Chapter 18
Chapter 18
I beg my heart to slow the hell down. “Where are we going?”
“To play the best sport in the world.”
“I don’t think we can figure-skate on sand.”
“Football, Maya.”
“Your football, or ours?”
“You have no football, just an organized system of overgrown men giving each other CTE.”
“Soccer, then. Well, thank you for the offer, but I take issue with team sports as a construct—”
“Hey, guys,” he announces. “Maya’s playing with us.”
Eli’s eyes turn to slits. He observes me from across the sand, skeptical. “You sure that’s a good idea?”
“Why not?” Conor pulls away, shrugging. “Diego, okay if she’s with you, Eli, and Axel? I’ll be with Sul and Paul.”
Diego gives me the thumbs-up and a wide smile. “Hope you’re ready to give it your all on the path to victory.”
I’m not even willing to give a third of my all—at least, that’s the intention. Unfortunately, anything with a remotely competitive bent sucks me in harder than a black hole. Fifteen minutes later, I’m very invested in the outcome of this inconsequential and severely dumbed-down game of soccer. Too invested.
I don’t like the person that I become when faced with the prospect of losing. Resist it , I beg my weak self. You’re stronger than this .
Then again, what if I’m not? And what if the fault lies in Axel and in subpar efforts? “Hey, Staph Boy?” I snarl after he fails to intercept the ball.
“Yeah?”
“Not a threat or anything, but if you don’t use your legs to run faster, someone might decide to cut them off.”
His expression is cowardly and not at all NHL-befitting. “W-what?”
“And they might feed them to the jellyfish hanging out in the shallow waters. The ones over there. Just saying—”
“That’s it,” Eli intervenes, facing me, hands on his hips. It gives me portentous You’re fourteen and I’m about to take away your Dr Pepper privileges flashbacks. “Maya, out.”
“What? Why? ”
“You know why. She’s back—and we do not negotiate with her.”
I gasp. “She is not back.”
Paul moves closer. Looks between us. “She? Who are you talking about?”
“The Mayageddon,” Sul whispers.
“No,” I protest. “Come on, no. She’s locked in. I was just pointing out that Axel is terribly incompetent and the sole reason we might not win. But like, in a nice, friendly way.”
Eli shakes his head. “You kicked sand at Paul, you tripped poor Sul twice—you know he has a bad back—and you nearly destroyed Hark’s ability to have children with your knee.”
“I was megging him.”
“Maya, megging involves dribbling the ball through someone else’s spread legs.”
“Precisely!”
“The ball wasn’t even in your half of the field.”
“What? Come on! You can’t kick me out, I can still win this.”
“That’s exactly what the Mayageddon would say.”
I open my mouth to protest, but it dawns on me. “Oh my god.” I bury my face in my hands. “She’s here. She’s fighting to break out.”
Paul clears his throat. “Is this, um, a habitual behavior?”
“No.” I sound desperate. “There’s no behavior. There’s no this !”
Eli sighs. “The Mayageddon hatches out of its depraved little egg every time there’s a competition. Two weeks ago I beat Maya at Trivial Pursuit, and the following morning I found the pie slices crushed in the blender and the question cards in the recycling bin.”
“It was a pre-2000 edition. I wasn’t even born . Keeping it in the house was ageist and—”
“Out,” Eli repeats ominously. “You’re expelled. Banned. If I see you within twenty feet of the field, I will tie you to the pier. Go play with Tiny, or something.”
I let out a typical Mayageddon groan and stomp away furiously, brushing past Conor, who holds out his bottle to me. “Have some water. It’ll calm you down.”
“No. It’s always water this and water that, but when I try to drink the blood of my enemies—”
“Can’t believe I’d forgotten,” he says, low. Fond, maybe. A few feet away, the others are straightening their shovel-made goalposts.
“Forgotten what?”
“The monster within.”
I look at him, letting my gaze slip from his sunglasses to his bare chest. It’s not the first time I’ve seen him shirtless. Last summer he came over to help Eli put up a couple of raised beds for Rue, and even before…I’m sure there were other times. Not a big deal. I know his workout regimen, so none of this is surprising.
