THE PAST （AGED 16）
LOLA
The waves remind me of serenity. The aqua hue of it consumes me, like a warm hug. I close my eyes and smile, embracing the soft breeze and the sunlight.
When Sophie invited me on a beach trip, I knew I had to go.
The thought of being right by the ocean filled me with joy.
Away from my household. Away from the slimy, wandering eyes of Marcus.
Ever since Sophie moved in next door a year and a half ago, we’ve become inseparable.
I always forget about my home issues when I am with her.
I also knew it would be a good opportunity to spend more time with Brody.
Brody is a mystery. We tease each other, we bicker, we get on each other’s nerves, but at the end of the day, he is always watching me. He is attractive, but so intimidating.
Sophie runs ahead, hoodie flapping, bare legs shining.
I chase her down the slope, hollering, until we crash into the flat part near the water.
She throws herself down, cackling, and rolls, immediately covered in sand.
Brody is up the beach, maybe thirty yards, but he’s doubled back.
Watching. Pretending not to. He’s drawing something in the sand with a stick.
When I look, he waits a second, then looks back at me, eyes too pale for the sunlight, and my cheeks go hot and my knees turn traitor.
I’m not ugly. I know that. But people look at me and only see curves.
Boys at school say “slut” if your shorts are too tight, or stare when you bend over.
At sixteen years old, my body is developing more.
Brody isn’t like that, though. He doesn’t talk about it, he just watches. Like a wolf in the underbrush. Like if he holds still long enough, I’ll walk right up to him and let him take a bite.
Maybe I would.
“Hey, Bambi,” he says when I get close.
There it is. My nickname. He barely smirks but his mouth curves, just a little, and it’s like a punch straight through the spine.
“Hey yourself,” I say, pretending I’m not grinning.
Sophie splashes water at his feet. It’s too early for the sun to be hot, but she acts like she doesn’t care. She dances back and forth, making a mess. Brody barely moves. He just stands there, shadow solid on the sand, looking like a bodyguard or a serial killer. Or both.
Lucas shows up last, dragging his heels. He’s got athletic shorts and a faded soccer jersey. He’s also wearing sunglasses, pushed up on his head, but unnecessary. The sun isn’t bright enough to hurt. He’s nice and cute, with floppy brown hair and green eyes, but he does not catch my attention.
I only know Lucas from school. He’s our age, and coincidentally, the son of Richard’s long-time friend who joined us on this trip too. They told me it’s a tradition to go on a trip every year. Brody and Sophie’s parents are long-time friends with Lucas’s.
He squints at Brody. “Whatcha making?”
Brody doesn’t reply, but flips the stick away. Sophie answers instead. “He’s writing something.”
I kneel and look. It’s my name. Okay, not my name. Just the word “BAMBI” in huge block letters, stabbed into the sand. The B’s are crazy big, and the rest is a mess.
I burst out laughing. “Damn, Brody. You always this sappy?”
He shrugs, offhand. “You like it or not?”
He’s teasing. Or is he? I can’t tell; his face is so flat. Unreadable. Only the edges of his ears are a little pink.
I trace my big toe over the ‘I.’ “It’s cute. Definitely wouldn’t survive a high tide, though. Just saying.”
“Not for the tide,” he says. “Just for you.”
Jesus. That does something to my belly. I can’t stop smiling.
Lucas shakes his head. “You two are weird.”
Sophie elbows him. “You’re just jealous your art sucks.”
“I’m not jealous,” Lucas says, but he flicks a shell at me anyway and it almost hits my arm.
I fake a scream. Everyone laughs, even Brody, low and guttural, so fast you’d miss it if you weren’t obsessed. I am.
We run around for a while, nothing to do but chase the water and dig holes.
Sophie starts building a fortress, and Lucas helps.
They have this way of syncing up, like twins, even though she’s nothing like him.
He’s punchy, always loud, always talking about sports or dumb pranks.
Sophie is quiet but ten times smarter. She lets him think he’s in charge, but he never is.
I hang back with Brody. He lets the wind eat his hair, the dark pieces whip around, getting in his eyes, but he doesn’t seem to notice.
He’s taller than me by a lot. It’s easier to look at his hands; the veins in his wrist, and the way he fists his thumb as if he needs to crush something soft. A crab shell, maybe. Or my throat.
I try to think of something casual. Something that won’t sound desperate. “You gonna swim today or just stalk me from the shoreline?”
He tilts his head. He does that a lot, like he’s dissecting every word. “That depends, Bambi. You want me to swim?”
I almost choke. Is he flirting? It’s impossible to tell, but his gaze holds me for a second too long.
