Chapter 32
“Max!” Alex smiles at him, delighted as our umbrellas are close enough to touch. “What are you doing here?”
“I…” Max looks lost for words. Something I can’t ever remember him being. “We’re just…”
“We’re at Carter’s uncle’s house for the break,” I jump in. “I’m Nieve. Linden’s cousin.”
A look of surprise flashes across her face before a smile is back on it. “Oh, it’s nice to finally officially meet you. I’ve heard a lot about you. Carter didn’t tell me your plans had changed.”
Changed? This was always the plan.
“He didn’t tell me you were going to be here.” Max is frowning.
Alex smiles as she glances away, a gesture that makes me think she’s trying to hide something. “Oh, no, I didn’t know I was going to be here either.”
Max nods.
“When do you leave?” Alex is trying to appear casual, but the way she says it feels like she’s asking something more.
“Saturday,” I answer.
Her smile is tight. “Well, you’ll have to come by for dinner.” It’s the kind of thing people say when they’re grown-up and fancy.
“Is your brother here?” Max asks.
“No, he’s still in the city. Work.”
This is awkward. Everything is awkward. “You should join us for dinner tonight,” I tell her. “We’re going to this restaurant on the beach that Linden picked out.”
“Oh, that’s okay—”
“Come,” Max tells her. “It will be nice to catch up.”
“Do you need us to pick you up?” I ask.
She and Max share a look before she gives me a sweet smile. “I actually live next door, but that’s kind of you.”
Next door. This person lives next door. Had she always?
“Are you sure you want me to come?” she asks Max.
“Yeah,” he tells her. “I think it’s important.”
The rain stops almost as fast as it starts. Alex mumbles something about Florida’s weather and we say goodbye with hugs and promises of reuniting later tonight.
The car ride back is silent. I want to ask a thousand questions about Alex, but it never feels like it’s the right time. It’s only when we get to the house that we remember that we forgot to go to the store.
When we get back, Carter, Linden, and Ava are in the pool, while Benji and Damian lounge on chairs, sipping brightly colored drinks decorated with the paper umbrellas that Linden brought. She thought they would be fun.
Max jumps into the water, and I head into the kitchen. I’m debating a snack when Carter comes in. His head is bent, and he looks up at me through his lashes, giving me a sweet smile.
I remember this smile.
“Come on, Nee Vee.”
I blush at hearing the nickname he only uses when he really wants something. “No, Carter.” I try to swim away from him, but he pulls me closer and looks up at me through his lashes.
“Nieve, you know I don’t like to make you mad. I’m sorry.”
“Oh yeah?” My body turns away from him, because I can’t bother to look at him smiling. “Why am I mad?”
He deflates with a sigh. “I don’t know, but I know you’re mad, which means I was wrong.”
He’s used to this. To being charming and getting his way. His arms wrap around my waist, and he presses a kiss to my neck, one that I can feel in other parts of my body.
And I forgive him, because I always do.
“Hey.” He says it simply.
“Hey.”
“Look, I’m really sorry about lying about the coffee.” He rests a hand on the counter so he can lean toward me. “I don’t really get why you were so mad, but that’s not the point. Linden has explained that to me over and over again.”
“It’s fine, Carter.”
And I wonder if it really is.
Before when Carter would apologize or do something that would hurt me, I felt like I was lying to myself when I forgave him, but now?
Now Carter isn’t my problem.
He’s Linden’s.
That truth settles in my chest. Burning through the acceptance I had come to believe I wanted.
Carter is Linden’s.
Am I jealous? Or angry? Or sad? I can’t tell what I am. Maybe I’m all of those, or maybe I’m none of them. Carter is wrong. This isn’t about the coffee. And he’s absolutely right. It is about the coffee.
But it’s mostly about something being not what I thought it was. Carter isn’t who I thought he was.
We weren’t who I thought we were.
“Thanks, Nieve,” he says. “I knew you and I would be good.”
He’s walking away when I tell him, “I met Alex today.”
His shoulders straighten, and he pauses before he turns back around. “Alex?”
“Yeah, she’s your uncle’s next-door neighbor? I’ve seen her … around.”
“Alex is here?”
“Yeah, Max and I saw her at the store. I invited her to dinner with us tonight.”
“Cool.” But he doesn’t look cool. He looks upset.
Alex meets us outside, looking effortless. She introduces herself to Linden, Ava, and Damian, gives me a hug before hugging the boys. And I can’t help but notice how stiff Carter is when she wraps her arms around him.
We walk to a seafood restaurant only a mile away. It’s the kind of place that advertises as casual, though the prices are anything but.
