Chapter Eight
Lila
We made it into the formal dining room before I understood Adam’s tactic.
Adam was bragging about the things he had, almost throwing in my face the trips he’d taken, the people he’d met, and the artifacts he’d gathered as relics during his travels.
He was the way I remembered, but different too, because the Adam I’d known as a teenager didn’t act this way, didn’t try to impress others with his sophistication.
The Adam I’d known had been sincere, sweet even.
That Adam I’d known didn’t have to prove his manhood with irrelevant trinkets and rare pieces of art.
“You can stop,” I finally said once we arrived in the master bedroom on the second floor, and he’d explained that the one-thousand-count sheets on the bed had come special ordered from France. “You really don’t have to do this.”
“Don’t have to do what?”
“All of this.” I spread a hand and glanced around the room, which included a king-sized bed with a Jackson Pollack hanging over it. “Bragging.”
He frowned. “I’m not bragging.”
“You are. At least, it sounds like it to me.” I stepped away from him. “Listen, I’ve enjoyed seeing you again, but I don’t want to keep you from the rest of your guests. And I just—”
“You don’t get it, do you, Lila?” His question had sharp, ragged edges. It hit me like a soft slap, and I recoiled.
“Don’t get what?”
“What this is.” I blinked at him. What was I supposed to get? “I’m not following you.”
“Fuck. Of course, you aren’t.” He sighed. “This whole place, this whole house, isn’t about me. It’s about you.”
I blanched. “What?”
“You heard me,” he replied, and something changed behind his eyes. Was he angry? Enjoying this? I couldn’t tell. “Isn’t this what a woman like you wants? This kind of perfection? This kind of—”
“No.”
“Don’t kid yourself.”
“I don’t understand, Adam. We knew each other as kids, and we were…it was what it was, but—” I looked away. Better to shut myself up than risk saying something I’d regret. “You disappeared.”
Lila
15 YEARS OLD
After a few text messages, we agreed to meet at the water taxi service on Singer Island around noon the day after Christmas.
Getting out of accompanying my parents to Miami had been surprisingly simple.
I faked a few cramps from my period, claimed to have thrown up in the middle of the night from the pain, and did my best to look as pale and sickly as possible when I shuffled into the kitchen for breakfast that morning.
True to form, my parents hadn’t asked many questions, and just accepted my excuse.
Once alone, I shifted through a few different outfits, and settled on a lightweight Lily Pulitzer sundress with a pair of gold slip-on sandals, the kind of thing most everyone in Palm Beach county wore as a quintessential uniform.
I didn’t know if what was about to happen was a date, but I wanted to look my best—especially since Adam had already kissed me once and told me in the garage that he wanted to kiss me again.
I finished the outfit with some lightweight makeup and candy-pink lip gloss that I thought would make my mouth look more enticing.
A half hour before noon, I ordered a car from the app on my phone.
The whole ride to Singer Island, I tried to push down the ball of nerves in my stomach.
It didn’t work very well, and I didn’t really relax until I saw Adam standing next to the ticket booth for the water taxis.
Then things became real. This was a date—or at least, the first time in my life when I felt like I might be on one.
“Hi,” he said once I reached him at the ticket office. “You look…you look great.”
“Thanks,” I replied, glad I’d worn a large pair of tortoiseshell sunglasses that hid how pleased I really was, not only to see him, but that my outfit had been a success. “You do too.”
And he did. Adam had on a pair of dark jeans and a white polo shirt, a welcome change from the usual uniform I saw him wear around the house.
“Come on.” He took his aviator sunglasses from the top of his head and shoved them onto his nose. “I already got us the tickets.”
“You didn’t have to do that. I could have paid for it.”
“No,” Adam replied as we walked toward the gangplank to board the water taxi to the small island. “I wanted to.”
I’d been to Peanut Island countless times before, and I always liked the quiet remoteness of it, a slice of relatively undisturbed beauty in the middle of such a tightly packed part of South Florida.
After exiting the water taxi, we decided to walk the circular path around the park, one that offered gorgeous views of the water, boats, and inlets that made our part of Palm Beach County so interesting.
