Chapter 23
Summer
Nick, Gabby, Seb, Holly, Alex, Bay and I all head to the Spirit Halloween store after school.
I wasn’t really feeling up for a party, but Seb convinced me it would be fun.
Instead of a house party at one of our classmates’, we bought tickets to an event in Charleston, and Zander arranged for Finn to provide security there.
We haven’t seen any more photos, and the letters have stopped from Ben, I think, but we’re all still cautious.
The party is for high school and college-aged kids and, according to Seb, it looks amazing.
“Okay, people,” Seb says, rubbing his hands together after we’ve hopped out of the Jeep. “We each need a kickass costume that will win the contest. Are we thinking of a group effort, or are we all doing individual costumes?”
“Jaxon and I were going to do some type of couple costume,” Holly replies. “He said I could pick since he had to work today.”
“Cool. That takes care of you two. Guys, what are we thinking?”
“Maybe individual since we’re not all together this year,” I say, not wanting to bring the mood down, but without E, it wouldn’t feel right to do one big group costume.
Seb slings an arm over my shoulder. “Good point, Sunshine. Let’s hit the racks and see what we can find.”
The store is enormous inside. We never had a store like this in Virginia. Seb and Nick follow me as the rest of our group breaks off to browse the aisles. “Any ideas, Seb?”
“A few. I was thinking some kind of alien or maybe food. Let’s walk around and see where inspiration strikes.”
We walk the perimeter of the store, and I stop and check out a few costumes.
There’s a cute fairy, but that seems unoriginal.
I find your typical witches, sexy nurses, and popular movies.
Seb is all about the sexy costumes and keeps trying to get me to try them on.
He has me chuckling, and I’m feeling in better spirits.
He goes off to try on a pizza box when I find a tree costume, and it sparks my imagination.
I don’t want to be a tree, but maybe something along those lines.
I find some moss, leaves, and gossamer that I think I can do something with, then I go back to the fairy costumes and grab some wings.
An idea is forming now. I’ll be a tree spirit.
Nick takes my items from me while I grab a makeup kit and find Gabby to talk about what I want.
“Oh, great idea, Summer. Don’t bother buying the makeup here.
I have enough at home that’s better quality.
” She leads me over to the accessories aisle, and we gather a few other items. Gabby chooses a hippie costume from the 60s, since she loves the clothes from that era.
Seb finds me, but he doesn’t like the pizza costume, so we help him find items to create an alien.
We check out when everyone's finished. Bay decided to be a Lego, and Alex picked a mad scientist. Holly bought a few smaller items but assured me she had an idea and didn’t need much from the store. Overall, it was a successful trip.
We’re all hungry, so we stop at a chain restaurant for dinner. Holly and Alex go their separate ways afterwards, and Seb and Nick drop me at home, where I find Zander in his office. “Did you find a costume, darling?”
“Sort of. I decided on a tree spirit. I’ve got some stuff I can use to make what I want. I invited Gabby and Holly over to help since Holly needs to make hers, too.”
“That sounds good,” Zander smiles.
I text Alex while I’m doing my homework to ask about helping me with precalculus, and he agrees right away. I pull on my big-girl panties and call Bay and tell him I asked Alex to tutor me. He offers to help too, but I reminded him how little time he has between school, diving, work, and Penny.
School is awkward the rest of the week between Seb, E, and me. E avoids talking to us, and I don’t engage him. Between us and the tension between Alex and Reesa, lunches are a mess.
On Friday after school, the basketball game is at home, so Alex helps me with precalculus in the library until the game starts.
Nick joins us while Bay mentioned he and Penny were going out to dinner.
We take a seat at one of the smaller tables, and I spread out my work.
“Alex, please make sense of this,” I beg, waving at my notes and the textbook. “I still don’t understand anything.”
“Your grades have been okay, have they not?”
“Well, I’ve got a B- so far, but that’s just because the teacher isn’t creative with his questions and I’m memorizing the answers at the back of the text.”
Alex smiles kindly at me. “Let us start with the lessons we began after the last test, then.”
We spend the next hour and a half working through the notes and problems that we covered in class. Alex is patient, just like Bay, but it still doesn’t make much sense to me.
We head to the gym to watch Seb and E play after tutoring. Our team won by a landslide, and Seb and E were able to rest a lot during the game. At least it gave the alternates more experience playing. We all head our separate ways afterwards, with Alex dropping me off at home.