Chapter 28
“Hey, Wren! Wanna come bluffing?”
I glower at Gus, then quickly glance at Wren. She’s about fifteen feet away, unlocking her convertible. Not meeting my gaze.
We’ve avoided each other since our argument on the docks. I’ve lain in bed for the past ten nights, tossing a baseball at the ceiling, listening to, “What are we?” echoing in my head.
“Yeah, sure,” she calls back. “I just have to swing by my house. Grab a suit.”
“What about skinny-dipping?” Aaron calls, and a muscle in my jaw jumps.
I see them talking a lot, but I don’t think he and Wren have hooked up. I don’t know for sure though. Maybe there are other guys besides Aaron. Maybe Wren isn’t as confused about us as I am.
I stride toward my truck, not waiting for Gus.
He checks with Wren, making sure she remembers where to go, then jogs over to climb into the passenger seat.
“Why’d you do that?” I ask Gus as soon as the door is shut.
“Do what?”
I reverse out of the spot, sending a spray of gravel flying as I accelerate toward the street. “Invite her,” I grit out.
“Cammie? Abby? Macie—”
“You know who.”
“Wren?”
I nod.
“Because you’re in love with her and you’re doing nothing about it.”
I nearly drive off the road, swerving the tires straight just before they cross the white line.
“Jesus!” Gus yelps.
I care about Wren a lot. I can admit that much to myself. She’s like no one else I’ve ever met, and there’s an intrigue to that. We have chemistry.
But I am absolutely, definitely, definitively not in love with her.
Right?
“I’m not,” I tell Gus.
He snorts, then says, “Okay,” in that obnoxious tone people use when they don’t believe you, but don’t bother saying so.
“I’m not.”
“You punched Nichols.”
“He deserved it.”
“He always deserves it,” Gus agrees. “But you don’t always show off your right hook. You haven’t hit anyone in years … until Wren was involved.”
I unclench my jaw to say, “I lost my temper. It happens.”
“Fine. Then why did you get wasted on New Year’s Eve after she left?
Why did she spend the night at your house back in May?
You never bring girls home. I saw the look on your face when people were talking about her going upstairs with Aaron.
You’ve barely said a word to the poor kid since then, and you treat all the other guys the same. ”
“Poor kid? He’s nineteen. And he forgot to charge a customer for gas yesterday.”
“I’m not saying you want to be in love with her, okay?
Maybe you’re so deep in denial that you actually believe you aren’t.
But I’m telling you, as your best friend and as someone who’s spent time around you two, you are.
And you’re going to lose her if you don’t accept it soon.
We both know she’s got plenty of other options. She won’t wait forever.”
I scoff. “She’s not waiting now.”
“She went upstairs with him after you showed up with Macie, Cap.”
“Whose fault was that? You called and asked me to drive Macie—”
“Yours,” Gus interrupts. “If you’d told Wren how you felt before then, it wouldn’t have mattered who you showed up with.”
When I say nothing, he continues, “I haven’t seen her with any other guys since then. I think you’ve got a shot.”
“I don’t want a shot,” I snap.
“Sure,” Gus sings in that maddening tone again.
I shake my head, turn up the radio’s volume, and roll my window all the way down. Rest one elbow on the door, keeping my gaze on the road ahead. Between the wind and the blaring music, I won’t hear anything else Gus says.
But it doesn’t matter. His words are already burrowing into my brain.
Fuck. Am I in love with her? How am I supposed to know, to tell?
I’ve tried to downplay any reaction around her, and Gus still thinks I am.
If I’d done what I really wanted to—chase after her on New Year’s Eve, fuck her in my bed on her prom night, punch Aaron for touching her at that party, tell Nichols, “She’s mine,” when he commented that he’d seen her first—what the hell would he have thought then?
Not that he was wrong about my feelings—that’s for damn sure.
Arriving at the cliff is a relief. Gus won’t say anything about Wren in front of everyone. He’s loyal. Always has my back.
Which makes his observations harder to dismiss.
He does know me, has seen me with a lot of girls.
I know his comments aren’t baseless. I just need them to be a little rickety.
Wren hasn’t said a word to me in over a week.
I already lost her, probably. I lost her in that damn storage closet, most likely.
And what would a relationship between us even look like?
She’s moving to California next month. And I’m …
well, past the marina closing, I have no clue what I’ll be doing.
Most of the jobs around here are seasonal.
Lucky’s might hire me around the holidays—they’re always short-staffed that time of year, and I think Owen likes me enough to look past the Brett incident.
I have enough savings to make it to next summer.
Longer if I keep living at home. But I don’t know what I’ll do if I stay right where I am.
Sadness about Skylar and anger at my dad turned my future into a dead end. Crappy grades and no baseball mean I couldn’t even get into the community college Gus is going to.
Wren might have chosen UCLA, but she could have gone anywhere.
Her opportunities are endless. Mine are practically nonexistent. That’s partly my fault, which makes it even worse. I want to be someone who triumphs over adversity rather than allows it to sink them, but I barely know where to begin that battle.
“Let’s go,” Cammie announces once everyone has climbed out of cars.
I scan the line of parked vehicles. No convertible.
“Wren isn’t here yet,” I say, avoiding looking toward where Gus is standing.
Cammie rolls her eyes. “She knows the way.”
I shrug a shoulder, then lean a foot back against my truck.
“It’ll be dark soon,” Cammie adds.