And for the first time, it occurred to me we were alone, with no fear of anyone bursting through a door, or wandering into a garage. How awesome. How nerve-racking.
“This is nice,” I remarked a few minutes after we began our walk. “Really nice.”
“It is. I had no idea this existed.” Adam walked alongside me on the outside of the path, his hands in his pockets, his eyes on the landscape. “Not this way, at least. Not as quiet as this.”
“We started coming here when I was about five. My nanny, Andrea, took me.” I looked away, returning my eyes to the horizon, suddenly embarrassed about my lifestyle, even if that was the truth.
It just sounded so…privileged. Useless. And elitist in comparison to what Adam probably dealt with daily.
“Anyway, sometimes we’d bring a picnic.”
“Too bad we didn’t bring one.”
“Yeah. Too bad.” The path turned, and a small white house with a red roof came into view. I pointed at it. “See that? That’s a little museum that has history about Palm Beach County.” I glanced at Adam. “And they sell tickets to get into the bunker JFK used when he was president.”
Adam stopped walking. “There was a bunker here?”
I nodded. “The whole time during his administration. In case of a nuclear war.”
“I didn’t know that. That’s awesome.”
“Come on,” I said. “I think it’s open.”
Twenty minutes later, tickets in hand, we entered the bunker for a self-guided tour.
In the 1960s, the government built it into the side of a small hill on the island, then hid the hatch door from view with foliage.
The document at the museum explained that during the height of the Cold War, protecting the president was of the utmost importance.
Kennedy spent a lot of time in Palm Beach during the winter, so it was natural to build a bunker for him near his family’s home.
Since they resided on the north end of Palm Beach, Peanut Island was only a short distance by speedboat, and just about the last place on earth anyone would expect to find the president in the event of a nuclear fallout.
“I can’t believe I never knew about this,” Adam said as we crossed the threshold. “And I mean, I totally should have known. Kennedy was my favorite president.”
“Mine too. Why do you like him?”
“Just really interesting.” Adam shrugged. “I actually think his father is more interesting, though. The family made a lot of contributions in less than three generations. They went from pretty much nobodies to some of the most powerful people in the country.”
“They did.” I glanced down at the long staircase leading to the main section of the shelter. “That’s the best part about America. You can be anything if you want.”
“With a little luck,” Adam replied and reached for my hand. I sucked in a deep breath but didn’t pull away. Instead, I threaded my fingers into his. “Well, here we go. Let’s check it out.”
We traveled down the stairs to the biggest part of the structure: a cramped, almost bare-bones facility designed to take care of Kennedy and his family for several weeks in the case of an emergency.
We took in the memorabilia of the 1960s collected by the museum staffers, and marveled at the scary, almost dystopian architecture of the of the bunker.
It was creepy, but also intriguing. And it felt so different to be there with Adam, rather than my parents.
I’d also never had friends who compared to him.
The hole I’d felt since leaving for school had somehow filled.
I had no idea how it was possible, but I felt as though I was seeing the world in a different way, seeing it with my best friend…
and I no longer felt lonely. Alone. I looked at Adam and wondered if he felt the same.
“Thank you,” he said after a while, still holding my hand. We stood in what counted as the dry storage section of the building, and it seemed like a pulse of energy surged all around us, a delicious feeling that had been building since 48 hours before, in the garage, when he’d whispered in my ear.
“For what?”
“This.” He gestured at the room with his free hand. “For wanting to bring me here. People don’t ever want to do that. They don’t…they don’t take an interest in me.”
“I’m sorry they don’t.” I thought about what I’d read in his application, about the foster parents he lived with and the things I knew about his life after reading the applications in my dad’s office.
“But it won’t be long before you’re out on your own, you’re at college, and you can…
it’s almost like you can restart your life. ”
“As long as I can get to Gainesville. That’s my out.” He stared at me a little more intently. “But I don’t want you to think that’s why I like you, or anything like that.”
“I don’t,” I breathed. He likes me?
“I just…I felt myself drawn to you the minute I saw you when you came home from school. I can’t explain it. I keep thinking about you, and—” He broke off and gave me a shy smile. “Is that crazy?”
“No,” I replied, hardly able to form the words. “I felt it too. I don’t know what it is, but it’s there.”