Still, I glance away.
“It’s cute,” he says.
“What is?”
“How competitive you get.”
I grab his water and take an angry sip from the same spot where he just drank. “I’m not competitive. I just want to win.”
“Two very different things. Maya?”
“Yeah?”
“Why did you leave, yesterday? At the theater.”
I bend my head. Curl my toes in the sand. “Did Avery not tell you? I wanted to explore on my own, and—”
“I know the excuse you gave her. Can I have the truth?”
My face heats in a way that has nothing to do with the sun. But I push through and turn to face him directly. “No,” I say firmly. “You can’t.”
He nods. Once. “Very well. Even so, don’t do it again.”
I laugh. Also once. “I will if I want to, Conor.”
“You said we are friends, Maya.” His lips thin. “Friends don’t do that.”
“Friends don’t do…what?”
“Disappear into the ether.”
A single, outraged laugh slips out of me. “Are you serious ? You are telling me ?”
His jaw tenses. “It’s not the same.”
“No? Please, then, enlighten me about how—”
“Maya?” Paul runs up to us. “I’m so sorry Eli kicked you out. Do you want me to speak to him? Get him to change his mind?”
I let my eyes linger on Conor’s face, defiant, angry. Don’t glance away from him until Paul says my name again, uncertain, clueless about the electric charge crackling between Conor and me. “Maya?”
Fucking Paul . “It’s okay,” I tell him, forcing a smile. “I totally could have won if he hadn’t kicked me out. It’s an old trick of his—sabotage. He was trying to cost me the game—”
Conor has yet to look away from my face. “Eli was on your team,” he points out.
Oh. Right. “He couldn’t stand not being the MVP. Jealousy is—what…?” I stammer to a halt. All of a sudden, Conor’s thumb is wiping back and forth at the base of my jaw, the pad of his finger cool in the rising heat.
“Smudge of sunscreen.”
“Ah.” I nod. “That’s fine then,” I say dumbly. As though he needs permission after the fact.
“Should we head back, Hark?” Paul asks him—and why is he here, again?
“Sure.” Conor sticks his bottle back in the cooler. Then tells me: “We’ll miss you.”
I snort. “The megging police clearly won’t.”
“True.” He grins, amused. “Others will, I’m sure.”
They jog back. I stare at Conor’s back, the ripple of muscles and tendons and bones and fat under his tanned skin, and try not to be disappointed when Paul is the one who turns around to smile at me.
If I wanted, I could walk northeast for ten minutes and reach Isola Bella. If I decided to break into an easy run, it would probably take me around half the time. The tide is low, and I can see the strip of sand that connects the island to the coast. There’s almost no one in that area—here in Taormina schools won’t be over until mid-June, and the beaches are on the lower end of crowded, especially in the mornings. If I went now, I wouldn’t even have to deal with other tourists. I am tempted, so tempted, but I’m intercepted by Kaede and Tiny, who both want to play, and when they beckon me to the non-football section where the others are lounging, I can’t say no to either.
Impossibly, Kaede is even more adorable than usual in her see-through plastic sandals and little arm floats—which are, spectacularly, Jaws themed. “Maybe I shouldn’t have let her pick,” Minami sighs. “Can’t believe I thought she’d go for the Barbie ones.”
“Promise me to never, ever change,” I whisper at Kaede as I strap on her suit, then watch her run toward the water, only to freeze when a wave inches toward her.
On the shore, we bake a sand cake that, I already know, I’ll have to make a show of eating. Avery swims a few feet away from us. When wet, her long straight hair reaches down past the middle of her back. The swimsuit she’s wearing is technically a one-piece, but its strategically placed holes remind me of an avant-garde sculpture, at once classy and complicated.
“Fish?” Kaede asks me, pointing at her.
I press my lips together, trying not to laugh. “More like a mermaid, princess.”
