Chapter 11
Eleven
I knew I was in trouble as soon as I broke the surface, completely miscalculating the meaning of strong current.
I’d expected something intense, something that wouldn’t stop jostling me.
But no matter how hard I kicked underwater, I felt powerless.
There was nothing violent about the channel; instead, the water was calm.
It was even smooth, the flow like a conveyor belt…
but one I couldn’t escape. “Connor!” I called as I fought being carried out to sea.
Our entwined hands had been ripped apart upon hitting the water. “Connor, where are you?”
“Let it carry you!” he called back. I thrashed around until I could see him bobbing behind me, seemingly in control. “Let it carry you a little farther, then start swimming toward the seawall!”
This wasn’t Connor’s first rodeo, so my pounding pulse and I believed him.
I took a deep breath, then stopped kicking and surrendered to the current; it scooped me up and swept me away in a diagonal direction.
Only when I was in line with the boulders did I channel my inner Katie Ledecky, breaking into my best freestyle.
Unfortunately, exhaustion soon struck. My arms and legs shrieked, and while I was aware of Connor cheering me on, I could barely hear him over the blood pulsing in my ears.
Just keep swimming, I chanted to myself. Just keep swimming…
But when the seawall didn’t seem to be getting any closer, I started to lose steam. Being swept into the bay wouldn’t be the end of the world, right? Island Girl was out there! Nick and Sage would see me!
It wasn’t until someone onshore waved at me that I snapped out of the fantasy and back into motion. A tall man in a blue baseball cap was walking down the wall, to the last rock. “Right here!” I distantly heard him call, arms over his head. “Focus on me!”
Okay. I inhaled, then exhaled. Okay, okay, okay.
“Olivia, you’ve got this!” Connor shouted right before I sucked in another breath, closed my eyes, and ducked underwater.
And slowly but surely, I made progress, coming up every several seconds for air and to make sure my coach was still in my crosshairs.
Closer, closer—I was getting closer. The man nodded encouragingly as I swam and stretched out his hand the moment I could grab it.
“Breathe,” he said once I was safely ashore, bent over and my body burning despite being sopping wet.
“Just…” He trailed off when I managed to stand and we looked at each other.
He was much older than I’d thought, maybe even close to Annie’s age with white hair under his sun-bleached hat and deep creases around his wide green eyes.
“Thank you.” I continued gulping for air. “Thank you so much. That was”—I mustered a shallow laugh—“a disaster.”
“It was my pleasure,” he replied. “I’ve dealt with many disasters over the decades.” He paused, tilted his head intently. “Was that your first—”
“Olivia!” Connor blurted, and I unsteadily spun to see him emerge from the water, hair plastered to his forehead. “I’m sorry! That was so much rougher than last time…”
“Don’t apologize,” I said, feeling something untangle in my chest. “It ended in a meet-cute.”
Connor smiled, but the older gentleman didn’t pick up on the joke (he must not have been a rom-com fan). “That current was wild,” Connor told him. “Thank you for helping her.”
“You’re welcome,” he said, then added, “I like that.”
Connor furrowed his brows. “Like what?”
“‘Thank you for helping her,’” he quoted. “Not ‘thank you for saving her.’ You recognize the distinction.”
Color rushed to Connor’s cheeks. “Of course.” His Adam’s apple bobbed and goose bumps bloomed on my skin. “Olivia doesn’t need saving.”
“Oh, yes, I can tell.” The man smiled and pointed to the bridge, right as a teenage boy in blue board shorts executed an off-kilter flip. He whistled. “Let’s hope my grandson doesn’t either.”
* * *
After wrapping ourselves in our towels and unsuccessfully sneaking a peek at our guardian artist’s sketchbook, we trekked back to Connor’s Jeep and silently sat in the car for a few minutes. “Your body is so red,” I finally remarked. “Are you getting a rash?”
“Maybe…” Connor mused. “Or it’s just the aftermath of my belly flop.”
I winced. “You belly flopped?”
“I was aiming for feetfirst,” he said, chuckling. “Clean and simple, but I got distracted.”
“By what?” I asked.
“Your smile.”
“Oh my god.” I shifted in my seat. “Why do you do that?”
“Do what?”
“Just…” I glanced away, willing my heart rate to slow. “Just say stuff like that.”
“I’m afraid I’m not following.”
I looked back to see Connor with his head cocked. “You are so easy with your compliments,” I clarified. “I mean, first you call me beautiful, and now—”
“That’s because I like you, Olivia.” The corners of his blue eyes crinkled. “I’ve always liked you.”
I’ve always liked you.
When I tried to take a breath, I discovered my lungs had turned to stone. If someone asked me when I’d met Connor, I would’ve said yesterday, but if someone asked Connor when he’d met me, I had a suspicion he’d dial back almost a decade.
