7
“BABE.” NICK LEVELEDan exasperated look at Trey, who had gamely offered to drive my car so I could work. “You have the cruise control set at sixty-two in a sixty-five-mile-an-hour zone. Maybe you should kick it up a mile or two so we get there before sunset?”
Nick’s tone was light, but he had a point; it felt like we’d been driving for ages.
Not that I wasn’t grateful; despite not hearing from me for months—or good lord, was it years?—Nick had responded Obvs! within minutes of me texting him to ask if they’d want to drive together up to Pine Lake, followed by a row of hearts from Trey. They’d been able to cancel their rental car, and I’d picked them up at the airport, nervous but excited to see them both again.
Nick’s openheartedness was classic him, as classic as the banter he and Trey had perfected over the years, a singsong soundtrack that wasn’t unpleasant, even as I tapped through my email trying to forward Lydia everything she could possibly need before we got to Pine Lake.
My sleep last night had been restless at best, one of those weird nights where you linger in that delirious purgatory between asleep and awake. I was exhausted but wired, and a dull, thumping panic throbbed behind my eyelids.
I’d spent the better part of the drive so far chewing the side of my mouth raw as I scrolled through endless email debates about creative direction and brand vision for Alewife. Amaya had shot down every idea we’d had so far, and now I was on my way to the land of limited internet access with less than two weeks to go before we had to present our pitch. Correction: only one week for me to get it right after this stupid micro-sabbatical. A wave of nervous nausea hit high tide in my stomach.
“Shhh, just do your crossword and let me drive.” Trey swatted at his boyfriend, his intricate tattoos flexing on his golden-brown skin, as Nick ducked playfully.
“Look, I just don’t want your Australian brain to get confused. Roads are hard for you.” Nick’s lips curled into a wicked smile as he baited Trey.
“I’m seriously about to pull over and leave you on the side of the highway.” Trey turned quickly to give Nick a ridiculously dramatic, brooding glare, and his lush, dark brows and thick black hair made him look like some sort of Austen-inspired grump-hunk.
Years ago, back when my group of friends was working at Pine Lake as counselors, Trey had rolled in from Down Under to teach waterskiing on a work visa, and he’d wooed the entire camp instantly with his down-to-earth charm and universally appealing biceps.
But Nick had been the one to win Trey’s heart, which surprised no one.
“I forgot how cute the two of you are together,” I teased, giving up on my emails for a moment to watch them.
Nick lodged a pointed glance at Trey before turning back to me, tugging at one of his chin-length black locs, which were not new, but new to me. I’d only ever seen them in photos online.
“Be honest, you’re only coming this weekend to see the two of us.”
“Oh, one hundred percent,” I agreed sarcastically, hoping he wouldn’t dig around for the real reason. I’d given no explanation for my about-face, other than my schedule magically changing at the last minute. The humiliation of my boss sending me on a forced vacation because I was utter shit at work wasn’t something I’d figured out how to share. Not yet.
“Charles and I never had adorable fights,” I muttered.
“I’m sorry that didn’t work out,” Trey said, his accent making even the most mundane words sound charming. “He always seemed like a decent dude.”
“Yeah, he was.” I smiled diplomatically. “He is. It just didn’t work out. We grew apart, wanted different things.”
This had been my rote answer for the past year, and it had worked in most social situations when people asked about him. The real answer was far more complicated and nuanced, something I still couldn’t quite put into words. When I tried—only in my head, of course—it amounted to something like, I think he was right. I loved the idea of him, and the stability I thought the relationship gave me, more than I actually loved him. But I’d never said anything close to this aloud, to anyone.
“That makes a lot of sense,” he said, nodding. I noticed Nick peek ever so slightly toward Trey, who caught his eye for a moment before turning back to the road ahead. “Well, wait until you see Eloise with her boyfriend. We met them up in Sonoma for a night a few months ago, and it was…” He shook his head like he still couldn’t believe what he’d seen.
“It was what?” I pushed, as Nick chuckled, making me feel even more like I was missing out on something. Eloise was the kind of person who had seemed forty years old at fourteen, so composed and collected it was hard to imagine her as anything else. She was wildly different from the rest of our group, serious and stoic to our silly, but that only made her fit in more, like a cork on a bottle of wine.
Nick turned in his seat. “Imagine two people in the honeymoon phase of a relationship and then multiply that times a hundred.”
“So much kissing,” Trey added with an amused shake of his head.
“Wow,” I replied. I didn’t know what to make of this loved-up version of Eloise other than it was an oversized example of everything I’d missed out on by not keeping in touch.
Unsure of what else to say, I gazed back down at my phone, hitting send on another email forward to Lydia.
“Clara Millen.” When I looked back up, I found Nick staring at me expectantly, like he was waiting for his coffee in the middle of Starbucks’ morning rush hour.
“Yes, Nick Reyes?”
“Are you… working?” The face Nick made back at me was so purely him—his arched brows and quirked, giant smile—that it was like looking directly into the past. Even though he was sitting directly in front of me, the sight of him made me nostalgic.
“No,” I lied, tossing my phone onto the seat next to me, on top of my notebook and the file of Alewife documents I’d dumped out of my tote bag the second I’d slid into the back seat.
“You finally get your ass up to camp after six long years—” Nick continued, chiding me again.
“Five!” I cut him off, giving him a hurt look. “It’s only been five.”
“Oh, as if that’s any better.”
“You’re right, you’re right. I’m sorry.” I waved my hand. “Continue.”
He cleared his throat dramatically. “You finally get your cute ass—”
“Oh, why, thank you.”
“—up to camp after five long years, during which you ditched your dearest friends—”
“I didn’t have a choice! I had to—”
“Work. We know. Your first love.”
