CHAPTER 18
Lacey
She was happy. She smiled, laughed, and yes, screamed a little, but it was the fun kind of scream.
She rode that board all the way in until she fell off it into the inches of water, and the waves rolled over her.
She lay on her back and laughed because she’d made it, and Cameron was behind her, standing up and holding her own board under her arm.
She hadn’t made it. Lacey had won this time.
She had really won because Cameron Levine was walking toward her in a bikini top and board shorts, tossing her messy hair back and looking at her with a smile and those blue eyes. She looked…
“Perfect,” she muttered to herself.
But it was more than just how Cameron looked.
Yes, the woman was an actress in Hollywood, so she was beautiful.
Everyone could see that. It was more than just that, though.
Cameron was nice, gentle would be a word that Lacey would use, but she also seemed to understand that Cameron wasn’t always gentle and that had wetness building between her legs that should not be there.
Cameron was funny, too. She was different than Lacey thought she’d be.
Kennedy was about what Lacey had thought she’d be, but not Cameron.
It was almost as if because Kennedy was essentially brought up in the industry and Cameron wasn’t, that they had totally different approaches to life.
Lacey knew it was unfair to make those kinds of judgments because she didn’t know either of them well and hadn’t spent much with Kennedy at all, but they were there all the same.
“Want to go again?” she asked when Cameron dropped the board behind them and sat down in the surf next to her.
“I’m exhausted. I think you’re the winner.”
“Only five to four.”
“Is that better or worse than one to zero?” Cameron asked, likely recalling their air hockey game from the night before.
“I think we can call it even,” Lacey suggested.
“Sounds good.” Cameron turned her head back toward the house and asked, “Do you want to stay out here for a few more minutes? It’s lunch soon anyway, and at least out here, we don’t have the cameras.”
“That sounds really good, actually,” she said and picked up a rock that was on her other side, holding it between her thumb and forefinger.
It had been there for a while at least or had been in the water previously because it was smooth on both sides.
She ran her thumb over that smoothness, and it calmed her a bit from the thought that had just entered her brain.
Soon, they’d have to go inside. There would be cameras.
There would be River and Kennedy and cameras and pressure to put on smiles she didn’t want to aim at either of them, and she’d have to avoid smiling at the one person she wanted to smile at, which was the wrong person for that smile because they both had partners.
“What are you thinking about?” Cameron asked after a long moment of shared silence.
“Loaded question,” she replied without thinking.
“Yeah? Why?”
Lacey turned her head and saw Cameron looking at her now, not the water in front of them.
“You know what you’re going through with Kennedy?”
Cameron nodded.
“I’m kind of in a similar situation with River,” she admitted.
“We haven’t been together for five-plus years or anything; it’s only been a year and a half, but that’s part of what is bothering me about it.
We shouldn’t be anywhere close to that yet.
We should still be tearing each other’s clothes off, excited to see each other.
Right? I know people move in together at different times, but I thought we were on track for that, and it’s clear that we’re not. ”
“Who doesn’t want to?”
“She doesn’t. Well, she told me she wasn’t ready when I asked her on our anniversary, and I didn’t want to pressure her, but things have pretty much sucked since then.
It would have been fine if she really just wasn’t ready, but it didn’t feel like that was the whole truth.
And, God, we haven’t had sex in the longest time.
” She covered her face with her hands. “I try, you know. I planned a date night. That was when we saw your movie. She bailed right after it and didn’t have dinner with me. ”
“She didn’t have dinner with you on a date night?”
“No. And I wore my good underwear, too.” The blush instantly crept up her cheeks. “Yeah… Disregard that. All of your underwear is probably the good underwear, but I–”
Cameron laughed and said, “I also have bad underwear, just like everyone else.”
Lacey shook her head and smiled.
“Anyway, nothing happened, and nothing keeps happening. We have our own businesses, and that keeps us busy, but not that busy that we can’t see each other more than once or twice a week, and it’s been like that recently. I don’t know what to do.”
“You asked me about talking to someone. Is that an option for you?”
“It’s only been a year and a half. We’re not supposed to need counseling yet.
