Chapter 30
Thirty
ANDREA
The salty breeze isn’t cooling. It’s stifling. Sweltering. Fucking suffocating. Only idiots romanticize summer in Florida. There’s nothing appealing about sweating from every orifice, collecting sand in every crevice, while roasting like a rotisserie chicken under the universe’s megawatt heat lamp.
Old driftwood creaks as I sit up for the hundredth time to reapply sunscreen. (Fuck skin cancer). As soon as I press the aerosol cap, releasing a fine mist, Remy makes an exaggerated gagging sound.
“Spray that shit the other way,” he whines, fanning the air.
I spray him in the face.
He sputters a cough and spits into the water lapping at the sides of the pier. We’ve been here for hours— Remy fishing and me attempting to even out my cheer camp tan lines. They’re horrendous.
“Focus on catching dinner.”
He wrinkles his sunburnt nose. “Catch and release, Drea. Catch and release.”
I scoff and chuck the sunscreen at my bag. “Maybe I’m feeling a bit murderous.”
“You don’t say,” he mutters, recasting his line.
“Don’t make me spray you in the face again.”
He inches away with a grimace. “It’s not my fault you’re in the love triangle from hell.”
Pretty sure my glare rivals the sun’s intensity. Venting to Remy about Seba and Cade might’ve been a mistake— an unfortunate, but necessary one. If I didn’t tell someone, I was going to implode. The reasonable thing to do would be to wipe my hands clean and walk away.
Clearly, I’m not reasonable.
“It’s not a love triangle.”
Remy arches a brow. “And I’m not bisexual.”
I flick his ear. “Fuck off.”
He smirks.
I grin despite myself and rest my head on his shoulder.
This latest medication seems to be working for him and the relief I feel is indescribable.
With each day that passes, I see a little more of my best friend breaking through the cage of his illness.
And as scary as hope is… I'm starting to have some.
“I saw him the other day,” Remy says. The fishing rod clicks as he starts reeling it in.
“Saw who?”
“The blonde one.”
Pretty sure I’m having a minor heart attack.
“Cade?”
He nods. “At Dr. Bedi’s office with his Dad.”
Now I’m having a major heart attack.
“What the fuck was he doing there?” I blurt. I can’t see Cade willingly going to a psychiatrist. All cylinders are firing— my brain is in hyperdrive, searching for signs that I missed. I’m swept into an over-analysis tornado while Remy drags a flopping fish out of the water.
“I said I saw him. I didn’t talk to him.”
Groaning, “Of course you didn’t,” I slump back to my towel, throwing an arm over my eyes to block the sun.
A horrific thought hits me. I shoot upright and grab Remy’s arm. He winces. “Ow!”
“You had to be eighteen before seeing Dr. Bedi.”
The poor fish flails. Slips from Remy’s grip. Hits the deck. Then plops back into the water with an obnoxious splash.
“Yeah, and?”
“Cade’s birthday was two days ago.”
Remy stares at me like I’ve cracked.
My arms flail like the fish he caught. “I texted him on his birthday and he never responded but maybe—”
“Maybe, he was there for his dad,” he interrupts, gently cuffing my wrist before the back of my hand can whack him in the cheek. “And he didn’t respond because you ignored his text on your birthday last month.”
I deflate. “Yeah… you’re probably right.”
Except something feels off.
He stabs a worm through the hook. “But you never know what people are really going through.”
It’s a knife twisting between my ribs as I think about everything I’ve kept from him. I lean into his side again.
“No. You really don’t.”