Chapter 20 Nellie Today
I can’t help it. I can’t help making the barbs and I can’t help feeling bad for Noah as I watch them land.
I can’t help studying his jawline, his scruff, the crinkle of his eyes. His biceps in his T-shirt, his tan forearms, the cords of muscle in his neck.
Noah is officially under my skin.
And I can only partially delude myself that he hasn’t always been.
I jog from the car to avoid getting wet, an automatic response after years of experiencing the frizz effects on my hair. But he just saunters and, dammit, even the way he walks—all casual and confident—is sexy.
I am so fucked.
But I’m going to have to suck it up (a terrible choice of words).
Because, now that my ego has had about twenty-four hours to recover, I realize that even if Noah stopped what was happening between us because he changed his mind, he was at least trying to spare my feelings.
And, as undignified as that feels, I have to admit that puts his heart in the right place.
His other organs less so.
This man is maybe not the same boy who left me stranded so many years ago.
When he reaches me now, there’s rain beginning to patter harder on the tin roof above us. I look up at him, his T-shirt damp and clinging to his defined chest, his short hair tufting up just slightly as he ruffles it with his hand. And I shiver, but not from cold.
He notices, frowns. “I’d offer you my jacket, but, like an idiot, I didn’t bring one.”
But I’m glad he didn’t. And not just because outerwear would only have blocked the view. But also because this is romantic, in an almost absurd way. It’s hard enough to bear without him gallantly offering me a coat. We are literally by the sea, alone together, caught in a storm.
And it’s because I can’t handle The Notebook of it all—and feel guilty about being a jerk in the car—that I turn to him and blurt out, “Truce!” And then stick out my pinky finger. Like I’m in fourth grade.
“What?”
“Truce. It’s when two sides agree to stop fighting for the greater good.”
“Yes, I’ve heard of that,” he smirks. “But, for the record, I wasn’t fighting.”
I roll my eyes big, my frustration ramping up like a race car at the starting line. “Do you want to try to get along or not? ’Cause I can take my pinky elsewhere.”
“No, no, no!” he says, rearranging his expression into something more solemn. “Okay. I’m in.”
He hooks his finger around mine and, against my will, something unholy vibrates through me, buzzy and electric. I flash to the hot tub, his fingers knotted in my hair.
Now, his hazel eyes zero in on mine and seem to hold them there like some Jedi mind trick. Like he’s thinking about the same thing. His hands are big and warm. And big. Did I mention big?
“But,” he says, before I can pull my pinky back to safety or, better yet, to a nunnery, “what are the deal points of this truce? If it’s official, there must be terms, right?”
Every second I spend physically touching him spells more disaster. I know I should inch away, but instead I find myself pulled into his orbit, answering his flirty side-eye with my own.
“Oh, there are terms,” I say, taking a step forward. “Major terms.”
He raises an eyebrow. “Major terms, huh? Not minor terms. Okay, then.”
“Are you ready? Can you handle it?”
“Yup. I’ve been ready.” For a second, I’m disoriented—I’m not sure what he means.
“For this?” I manage, with all the false bravado I can muster. “Never.”
He steps in close too, so that now our hands, intertwined, are the only things separating us. The air between us is kinetic and charged. I can see his chest rise and fall. And it’s hypnotic.
My breath feels shallower too. I need to get it together, break this spell or risk jumping his bones.
Would he reject me again? Am I this glutton for punishment?
A few more seconds and I can’t be held responsible for where my lips land.
And I don’t know for sure what’s going through his head, but his eyes are wolfish like he’s about to eat me for lunch.
“So,” he says, leaning in closer, “what are the rules? Tell me. No promises. But I’ll do my best to follow them.”
Behind us, someone clears their throat. My face flashes red hot.
What am I doing? Falling down the same black hole, that’s what.
“Just don’t be an asshole,” I mutter and tear my hand away.
Noah’s hand is left stranded, dangling in midair. He exhales sharply. And I feel that pang of pathos again. Dammit.
He shrugs, lowering his hand and sliding it into his pocket for safekeeping. “I’ll try,” he murmurs.
To our right is a man who must be Mike, the oyster farm’s “head of sustainable agriculture” according to his name tag. He’s the dude Cara says we are meant to meet. He is goofy looking in a floppy fisherman’s cap and rubber waders. But beneath it, I see he is about our age—and not un-handsome.
“Welcome,” he says. “You must be Ben Goldstein and Cara Faustin.”
“There’s been a slight change of plans,” I say.