We’re supposed to be texting constantly, annoying people around us, FaceTiming each other on the nights we have to be apart, and having as few of those as possible to begin with because we can’t stand not falling asleep next to each other.
Instead, she’s picking up her phone and checking in on the store this morning, when I put my hand on her stomach. ”
“You…” Cameron faded out before turning back to the water. “Wanted sex this morning?” she finally finished the sentence what felt like a whole year later.
“Honestly?” Lacey shook her head again. “No.”
Cameron turned her head back to her and asked, “So, why?”
“I just felt like I should try, and if we did, we did, and maybe that could’ve gotten us back on track. We took a shower together mainly for the same reason.”
“I actually get that.”
“You get what?”
“The shower thing. I’ve asked Ken to shower with me, too. We used to do it all the time, and it was rarely about the actual shower then. Now, it’s just… gone.”
Lacey swallowed hard, and it was her who turned back to the water this time as she tried not to picture Cameron and Kennedy Gannon having shower sex in her very vivid imagination.
“So, you didn’t…” Cameron added.
“We only had the shower part of the shower.”
“What are you going to do?” Cameron asked.
“Same as you, I guess – I have no idea. So, I’m going to keep hoping an answer comes to me.”
“And if it doesn’t?”
“I will have to make one come to me eventually, right? The happiest I’ve been in months was riding on this thing.
” She lifted her board momentarily before she dropped it back down to the wet sand.
“I like my work. It’s not that. It’s the personal stuff I can’t seem to figure out.
Like, I love my girlfriend. Why can’t it just be good with us? ”
“Cameron!”
Cameron turned her head toward the house, and Lacey did the same. Jessie was hurrying down the sand in a huff.
“Busted,” Cameron said to Lacey.
“Are you about to get middle-named again?” she joked, and Cameron chuckled.
“Did you tell the camera guys that you could refuse if you were uncomfortable?”
“Actually, that was me,” Lacey confessed with a raised hand. “I didn’t want to be on camera in my bathing suit. I’m self-conscious. Sorry.”
“Oh. Well, that’s fine. I assumed it was Cameron.”
“I was behaving.”
“Lunch is ready. Can you two please get changed and get inside?”
Lacey stood up, realizing their peaceful time together was over.
“Lacey, what happened?” Jessie asked her.
Lacey looked down and saw the thin, about six-inch-long scratch.
“Oh, nothing. The board scratched me, but it’s okay. It doesn’t even hurt.”
“You should put something on that. I have a first aid kit inside.”
“Ever the prepared,” Cameron said of Jessie and stood up.
“The saltwater helps, so I should be okay, but if it would make you feel better, I’ll put something on it.”
“It would,” Jessie replied. “Come on. It’s in the kitchen because I thought if anyone got injured here, that would be the most likely place.”
They walked up the sand, carrying their clothes, towels, and boogie boards until they got inside from the downstairs.
Jessie waved the cameras off, and Cameron tucked the boards back into the closet where she’d found them in, forgotten and left behind by whoever had lived there before.
Cameron tossed a towel over her shoulder, Lacey pulled one over both of hers, and they headed upstairs in slightly sandy bare feet.
“Ladies, lunch is ready,” Jessie said to River and Kennedy, who were in the kitchen, looking down at a small baking pan filled with something.
Jessie’s words had interrupted their laughter, and Lacey hadn’t heard her girlfriend laugh like that in the longest time.
River looked up at them, and she didn’t smile.
She more just looked annoyed that they’d been interrupted.
Kennedy’s face looked the same to Lacey, but she didn’t know her as well, so she could have misread that.
“Lace, what the fuck?” River asked, pointing to Lacey’s stomach with a spatula. “Are you okay?”
Lacey looked down and replied, “Yes. It’s literally the world’s smallest scratch. I’m fine.”
“We’re just in here to get the first aid kit,” Cameron said as Jessie pulled it down from a cabinet and handed it to Cameron, not Lacey, which Lacey found interesting.
“Again, I’m good. I’m only doing this because Jessie requested it.”
“What happened?” Kennedy asked.
“Board scratched her a little,” Cameron replied. “We’re going to hop in the shower and be right out for lunch, okay?”
“Hop in the–” River didn’t finish her sentence.
