painting.
My bag is heavy with several Huntington tomes and my sunblock, and I hitch it higher on my shoulder. There’s a cluster of candy-striped umbrellas a short distance away. I move toward them, my sand-logged sandals slowing me down.
The guys are already messing around in the water, a short distance from shore. Maeve and Lux must still be inside, probably meticulously slathering on their tanning oils.
I fish my sunscreen from the bag and start applying it to my legs. I may be blessed with my mother’s Spanish skin, but with how much time I spend inside, it isn’t familiar with the rays of the sun. Better to be safe than sorry.
I’m applying the lotion on my shoulders when a shadow falls across me. Heath is standing on the other side of my chaise lounge.
“Need some help?” he says.
I didn’t even hear him approach. “Sure,” I say, before I can think better of it. I hand him the bottle.
A few torturous seconds pass as he squirts the sunblock into his hands. Then his warm fingers are on my back. He rubs in large circles, the way he has a hundred times for me before. Something about this time feels different, though. Maybe because the last conversation we had was an argument.
Or maybe because a million things have happened to us, and we’re no longer the same people we were.