All the seating is outdoor, a series of weathered picnic tables under string lights. On one side, Carter sits next to Linden with Benji and Damian. Alex sits across from Carter, and Ava and Max and me fill out the rest of the row.
As a group, we order fish and chips, giant peel-and-eat boiled shrimps, tacos, and crab legs to go with the pitchers of frozen margaritas that came out of a giant Slurpee machine. They sit in front of us like neon elixirs. Green, pink, purple, and orange.
Ava only has a drink and eats none of the food on the table, claiming to only want a salad. Until Carter orders oysters.
“Oh, I love oysters.” She looks at Max when she says it, and I can’t help but roll my eyes.
At least she doesn’t say it’s an aphrodisiac.
Max hands Ava one. He holds one out to me, but I give him a concerned look.
“She’s never had them,” Linden answers for me.
His head tilts to the side. “You … haven’t?”
I have. At Carter’s party for his birthday. But that was another life that happened to a girl who doesn’t exist anymore.
“Oysters are rich-people shit,” Linden says, but shoots one down her throat like a professional.
“Alex?” Max offers.
“I don’t like them, but thanks.”
I take the one Max is offering me that hangs in the air.
Without prompting, Max walks me through all the different things you can put on the oyster. Explaining the best way to eat them. I don’t correct him. I just let him do it. And after I’ve added hot sauce, I loosen the weird thing that looks like a dead tongue and … swallow.
It’s salty. And the texture is obscene … but it also tastes …
“Do you love it?” Carter smiles at me. The sun is setting at his family’s estate, and it casts the back garden in a beautiful golden-hour glow.
No. It’s horrible and no one should eat them ever, but that’s not what Carter wants. I can tell. So, like I almost always do, I tell Carter what he wants to hear. “I love it.”
“I can’t tell if you like it,” Max says.
I look at him and answer honestly. “I can’t either.”
It’s better than the last time I had it, when Carter’s dad was telling me how expensive and rare they were. Only the best. But it absolutely doesn’t pair well with my blackberry margarita.
Max is watching me. Something unspoken floats between us, and I want to pluck it from the air and ask why it’s there. See what secrets Max is holding on to. “Want another?” he asks quietly.
“I do!” Ava interjects.
The weird moment between Max and me seems to break, and he hands Ava an oyster.
A band starts playing, mostly Jimmy Buffett covers, and when I get up, a man in a Hawaiian shirt with silver hair asks me to dance.
His wife rolls her eyes. “I won’t dance with him, so you’re his only hope.”
With a smile, I take his hand, and we dance to “Margaritaville.” By the end of the song, my friends are also up. Carter, Max, Benji, Linden, and even Alex sway and sing with us, while Ava and Damian look on a little confused.
The night is warm, the sand is soft, and the music feels like it lives against our skin as we jump and sing and dance poorly without worrying about what anyone else thinks.
When a slow song comes on, Max holds out his hand to Alex, and I only feel a little disappointed as I watch him pull her close. Benji takes my hands, and we move in small steps on the floor. Max and Alex whisper to each other, and I notice Carter watching them as he dances with Linden.
“Switch!” Benji announces, letting go of me and cutting between Max and Alex.
And then I’m dancing with Max. It feels nothing like dancing with Benji. Max’s hand goes to my waist, and I fit myself against his chest. His cheek is so close to mine that if I turned, we would be kissing. I feel every place where his body touches mine.
Last time we were this close, I kissed him. Last time, he pushed me away.
I stiffen, and Max’s hands loosen their grip. “No pressure, but if you don’t dance with me, I’m pretty sure Ava will want me to dance with her.”
I glance over to where Ava’s sitting at the table. Ah. He’s using me to avoid her.
“Is this okay?” he asks me. It’s against my ear. The words are soft, like the way he holds me.
I hum a sound of agreement, because for the first time since we came to Florida, I feel like it is. I’m not worried about what I’m doing or the choices I’m making or why I’m not thinking about what it felt like when I woke up and weeks of my life were gone all because I got too close to Max.
Those consequences feel a million years away.
We walk back to the house together, the two of us falling behind the group. Ava seems to have given up on Max. I tell myself that when Max stops paying attention to me, it won’t sting because I know what this is.
But the night sky is infinite, and everyone is where they should be. The only trace of the rain from earlier is the balmy air. I keep seeing Max and that umbrella in my mind. It blurs with the memory of before, until I can’t really remember which version happened in this time.
And I can’t tell if it matters.
Max clears his throat. “Are you almost done with your portrait?”
I groan. I’m almost done, but I’m worried about showing him. “Are you done?”