Lacey knew why, but she didn’t want to correct where River’s mind had gone by saying that she and Cameron would be taking showers in their own bathrooms because that could draw even more attention to this awkward situation that they had found themselves in.
“We’ll be right back,” she said instead.
“Okay,” River replied.
“Cam, can you make sure your wet clothes don’t drip on the floor?” Kennedy asked.
“I’m basically dry already, but, yeah,” Cameron replied.
“I hate that,” River said to Kennedy. “When you hang them over something, and it just drips down.”
“Yes!” Kennedy laughed.
Lacey walked out of the kitchen, with Cameron behind her, but Jessie must have stayed in there because Lacey didn’t see her following them. When she got to her bedroom door, Lacey looked over at Cameron and gave her a straight-lined smile.
“Oh, sorry. Here.”
Cameron held out the first aid kit.
“Thank you,” she replied and took it from her.
“Um… When you get out of the shower, if you need help with that or something, let me know.”
“I think I’ll be okay, but thanks,” she said. “I really am okay, you know?”
“I know. It’s just that… When I think that something I suggested we do could’ve really hurt you, it– Well, it kind of sucks, honestly. So, I’ll apply whatever alcohol wipe or antibiotic gel stuff you need. That’s all I’m saying.”
Cameron looked nervous or maybe anxious right now.
“I’ll let you know,” Lacey replied. “And, Cam?”
“Yeah?”
“Thanks.”
Cameron nodded and disappeared into her own bedroom.
Lacey walked into hers, set the first aid kit down on the bathroom counter, turned on the shower, and waited for it to warm up.
Something was really wrong between her and River.
She knew that now more than ever. River hadn’t even walked over to check on her how Cameron had.
She hadn’t offered to help Lacey with the first aid kit.
She hadn’t even really said hello, asked if they’d had fun outside, or followed her in here to talk about anything at all.
River had just stayed out there with Kennedy, talking and laughing about whatever it was that they’d been doing while Cameron and Lacey were outside.
Yes, something was really, really wrong with them, and she wasn’t sure how much more she could take.
She climbed into the shower and washed the sand and saltwater from her body and out of her hair.
Lacey knew she was taking too long. Pretty soon, someone, likely River, since no one else was allowed in here, would walk in and check on her, but she didn’t care.
She was picturing Cameron in a shower just like this one, and she was so tired of feeling guilty for thinking and feeling what she was feeling for the woman who had walked over to check on her, touched her skin next to the scratch as if to make sure it was still there, giving Lacey goose bumps that had nothing to do with being cold, and offered to take care of her after they both showered.
“You cannot like her. Even if you and River end today, you can’t like Cameron Levine.
She’s Cameron Levine, you idiot. She’s a massive celebrity, with a million women who are already lined up, hoping for their shot with her.
Just… cool it, Keller,” she scolded herself.
“God, that would sound good, though. Cameron Keller. Or, Lacey Levine.” Her eyes went wide when she realized that she’d just been playing that stupid game she and her friends had played as kids whenever they had crushes and tried to picture how their names would sound and look together. “Get a fucking grip, Lacey Sue.”
Eventually, she got out, dried off and changed, leaving her suit to hang over the edge of the shower because River could just deal with that today, and went to apply a little gel to her scratch that would scab over in under an hour.
Then, she put on a new shirt and another pair of shorts and walked out at the same time Cameron emerged from her own room.
“All good?” Cameron asked.
“All good,” she replied.
“Did you even use the stuff?” Cameron asked, turning toward her.
“Yes.” Lacey laughed.
“Are you lying because you’re trying to be tough?”
Lacey laughed louder and said, “Cam, no. I used it.” She lifted her shirt a little, revealing her stomach. “See?”
“What am I supposed to see?”
“Well, it’s there. I rubbed it in really well so it wouldn’t get on my shirt.”
“Do I trust you, or check the first aid kit?”
“You go eat lunch.”
Lacey looked over Cameron’s shoulder and saw Jessie standing there with her arms crossed over her chest. She was staring right at Lacey, too, because she already knew what was going on.
Jessie had been watching this whole thing play out between the four of them in this weird dance to get away from their partners and spend time with someone else, and Jessie was not happy.