And I suddenly wondered if Connor has a really big heart went deeper than his penchant for flirting; I worried it better translated to Connor catches feelings fast.
I didn’t catch feelings period.
And I didn’t want to start now.
Be gentle with Connor also echoed through my mind.
“I’m sorry,” Connor said when I was quiet. “Do compliments make you cringe?”
“No…” I mechanically shook my head. “They’re just really up-front.” No guy I’d hung out with had handed compliments to me like flowers. You look nice or you smell so good was as blush-inducing as it got.
Connor smirked. “Up-front has yet to fail me.”
His Jeep suddenly felt way too small.
“How many times have you seen The Holiday?” I almost asked, especially because “meet-cute” had struck a chord earlier.
“The Holiday should be required viewing for all men,” Erica had once written in an Ask Me Anything Instagram story.
“My husband and I watch it every Christmas, and he agrees that no line is more enlightening than Kate Winslet’s ‘I’m looking for corny! ’”
An unfamiliar ringtone popped whatever bubble we were in; I unlatched the glove compartment and pulled out Connor’s phone. Liam, its screen read.
“Hey,” he said to his brother. I watched him cradle the phone with his chin while he dug his AirPods out of the Jeep’s cupholder. “What’s up?”
“Okay, guess—” I heard Liam say breathlessly. “Guess what—” It sounded like he was laughing. “Guess what Miranda did this morning!”
“You call your mom by her first name?” I asked later, as we inched back into Edgartown. Connor had spent the drive on the phone, animated as ever. I didn’t mind, contemplating whether or not I should put some space between us.
“Oh, yeah.” He nodded. “She’s ‘Mom’ to her face, but Liam and I pretty much always refer to her as ‘Miranda’ with each other.” One side of his mouth tipped up in a smile. “She thinks it’s hilarious.”
“Huh,” I said. “I can’t imagine Erica ever being cool with the twins doing that.”
And I couldn’t say one way or the other how my own mother would’ve felt.
I’d lost her so fast, and she’d been gone so long.
Sometimes I felt like I could barely remember her, but I would never forget hugging her goodbye when I was seven; she’d dropped me off at Annie and Pops’s town house to spend the night with them while she celebrated her best friend’s birthday in New York.
She never came to pick me up. An aneurysm, I’d learned.
A lump formed in my throat.
Connor coughed. “We’re really close.”
“Aww,” I cooed, needing to joke my way out of this mood. “Are you a mama’s boy?”
“Yes.” He adjusted his hands on the steering wheel. “I absolutely am, and she loves it.”
“Oh, I’m sure…” I rolled my eyes, stomach rumbling before I could tease him more.
“Hungry?” he asked lightly.
I nodded. “Starving.”
He nodded back. “I know a place.”
* * *
While Teddy and Finn had gone into the yacht club together, they emerged separately.
Teddy came storming out to show Connor his wounded elbow.
“They didn’t even clean it!” he exclaimed after giving us the full scoop on the scrape (tripping out of his sailboat).
“I just got this Band-Aid, which isn’t the right size… ”
“Okay.” Connor nodded easily, which I noticed slowed Teddy’s shallow breathing. “My first aid kit has antiseptic wipes.”
“And a variety of Band-Aids?”
“And a variety of Band-Aids.”
Teddy smiled, and when his older brother joined us, he said, “Finn sailed really well today.”
“Really?” Connor asked. “How well?”
Finn shrugged but couldn’t hide a little smirk. “Claire Dupré told me she’s now reexamining her wants and needs.”
Where is Claire Dupré getting this mature language? I wondered.
Connor grinned and offered Finn a fist bump. “This definitely calls for fudge!”
The brothers cheered, and after stopping by the Jeep to clean and rebandage Teddy’s scrape, we walked through town toward Murdick’s Fudge.
Earlier Connor and I’d gotten lunch at Behind the Bookstore, a cute open-air café tucked behind Edgartown Books.
“Pace yourself,” he’d said when I’d made my intentions to devour my Italian toast clear.
“Fudge should be highest on your list of priorities…”
A bell chimed overhead when Finn pulled open Murdick’s screen door, and an aroma of sweetness immediately wrapped around me.
Pure chocolate, vanilla, and nuttiness all at once.
I found myself transfixed by the marble tables in the front window; my mouth watered as I watched a fudge-maker pour batter into a mold on the thick stone slab.
“Olivia!” Teddy called, and I turned to see cases full of different flavors of fudge.
He frantically waved me over. “What do you want?”
Everything, I thought.
“You’re the expert,” I told him, wishing Maisie and Bryce were here. “What do you recommend?”