Chapter Eight Sera
Chapter Eight
Sera
On Friday I go straight to Maddy’s parents’ diner after camp is over. The place is packed, so I take a spinning seat at the far end of the counter and wave to Maddy to let her know I’m there.
“No rush,” I say, pulling out my notebook to work on my ideas for the fellowship application.
I have to submit three cohesive pieces and write an essay.
I’ve been toying with finally doing some self-portraits and writing about my heart, since it is the thing I know best. I send Iris a text to ask how Paris is, and she sends back a few photos of the view out her window.
There’s a cobbled courtyard covered in potted plants and a teal Vespa leaning against a vine-covered wall.
She asks how the first week of camp was and if I’ve decided on a theme for my application yet.
I send a thumbs-up on both and tell her I’m working on it today. It’s not ready for her critique yet.
Maddy comes over with a milkshake and a plate covered with an upside-down takeout container and leans on the counter, sighing dramatically.
She looks exhausted, and I feel a twinge of guilt for how hard she’s always working.
Her glasses are smudged, her hair frizzed.
She’s been here all day, and I know she’s dying to leave.
There’s a group of younger teens in the corner booth who are counting out their change before they order, reminding me of us, of simpler times.
Five years feels like such a long time ago.
I hope no matter where I am in the next five years, I’m still coming down to Northport for at least part of the summer.
And I hope that Maddy has her own bakery business and isn’t tied to the diner.
“When are you off?” I ask, stirring the shake and taking a spoonful of the whipped cream off the top.
“We still close at eight even though it’s Friday on the Cape in the summer. Usually I think it’s crazy that my parents don’t want the extra hour or two of dinner service, but today, thank god. It’s been chaos.”
“The weather.” I nod knowingly, looking outside at the sideways rain that’s been coming down all day. “The kids at camp were all worked up too.”
“You have the weekend off, though, yeah?”
I nod and take a sip of the peanut butter–chocolate milkshake. “Wow, that’s amazing.”
“Right? My own special recipe. A few hundred more of these will pay for culinary school. I think.” She shrugs. Something crashes in the kitchen and the line cook, Maddy’s cousin Kris, shouts out that she’s fine. Maddy sighs. “Maybe in five years.”
“And what’s this?” I point my spoon at the covered plate, and Maddy straightens up, her eyes twinkling.
“Cookies. You’re gonna love them. They’re kind of like the sequilhos my mom makes, but I added shredded coconut and vanilla.” She slides the plate closer, and I pick up a cookie.
I take a bite, and Maddy’s right. I do love them. They rival the baked goods at Lorell’s, and I tell her as much.
“Seriously, Mads, this might be the best thing you’ve ever made.”
“You always say that,” Maddy says, taking a cookie for herself. She points to my notebook. “What are you working on?”
I tell her about the fellowship and the application process, the house I’d get to stay in in Paris next summer. Her eyes grow wide behind her glasses.
“That sounds so cool. What if…” Maddy starts, and I sit up taller. Maddy’s what-ifs are usually followed by spectacular ideas. “What if I came with you?”
“Yes! I mean, can you?” I look around the diner again, knowing Maddy’s parents rely on her.
“If I give my family a heads-up, I think so. I’ve already been talking to them about this Parisian bakery course.”
“Oh my god. Yes. It would be amazing to go to Paris together. We’d eat all the best pastries.”
“Maybe we can go backpacking too. Do a real European gap year,” Maddy adds.
“Yes,” I say. “It’s decided. We’re doing it.”
Maddy laughs. “We better start saving up.”
Two meals pop up in the service window and Maddy spins off to deliver them.
As she does, the bell above the front door chimes, and a girl our age with brown skin and sleek black hair comes in.
She has big headphones on and is clutching a sticker-covered laptop to her chest. I smile a little to myself as she catches Maddy’s eye—she’s totally Maddy’s type.
Maddy tells her to sit anywhere, then goes and takes the tweens’ orders and greets a family of six that has just piled in.
She comes back around the counter, picking up fries from the window and sliding them toward me.
“Who’s that?” I ask, tilting my head toward the corner booth where the new girl is getting settled.
Maddy shrugs, but there’s a mischievous smile playing at the corner of her mouth. “Don’t know. Summer person, probably.” I raise my eyebrows, but Maddy doesn’t take the bait.
“Do you want a burger too?”
My mouth waters. Of course I want a burger, but there’s already more salt on the fries than I’m supposed to have in a month. I pop one in my mouth while it’s still hot and moan in appreciation.