Kaede and Tiny run in circles around each other, both convinced that they’re the one being chased. They dip their feet (paws?) in the water, experimenting, trying to gauge the height of the splashes they can produce with the scientific focus worthy of a dam architect. I glance around in search of my phone, eager to take a commemorative video of baby’s first hydropower project.
But something feels amiss.
“Hey,” I call toward the cabana. Minami, Rue, and the others are all there. “Have you seen Avery?”
Minami looks lazily to her left, then her right. “I think she may have gone back?”
“Did you see her leave?”
“No, but I was napping. Why?”
“I just…” I turn back toward the ocean. Nothing disturbs the horizon—not a seagull, not a boat, not a floating piece of wood. Not a person. “It’s weird.”
“ Could she have gone back?” Tisha asks, coming to stand at my side.
“I don’t think so. She was a bit ahead of us, maybe two minutes ago? She’d still be climbing the staircase.” I frown. Spin toward the football field, and do what I always do when I’m feeling uncertain: call my brother. “Eli?”
He stops the ball under his foot. Yells back: “Still not welcome, Mayageddon.”
“No, it’s—Kaede, hang on, hold my hand and stay close by for a minute, okay? Thank you, princess. Have you guys seen Avery in the last minute or so?”
“No. Should we have?”
“I’m not sure. I saw her floating just a minute ago, but not since, and she mentioned not being a very strong swimmer…”
I watch Eli and Conor exchange a brief, heavy look, and then it all happens very fast—the way they run into the water, followed by the others; my sinking heart as Conor screams from the water, asking me to be precise about Avery’s last location; the self-hatred I feel for not realizing sooner that she was missing. It can’t last more than a minute, before they find her. By the time I see Conor and Eli emerge from the waves, I’m about to drop to my knees. Eli gets out first. Then there’s Conor, holding a smaller body folded against his chest.
Next to me there are gasps. Oh my god s. Holy shit s.
Avery is conscious as Conor carries her out of the ocean. Her coughing is chest-deep, but she’s breathing, her lungs forcefully expelling water. When I see her standing on her feet I feel a massive wave of relief. Everyone crowds around her, asking her if she’s okay, if they should call someone, What do you need? but she clings to Conor, who pulls the wet hair back from her face. When he bends forward to wrap a towel around her shoulder, I watch her laugh and hug him, arms tight around his waist.
My relief turns into something else—something sour that disgusts me.
Nyota’s voice makes me jump. “You think she faked it?” she asks, suddenly next to me.
“What? Absolutely no .”
“Yeah. Me neither, sadly. Maybe the wedding is cursed, after all.”
We exchange a long look. Then we both laugh, a mix of nervousness, adrenaline crash, and incredulity at the absurd situation. A few feet away, everyone’s talking at once.
“Ny, I…This could have gone so bad.”
“I know.” Nyota pats my shoulder. “The thing is, it was prime romance material.”
“Was it?”
“Yup. Pretty sure I’ve read a book in which this exact scene occurs. The guy saves the girl, who happens to be his estranged former lover.”
“Yeah?” I swallow. I’m not—I don’t want to feel like I do now. If something had happened to Avery, I’d be devastated. What the hell is wrong with me? “What comes next? In the book, I mean.”
“I believe that the brush with death rekindles their love, and after a passionate declaration they celebrate the impermanence of life with several bouts of improbably orgasmic sexual intercourse.”
“Sounds like a good book. Maybe you should bring it on our next beach vacation.”
“Oh, I will.”
“Cool. We’re going to buddy-read it.”
“Oh, no, Maya.” She wraps an arm around my waist. “We’re going to buddy–set it on fire.”
We laugh again, a bit hysterical. Until: “Ma-da?” Something warm squeezes my hand. Kaede, pointing at the wave that rudely dragged her pail away.
I gasp theatrically. “What happened to your pail? We have to rescue it, don’t we?”
She nods urgently, and together we set out for the task.
The last thing I see before turning around is Conor, carrying Avery up the staircase toward the villa.