“Think you could beat me?” I say. “You look more like you’d sink.”
He’s so matter-of-fact. “Bet I could pull you under.”
God.
“Bet you couldn’t,” I say, but my voice is thinner than I want.
We stare at each other. The wind lifts my hair and curls it around my cheek. He doesn’t break eye contact, not even for a blink.
He does this all the time, waiting, watching, but never pouncing. Never making the first move.
I step closer anyway. “Prove it.”
He smirks, just a fraction, then walks straight into the sea, no hesitation at all. The water goes up to his knees almost instantly. I hesitate at the edge. It’s freezing, but now there’s no way I’m backing down.
Sophie shouts behind us. “You’re nuts! It’s, like, negative degrees in the water!”
“We’ll live,” I yell back.
Brody twists and gestures like I should follow.
I go in. The cold stings so bad my ankles burn.
I scream, but that only makes him smirk more.
He waits until I’m next to him, then dips his hand in the water and flicks a huge wave at my chest. My tank top is soaked instantly.
Suddenly, I am self-conscious; my bra barely hides my nipples peaking through the cotton.
I gasp. “Asshole!”
He shrugs again. “Told you.”
We splash at each other. Brody moves differently in the water.
Looser, more carefree. The muscles in his arms show, but not in a gross jock way.
I keep staring, not that he seems to care.
Then he gets this weird look, like he wants to say something and can’t.
He looks at the water, then at me, then at the water again.
His hand brushes my shoulder for no reason. “You cold?” he asks, voice low. I don’t trust myself to answer, instead nodding. He grabs my wrist—just a squeeze—then lets go. “Come on.”
It’s not playful now. It’s ferocious, even the way he moves. He drags me out of the surf, up onto the dry sand, and we both flop down like corpses. Sophie brings us towels. She puts hers around my shoulder, then sits beside Lucas, who looks annoyed that nobody is playing soccer.
“Should we build a fire?” Sophie says.
Lucas shrugs. “We can’t. They said no fires.”
“Well, that sucks.”
Brody sits really close to me, close enough that I feel the heat coming off his skin. He never says anything about it, doesn’t act weird, just takes up space like he owns it. His eyes are on the horizon, or maybe on my thighs, which are wet and sandy and shaking a little.
Sophie and Lucas start arguing about something, rules, or who won a card game last night. The noise blurs out. All I can feel is Brody’s shoulder brushing mine.
He finally leans in. “You look miserable,” he whispers.
“You look like a serial killer,” I whisper back.
He laughs, just a puff of air. “Takes one to know one, Bambi.”
I want to tell him something. I want to say, I think about you all the time. I want to see what your hands would do if I let you. But nothing comes out,so I bump his shoulder and say, “Next time, I’ll beat you. Promise.”
His mouth twists. “Try me.”
My chest won’t stop pounding.
We spend hours like that. Nobody moves. Nobody does anything except get sunburned and cover themselves in sand and fight over dumb jokes.
Lucas and Sophie go for a walk, but I stay.
I can’t leave Brody alone, not when he’s sitting so close, not when I know he could snap and break me in two if he cared enough.
He never does, though. He’s always careful.
Always holding himself back. Every once in a while, he glances sideways at me like he wants to ask something. Yet the questions never come.
When the sky starts to turn gold, I lean back and close my eyes. For a second, I let myself imagine it’s just us. Not Sophie, not Lucas, not the voices from the deck. Just us and the ocean and this low ache that never goes away.
Eventually, Sophie comes back, dragging Lucas. “They’re grilling. Food’s ready!”
Brody pulls himself to his feet and offers a hand to me. I take it, his grip tight enough to hurt.Once I’m standing, his fingers linger on my wrist for a second too long.
We head back up the hill. Sophie skips ahead, yelling about burgers while Lucas actually runs.
Only Brody holds back, keeping pace with me, like he doesn’t want this walk to end, and neither do I.
At the top, we peel off our towels and toss them over the balcony.
Someone yells at us from the kitchen but Sophie flips them off and laughs.
Inside, the house is bright and crowded. Music plays on the speakers, people talk with their mouths full and not listening to each other. Plates of food everywhere.
Nobody else notices; they all laugh and drink and pretend nothing is wrong. Maybe nothing is. Maybe this is normal. Maybe I am.
But Brody’s eyes say differently.
Later, the grownups are hammered again, even Richard, who never lets his guard drop, so sneaking out is easy. We steal leftover chips and a bag of grapes. Sophie grabs a blanket and I take two sodas from the fridge. Brody pockets a pack of matches.