Chapter 32 #2
“I’m your boss. I say we can. Come on.” He steps away, using his hand in mine to tug me off the edge of the desk.
“I’ll email Rowan now to tell him we’re taking the day to explore and engage with the community.
He won’t care.” He pauses, reaching out to push my hair back.
“We’ll chase rainbows, June. That’s what your grandmother said to do, right? ”
My heart melts at the mere idea that he remembers that small moment.
“We don’t have bathing suits,” I argue weakly. “We’ll have to go back home.” He shakes his head.
“Buy some in the gift shop. Go pick them out while I finish things up here.” I stare at him, wide-eyed, but his face is serious. “Go, June. Now. That’s an order.”
And really, who am I to argue?
“Are you sure about these?” Graham asks as we walk to his car, tugging down the hem of the swim shorts I grabbed for him. They’re a seafoam green color and just like I daydreamed about all those weeks ago, short as can be. The perfect slutty inseam for my man to show off his killer thighs.
And again, just as I daydreamed all those weeks ago, the man has thighs that should never be trapped in the crime that is dress pants. They don’t do even close to the justice they deserve.
“Graham, I swear to god, I have never wanted to jump your bones more than right now.”
He looks at me, confused, as we slip into his car.
“Really?”
“Oh yeah. Your thighs…” I look at them for long moments, then fan myself. “How do you even maintain those?” A small smirk tips his lips.
“Genetics, and I used to work out for ninety minutes a day.” My eyes widen in awe.
“Over an hour? On purpose?”
I, of course, know he works out because he tends to do it while I paint, but it’s definitely not ninety minutes.
“I never had anything else to work toward, no one else to spend my time with,” he says, looking over at me and placing a hand on my thigh. He squeezes once, and I smile at him. My bad mood is already lifting, but if I tell him that I’ll sacrifice our day out.
“But now you do?”
“Now I do.”
He smiles at me as he opens the door for me, then walks around the car to the driver’s side before taking us to the local deli to grab lunch to go.
“Okay, where to?” he asks once we have a feast inside the small cooler he also bought from the gift shop.
With a smile, I direct him toward my favorite beach.
It’s not technically in Seaside Point, but a state park right outside of town, so it doesn’t have all of the chaos that Seaside Point does, just the peaceful ocean and stretch of sand.
We unpack the towels we brought and spend time lying in the sun or dipping our toes into the water.
It’s the perfect day, perhaps even more perfect since we’re here purely because I was having a shit one. It only gets better when I find a white circle sitting half-buried in the sand. Excitedly, I bend to pick it up, then gasp when I pull a perfect sand dollar out.
“What is it?” Graham asks, putting his hand on my lower back.
“It’s a sand dollar!” I say excitedly, turning to him to show him the delicate discovery.
“It’s lucky to find a whole one. I can’t believe it!
” My eyes narrow. “Did you drop it?” I’ve lived in Seaside my entire life and have probably spent whole days and weeks wandering these shores without ever finding a whole sand dollar.
“What?” he asks, looking genuinely confused. “Why would I drop it?” I let out a laugh, then shake my head.
“Claire has always been in love with finding seashells, and when they first met, Miles started buying nice ones and dropping them when she wasn’t looking.
She thought she was just really good at finding seashells.
Last summer, she found out he’s been dropping them for her, long before they even started dating. ”
Graham’s eyes widen, and his arm on me tightens, pulling me in closer.
“Was she mad when she found out he’d been dropping them all along?”
I think about that, never considering it because Miles and Claire are so deeply in love, then shake my head.
“No. She understood. It’s a sweet thing between them now. He still does it.”
He smiles then, something close to relief flashing over his face. I open my mouth to question it, but before I can, I’m distracted as the soft tones of an ice cream truck filter through the air.
“Is that the ice cream truck?” I ask, turning my head up the beach and toward the parking lot
“Sounds like it,” he says.
“Oh, my god. I need an ice pop. I need to go grab my wallet!” I say, excited, but he grabs my wrist.
“No. I’ve got it,” he says, pulling his own wallet out. I narrow my eyes at him, and something clicks, a memory from a few weeks ago when I said I was craving an ice pop.