Maddy quirks an eyebrow at me. “You never had a fry before?”
“It’s been a while since I’ve had one this superb.” Heart-healthy food is fine until it’s all you get, even when you’re on your period and craving Cheetos. Then it’s torture.
“Ah, your heart? Thought you were good?”
“I am. Just supposed to watch my salt, but I’ve been so good all week,” I say as I eat another fry. “Better make it a turkey burger because I’m going to eat too many of these fries.”
Maddy snags a couple fries off the plate and nods.
“So, where are we going on our Eurotrip?” I ask.
“Hmm…Amsterdam, maybe Oslo? Berlin?”
I write Berlin, Amsterdam, and Oslo really big at the bottom of my page.
“Yes! I’ll start googling hostels.”
Maddy shoots me a grin and goes to run more food orders. She lingers a little longer than needed as she pours coffee for the girl in the corner, but I can’t catch what they’re saying.
I’m jotting down other ideas for my application when my phone lights up next to my milkshake.
It’s Jackson, asking if I want to go to dinner soon.
After the drive-in, he walked me home, since Abbi went to Cam’s, and I found out his mother is an artist and has taken him all over the world to see some of the greatest museums. I’m dying to hear more.
I smile and send a yes. Maddy resumes her position across from me at the counter.
“Was that Luke? What’s going on with you two?” she asks, looking excited.
I swallow, my mouth cottony. “There’s nothing going on. That was Jackson.”
She looks at me, quiet, waiting. I hold out. Maddy sighs.
“Something happened at the drive-in, before Jackson got there. Was it just that Izzy’s back? Because they’re not serious. They were on and off all summer last year.”
“Seemed serious.” I try to keep my voice light. “And I don’t care, really. Luke can date whoever. We’re just friends. Did you get her name?” I glance at the girl in the corner booth, who is opening her laptop and emptying sugars into her coffee.
“Sienna.” Maddy blows her bangs out of her eyes. “Stop deflecting. So, you two talked? Like, for real, about…everything that happened? And he knows about your heart?”
“You hypocrite.” I shake my head. “And well, no, not in detail”—I shrug—“but we agreed to be friends again. I’ll tell him about my heart soon. I swear. But I’m fine and it’s not really important now.” I don’t mention the moment in the dark at the drive-in.
Maddy smirks. “You two aren’t meant to be just friends.”
“No one is meant for anything, Mads. We both made choices, and his was clear.”
Jackson sends me a thumbs-up, and I show Maddy my phone. “Plus Jackson is new, and he’s nice. And he’s hot.” I reach for another fry and Maddy takes it right out of my hand.
“Hey!”
“Sure, so hook up with Jackson, whatever. But you’re still avoiding them, aren’t you?” she says, pointing the fry at me.
“Avoiding what?”
“Your feelings for Luke.”
“I don’t have feelings for Luke.”
“Liar!” Maddy’s voice rises, and there’s another crash from the kitchen.
The family in the corner whips their heads her way, frowning.
Sienna looks over too, concerned, and Maddy tucks her hair behind her ear.
“Oops.” Maddy laughs as Kris shouts that she’s okay again, then leans closer and lowers her voice.
“I didn’t push last year ’cause, well, you know, but come on, you’d be so great together.
He literally has two pieces of your heart.
Tell me a more storybook romance beginning than that. ”
My heart flutters in reply, and I sigh. “I really don’t want to talk about it, Maddy.”
“Maybe you need to,” Maddy says, gently cutting through my bullshit.
“Maybe,” I admit, “but I just want to move forward, not back.”
“But what if you left something good behind?” Maddy asks. Thankfully more food comes up in the service window and she leaves me with my thoughts.
She’s not wrong. Sometimes it does feel like two summers ago Luke and I missed out on something great.
By July I was sure Luke and I were going to be getting together, but it just kept not happening.
At the end of August, the camp hosts a dance at the high school, and I was positive Luke was going to ask me as his date.
There’d been so many moments all summer where it felt like something was about to happen that kept getting interrupted by our friends or siblings or even my own nerves.
Then, a week before the dance, he stopped me on our bike ride home, pulling us off into the grass at the corner of Beach Rose Lane.
“What’s up?” I asked. “You’re going to be late.” He was due at the shop to help his dad with some delivery orders.
“It’s fine.” He pushed his hair out of his eyes and smiled his mischievous smile that crinkled his eyes and set off butterflies from my chest to my toes. “Meet me at our beach tomorrow night. Ten? After your tournament.”