I glance up at the sky. It’s barely six. “Sun won’t set for a couple of hours.”
“We should wait for everyone,” Aaron says, glancing at me like I’ll be impressed by him agreeing.
The only reason I fight the scowl that wants to appear in response is Gus’s lecture. He’s right; I don’t have to be best friends with the guy, but it’s unprofessional and unfair—and obvious, apparently—to treat him differently simply because of whatever has or is happening between him and Wren.
Cammie sighs, but quits arguing after Aaron chimes in.
Wren’s convertible arrives a few minutes later. She parks at the end of the row of cars, climbing out, and Aaron jogs over to her like an eager puppy.
I tug on the brim of my ball cap as I straighten and start walking toward the path, tracking Wren’s progress out of the corner of my eye.
She’s smiling in response to whatever Aaron said to her, tucking her hands into the front pocket of her hoodie.
I do a double take, gaze lingering in that direction.
She’s wearing my sweatshirt. The one I gave her on the beach, on the Fourth, while we watched the fireworks. I’m just realizing she never returned it.
I don’t know what her wearing it means. If she just happened to grab it or happened to have it in her car.
But I do like seeing her in my clothes, and if I asked Gus, I’m pretty sure he would say that’s another tally in the Love column.
No one else is in the clearing. We’re too large of a group to all approach the cliff ledge at once—I’m not even sure if everyone who came is planning on jumping, but I am. So, I walk ahead as part of the first group. So does Wren.
“Want to go first?” Aaron asks her as she pulls off my sweatshirt.
“Sure,” she answers, tossing the hoodie on the ground and walking closer to the edge.
Wren doesn’t hesitate this time. Nor does she kiss Aaron, in case she’s about to die, which is a relief. She runs and leaps, allowing plenty of clearance from the rocks clustered against the cliff’s face.
Aaron steps ahead to jump next. No doubt hoping for a romantic moment in the water before the rest of us join them.
Gus holds a hand out, blocking him. “Wait for her to come up first.”
I frown, taking a step forward so I can peer over the edge. All I see are blue waves topped with whitecaps. No blonde hair. It’s choppy, but not dangerously rough. Especially for a strong swimmer.
More seconds tick past. I’m too panicked to count them precisely, but the number I do is too high. She should have surfaced by now. Icy terror floods my veins, freezing my heart and stalling my breathing.
Gus glances nervously at me. “She cleared the rocks fine, so—Cap!”
I barely hear his shout over the wind whistling in my ears.
Salty water closes over my head a few seconds later.
I kick my feet viciously, realizing I didn’t take my T-shirt off.
Saturated cotton sticks to my arms, billowing around my chest and hindering my progress.
Still, when my head breaks through the waves, it looks like I’m the only one in the ocean.
“Wren!” I yell, treading water and rotating in circles as I desperately search the surf for another head.
It gets deep here, fast, which is why it was selected as a jump spot. But she could have gotten slammed by a piece of driftwood, or there could be a shark or a jellyfish, or—
“Hi!” She pops up like a buoy right in front of me, slicking blonde hair out of her face and smiling hugely as she sucks in a deep breath. “I’ve been practicing in the pool. I can do three laps now without—”
I nearly sink; I’m so weak with relief. And then? Then I’m fucking furious. So mad that I can’t say a word. I start swimming toward the shore, my waterlogged shirt barely slowing my angry strokes.
“Sawyer!” Wren calls, but I can’t stop. Can’t talk.
I reach the sandy section of the shore in record time, yanking my shirt off as soon as I can stand. It rips, and I couldn’t give a single shit.
“Sawyer!” She’s still following. Still shouting my name.
I’m out of the water, striding toward the path that leads back up to the top. Except I’m not headed there. I need to be somewhere—anywhere—else. Gus can catch a ride home with someone else. All our friends are here.
“Hey!” Wren sounds angry now too.
And she’s catching up. I can hear the splashing as she reaches the shallows. Hear her rapid breathing as she runs after me, grabbing my arm and yanking me to face her.
“What the—”
“Did you think that was funny?” I barely recognize the sound of my own voice. Each syllable seethes with fury.
Her annoyed expression wavers. “I mean, I was just holding my—”
“My sister fucking drowned, Wren. Skylar got caught in a rip current, and they couldn’t save her in time.”
Wren’s grip on my arm goes slack. I literally see the blood drain from her cheeks, turning her flushed face pale.
“I-I had no idea.”
I close my eyes. “I know.”
Another thing I’ve fucked up. Because I didn’t know how to tell her. Because I’d never had to tell someone before. This was the worst possible way to go about it—blaming her for trauma she hadn’t even known existed.
“I’m so sorry about your sister, Sawyer. I-I didn’t mean to … I wasn’t—I didn’t think I was under for that long.”
I have no idea how long Wren was under for. Each second felt like hours dragging by since I freaked out as soon as she didn’t come up right away. Not only because it was a reminder of what had happened to Skylar, but because it was Wren who might have been in trouble.
Gus was right.
I love her.
I wouldn’t have freaked out that way if it had been anyone else slow to surface. I would have been concerned, but I would have been coherent.
“It’s fine,” I say stiffly. “I overreacted.”
“No, you didn’t. I swear, if I’d known, I never would have—”
“I have to go,” I say, turning and walking away.
She calls my name again, but I don’t stop. And I sure as hell don’t look back.