“They couldn’t come, so we’re here in their place,” Noah explains.
“We’re not married,” I over-explain.
“Or even a couple,” Noah grumbles.
“Oh,” Mike says, eyes widening slightly. “Okay! Well, nice to meet you then.”
He directs this only to me.
“Are you ready to begin the tour?”
Tour? I thought we were picking up oysters on ice and hauling ass out of here. There’s a tour involved? But of course there is, because… my bestie loves a tour.
Noah shoots me a questioning look.
“Cara,” I say.
“Ah,” he nods.
“Right this way,” says Mike with a flourish, like he is ushering us through Versailles and not past massive basin flats of water with oysters being cleaned inside.
The air is ripe with brininess, but this somehow offers even more sense of place.
It’s hard not to feel transported—and I realize it’s been too long since I’ve been somewhere truly new.
On Cara’s itinerary, today read, “Day 4: Free Parking!” The song? “Freedom! ’90” by George Michael.
I think there’s something you should know, I think it’s time I told you so
There’s something deep inside of me, there’s someone else I’ve got to be
A Cara classic.
And right now, it’s feeling like it kind of makes sense.
Because when Mike leads us out to the back, I realize we are not just near, but right on the coast. It’s nothing fancy.
The shoreline’s dirt and sand—littered with the fragments of cratered oyster shells—gives way to the placid water of Tomales Bay, serene and glossy.
Patches of overgrown grass crest like small islands and, farther out, fishing and sail boats glide.
On our side of the bay, the shore is lined with small houses on stilts that jut into the water.
There’s something in them of faded gentry, weathered by the seasons but designed to withstand the changing tides.
They have been here, and they will be here.
Across the water are low green hills under a layer of fog and peppered with trees like so many broccoli florets.
I exhale, big.
Here, Mike begins his spiel, explaining the forty-year history of the oyster farm, where they currently lease over one hundred and fifty acres of the bay.
He references sticks protruding from the water that mark the beds and describes another site, a nursery, where they grow oysters from inception.
And he delivers all this information directly to me—and me alone.
“It’s beautiful here,” I say.
“Well, beauty knows beauty,” he winks.
Noah clears his throat.
The rain has let up for a moment, the sun feebly fighting the good fight.
So, next, Mike suggests we jump ahead and leads us to a picnic table where all the necessary components wait for oyster shucking.
There are two kinds of hot sauce, lemons, a special basil mignonette made by a local chef—and, of course, oysters on ice.
And there are flutes of Prosecco, too.
Handing us knives, an unwittingly questionable choice considering the way we’ve been bickering, Mike demonstrates the how-to—first on his own and then placing his hands over mine and guiding me, as he leans down over me.
It is a lot of contact with Mike. I wonder if next he’s going to rest his hands on my hips and show me how to hit a fastball.
On the bench across from me, my ex-boyfriend seethes. Which makes enduring Mike easier.
“Amazing job!” Mike says to me. “You’re a natural.”
“Thank you,” I bask.
He ignores Noah, who is struggling.
“You’re terrible at this,” I say to Noah, who is still unable to open a single oyster after several minutes. “And you are literally a surgeon.”
Noah shoots me a death glare. “My patients don’t have shells.”
“We can’t be good at everything,” Mike says. Then he nudges me and winks again. “These are some of our classics,” he continues, describing the varieties before we try them. “Pacific, Deep Water, Cold Water.”
“Isn’t that the name of a cologne people wore in the nineties?” Noah grunts.
“That’s Cool Water!” I say, giggling.
Neither man seems amused.
But when we finally sample the oysters, everything else melts away. They taste like sea, salt air, something ephemeral and hard to grasp—days of leisure, of easy breezes, of escape.
I must groan out loud because Mike says, “You know, some people say oysters are aphrodisiacs.”
Then he makes eyes at me.
“You don’t say,” I reply.
“Maybe you want to try one with hot sauce? Something a little spicy?”
“She doesn’t like hot sauce,” Noah practically barks.
“How do you know?” I am tempted to ask as annoyance rises in me. Maybe I’ve changed! Maybe I’m a new and exciting hot-sauce-loving woman now!
But he’s right. And I will not relive the gummy episode or the cold plunge by dosing myself to prove a point. I down the rest of my wine instead.
It’s begun raining again and there’s a definite chill.
Time to move on.
Before we leave, Mike takes us—well, me, with Noah trailing behind—around to see the various machinery. The farm is small and rustic, but mighty, supplying oysters to some of the highest-end restaurants in Northern California.