“Okay, that’s a bit much,” I said, crossing my arms defiantly. “My first love is cheese.”
Nick leveled a look at me, and we both burst out laughing. It felt amazing to slip right back into our friendship, like an old, worn bathrobe that was still warm and cozy after all these years.
But there was just the tiniest bit of hurt buried in his comment, and I added it to my mental drawer of shame, where I’d stored Sam’s reveal about the group text, and Teen Clara’s hopeful expectations for her life that I’d so far failed to meet.
“You have promised to give yourself over to this friend-union this week, work be damned,” he reminded me.
“I promise. Just let me hit send on this email and then I’m all yours.”
“Pinky swear?” Nick held out a finger, and I latched mine around it, giving our joined hands a shake.
“Pinky swear,” I said firmly, though there was a part of me that felt like a liar. I wasn’t sure how to completely check out of work, even though I was being forced to do just that.
Be kind to yourself, I thought, and glanced down at the pile of papers next to me, where I’d tucked my letter, hidden between spreadsheets and outlines. But that felt easier said than done, the demand of an idealistic, naive teenager trying to cope with the emotional tornado on her horizon.
Satisfied with our agreement, Nick turned back around in his seat. As promised, I tapped out one more email and then put my phone down. NPR filled in the lull between our chitchat, as Massachusetts turned into New Hampshire, which flew by the window in a mix of every shade of green imaginable.
“The way life should be!” Trey announced as we crossed the border.
“Honey, that’s Maine’s motto,” Nick reminded him with a pat on the shoulder. “New Hampshire is ‘Live Free or Die.’”
“Christ, of course it is,” Trey muttered. “I forgot about their absurd no motorcycle helmet law.”
New Hampshire was so often overlooked, overshadowed by the lush rolling hills and earnestly cool vibe of Vermont to its left and the breathtaking beauty and storied seaside villages of Maine on the right. It was the middle child of New England states: kind of weird, occasionally out of step, often forgotten. And yes, they did not require motorcyclists to wear helmets, because of the whole live-free-or-die ethos, which was deeply rooted in every nook and cranny of the place.
But to me it was magical; New Hampshire had an old soul. It was simple and complex, stoic and serene, and I felt utterly like myself when I was here.
“I don’t know,” I mumbled, admiring the beauty through the window as Mount Monadnock appeared on the horizon. “This is definitely the way life should be, if you ask me.”
Eventually I dozed off in the back seat, my head jolting forward every time Trey slowed the car to a stop. I slept hard and deep, and finally willed my eyes open about an hour later, just as we approached the three white buildings that made up the town of Peridot’s tiny square.
“Nothing’s changed,” I muttered, shifting my head back and forth to ease up the cricks in my neck. The village wasn’t frozen in time; there was wear and tear on everything, faded paint holding on for dear life, and a gazebo that looked like it was ready to retire. Rather, Peridot survived despite the passing of time, the town hall, library, and tiny church still standing there, almost defiant in the face of time racing past.
“Nothing ever changes here,” Nick corrected, his voice reverent. “Remember Margo, who ran the dining hall? Her family still owns the General Store.”
He pointed to the small dusty red building in the center of town, with its rickety porch that seemed more lopsided than I remembered, the sign of a life well lived. The New Hampshire state flag hung off the banister, and next to it was a banner that read “Live Free Or Die, But You Gotta Pay For Your Dinner.”
Trey flicked on the left blinker and steered the car onto the bumpy dirt road out of town, the final stretch of our trip. Instinctively, we all rolled down our windows at the same time, the fresh, summer air pushing its way into the car, which smelled of the now-stale Dunkin coffee we’d grabbed just after leaving Boston.
Trey slowed down to five miles an hour, the only way to savor the approach to camp. I swear all of our shoulders lowered a full inch. Just past a small gray-shingled cabin on the left was the lake, which appeared through the emerald-tipped pines in all its deep blue, sparkling glory. I let out a pleased sigh, and Nick leaned his head out the window, a blissful look on his face.
“We welcome you to Pine Lake Camp, we’re mighty glad you’re here,” Nick started singing. “We’ll send you in reverberating with a mighty cheer. Come on, Clara!”
I pressed my lips together and shook my head no, self-conscious. But Nick just waved me on expectantly. He and Amaya should swap notes in getting people to do what they want.
“We’ll sing you in, we’ll sing you out,” I sang begrudgingly, my voice getting just a little bit louder with each word. “And we’ll raise a mighty shout!”
It felt ridiculous, yelling these familiar words as the air swept my hair up against my face. But my tepid smile quickly bloomed into a grin, and god, it felt good to be giddy about something again.
“Hail, hail, the gang’s all here at Pine Lake Camp!” I sang with newfound abandon. And for the first time since Amaya pushed me out of the Four Points office and into the woods, I felt downright ecstatic to be here. Joyful, even. Fifteen-year-old Clara would almost certainly approve.
I was so caught up in the moment that it took me a beat to register that something was wrong after Trey blurted, “What the hell?”
“Whoa,” Nick said, all the sunny brightness that normally occupied his voice gone.
“What?” I asked, thoroughly confused, still high on singing.
Trey pointed toward Nick’s window, and when I looked to the right, I saw the giant wooden sign that read PINE LAKE CAMP standing proudly at the entrance, like always. Its stark, bright white background had long since faded in the sun, but the name, printed in deep forest-green, was still as clear as ever. Next to it stood Steve and Marla waving at us, the sun glistening off their speckled gray hair.
And just behind them, Mack.
But this wasn’t what had thrown Nick and Trey off. It was the sign next to them staked into the ground, small, square, with sharp blue lettering.
SOLD.