“Did you do this?” I ask, tipping my head to the side.
“Do this?”
“The ice cream truck, did you do it?”
A tiny, mischievous smile tips on his lips.
“How would I have done that?” I don’t buy his half-assed denial in the least.
“Oh, my god, you totally did. You totally had the ice cream truck come here just to make me happy, didn’t you?”
A laugh leaves his lips as he takes my hand and leads me up the sand.
“You mentioned wanting one. I just sent them a message on social media when we got here. It was no big deal; they were already coming this way.”
I stare at him in awe.
“Are you mad?”
“Why would I be mad?” I ask with a laugh, shaking my head. “Because you’re the kindest, sweetest, most caring man alive? No, I’m not mad. Let’s go before they drive off.”
Then, Graham buys me a Powerpuff Girl ice pop, and I smile as I eat it. He gets a boring soft serve, but watches me in something close to horror.
“How are you eating that?” he asks eventually, and I just shrug.
“This is what I always get from the ice cream truck. You can get soft serve all over the island, but there are only a few places you can get a Bubbles ice pop.”
He shakes his head but smiles all the same.
“You’re a nut, you know that?”
“You like it though,” I say, and he pulls me in close.
“I really do. I must be out of my mind, but I really do.” Then he kisses me, long and deep, until a drip melts onto my hand.
I pull back, licking the melted ice pop off.
When I look up, he’s watching me with rapt attention, and I giggle, not because of his teenage boy look, but at the fact that his face has pink and blue smeared on his lips.
And somehow, my day is completely better.
“What’s the damage?” I ask as Miles meets me in the garage, a blue shop towel in his hands. He texted me while we were at the beach to tell me my car was ready, and Graham took me over to pick it up on the way back to his place. He gives me a wide, brotherly smile.
“A hundred,” he says, and I stare at him before looking at him, annoyed. Graham lets out a little snicker, thoroughly entertained by this.
“Okay, and what’s your not my brother’s best friend and my best friend’s boyfriend price?”
“Hundred,” he repeats, and I fight the urge not to stomp my foot.
“Miles Miller,” I start. “Don’t make me call Claire. Or worse, your mom. She knows how important it is for a woman to pay for things herself.”
He lets out a laugh and shakes his head before lifting his hands in surrender.
“Serious, June. It wasn’t too bad, just two minutes of tinkering. Then I recharged the air conditioning. That was like, five bucks, and I knew you wouldn’t be down with that, so I changed your oil and refilled your windshield wiper fluid and changed the cabin air filter.” I narrow my eyes.
“You’re telling me the only thing wrong with that is that you needed to tinker?” He nods. “What about the starter? You said that might be an issue.” He shakes his head.
“Something was loose.” I narrow my eyes.
“An oil change alone is a hundred bucks, Miles.”
“That’s just because shops upcharge. I only charged you for materials. Those aren’t that much, right Graham? Back me up on this,” Miles says. Graham nods.
“Stop giving him a hard time. He’s probably overcharging you for oil, too, if we’re being honest, since he’s afraid you’ll do exactly this.”
“I am! Thank you!” I look between the two of them, then roll my eyes.
“I’m sorry,” I say with a sigh. “It just sounds…too good to be true. That car is older than me.”
“It’s a good car. You got lucky, June. It didn’t need much.”
There’s that word again: lucky. My chest lightens, and I grin, because more and more, that seems to be the truth. Maybe it’s finally my turn to have things work out for me, or maybe I really am manifesting my luck turning around, but either way, I try not to look at it too closely.
“Here’s the keys, you’re good to go,” he says, and I glare at him.
“I have to pay,” I remind him, and he grins, shaking his head before rolling his eyes.
“You’re a pain, you know that?”
“It’s pretty much my one job in life to make your and Grant’s life a misery.”
“And now Graham’s,” Miles adds. I look over my shoulder at the man in question.
“No, he likes it, trust me.”
A loud laugh fills the garage, and it’s not until I’ve paid and I’m following Graham back to his place in my car that’s never run smoother that I realize Graham never argued my point.