Chapter 18 Now
Now
Inside the restaurant, Maren, David and I find Bubba at the hostess stand, flipping through paperwork.
I know from my texts with Sebastian that she’s been skipping some days altogether, but that on good days she loves nothing more than working.
My annoyance at my friends’ meddling dissipates: I’m glad it’s a good day.
When Bubba looks up and sees us, she beams at Maren and me. “You two look like a million bucks!” She hands me a stack of menus. “Sebastian’s out on the patio.”
“Thanks, Bubba,” I say, clocking that she didn’t mention Andre.
My hackles are already up on our way to the patio when David gasps dramatically, his phone held up to his face.
“What now?” I ask, stopping short.
“I double-booked myself today and just realized: trivia night. The one Henry’s cousin hosts.”
I glower at him. David has complained to me on numerous occasions about Henry’s insufferable cousin. He wouldn’t be caught dead at that trivia night.
I turn to Maren, who’s chewing her lower lip. “Let me guess. You can’t stay either?”
“Please don’t kill me,” she says, shooting David a glare. “I have a real reason. My parents texted me earlier to see if I can do dinner with them tonight. Mom’s getting sappy about my trip ending. She wants me to come home and help her make all my favorites.”
I glance at the patio. Through the windows I spot Sebastian, alone at a four-top.
He’s donned a white T-shirt (probably at his mother’s behest).
Without his shirtlessness to distract me, I notice that his hair has grown longer since that day I saw him at the clerk’s office, his curls back in full force.
He looks more like he did back in high school—wild and natural.
“Go ahead,” I say, turning back to my friends. “I got this.” (Whatever “this” is.)
David pulls me into a side hug. Maren kisses me on both cheeks, European style.
“I love you.” She whispers it like an apology. “Call me after?”
I nod, and then they’re gone.
“We need to find less flaky friends,” I say as I sit down across from Sebastian. I immediately avert my eyes to the menu. Sebastian against an ocean backdrop is too ridiculous a view for me right now.
“Funny, I was going to say less intrusive,” he says. I look up and find him smirking.
What the hell does that mean?
“I don’t really mind, though,” he continues. “I wanted to get your opinion.”
That’s when I notice two takeout coffee cups on the table, one with a hot drink and one with some sort of iced coffee drink.
He slides both toward me. I sip the hot one first. It’s a latte—or no, maybe a flat white.
Rich, bold espresso cut by just the right amount of frothy milk.
Even on a hot summer day, it tastes perfect.
I switch to the other drink, which is an equally delicious iced latte, and refreshing.
“These are excellent,” I say, then take another sip. “Where are they from?” Bubba’s only serves basic drip coffee: hot and acidic, or iced and slightly watery.
“I’ve been to dozens of cafés and coffee shops up and down the Shore the last couple of weeks—all places that source and roast their own beans.
This place in Manasquan is my favorite. Family owned.
The sister was a chemical engineer and the brother was a hedge-fund guy in the city.
She figured out the small-batch roasting process, and he got an investor.
I’ve been talking to them about what a partnership might look like, if we kept the restaurant and they became our sole bean supplier.
I still want to talk with a few more places, but they seem like a great fit, and the numbers weren’t as much of a stretch as I was expecting. ”
“Sebastian, that’s incredible. I knew Bubba would love the café idea. You showed her the sketches?”
He surprises me by pulling the flat white back toward him and taking a sip. The casual intimacy of this gesture—with him, here—hits me with a wave of déjà vu. I feel like we’re teenagers again, splitting a fountain drink during a shift. I half expect Ravi or Tina to round the corner.
“Not yet,” he says. “But I’m going to. I just want to get the details right first. And I have a little time.
We aren’t supposed to finalize the contract with Diamond Group until later this summer.
As long as I can secure a vendor and prove the numbers make sense, I think I can convince her not to sell. ”
“You will,” I say, meaning it. “Besides Bubba, no one knows this restaurant better than you. She’ll see that.”
He smiles softly. “Thanks, Leens.”
“So what does this mean for you?” I ask tentatively. “You have a whole life in California.”
He nods slowly, looking toward the ocean. “I do. And if you’d asked me a few weeks ago, I’d have insisted it was a life worth getting back to as soon as possible. But now?” His eyes land on me, and my skin heats. “Now I’m not so sure. I just know I have to see this through.”
I know he’s talking about the restaurant—of course he is. But I feel a flutter of something anyway. Something exciting and dangerous and familiar all at once.
Hope.
We sip our coffees in surprisingly comfortable silence for a moment. Then he asks, “How are you? Does your editor hate you because of me?”
“Ha. She’s disappointed we won’t be getting all those impressions from Claire’s Instagram followers, but she’ll survive.” I twirl the plastic cup between my palms. “Sometimes I think if I have to write about one more wedding I may wind up murdering the bride and groom.”
“Dark. Who’s the next potential victim?”
“A couple from Philly. They’re getting married this weekend at that new hotel on LBI.
” Long Beach Island is one of my favorite areas of the Jersey Shore, about an hour south of Brantley Beach.
Eighteen miles of white-sand beaches, gorgeous homes and a local population of 15,000 that grows to 200,000 from June to August.
“Love LBI. Sounds beautiful.”
“It does. And since it’s a new venue I’ll get to go see it for myself. I’ll write my usual column about the wedding and another article all about the hotel.”
“Do you get a plus-one on this assignment?” Sebastian leans lazily back in his chair, almost like he’s trying to look as casual as possible while asking the question.
I nod, holding that incessant eye contact. After a beat I add, “I’m taking someone.” I don’t specify that the someone is David because, frankly, he’s on my shit list right now.
Sebastian raises an eyebrow in curiosity and says, “I’m jealous.”
I nearly choke on my latte.
Sebastian definitely notices, because the corner of his mouth curls up into a smirk. “I’ve been meaning to get down to LBI to check out the coffee scene,” he explains, and my esophagus muscles begin working properly again.
I’m about to offer to do some recon for him when a clap of thunder breaks out overhead. Rain follows, fast and heavy. And by the look of the gray storm clouds rolling in, this won’t just be a passing summer shower.
Sebastian and I duck inside the restaurant, where there isn’t an open table in sight. Everyone else who has been sitting on the patio with us had the same idea, along with all the sopping wet beachgoers who are now pouring in to take cover.
“Shit,” I say, leaning against the wall. “I picked the wrong day to bike here.”
“I’ll drive you home,” Sebastian says, running a hand through his already wet hair.
Outside, we walk around the perimeter of the restaurant, under cover of the awning, to grab my beach chair and towel, then my bike from the rack.
But there’s no choice but to weather the rain as we dash across the parking lot to his Jeep.
I hop in and slam the door shut while Sebastian wrestles my gear into the trunk.
Once he’s behind the wheel we both break out in a fit of laughter at how ridiculous we look.
My soaked cover-up sticks to my body. His T-shirt and shorts sop onto the seat.
When he asks, “Want to DJ?” and offers me the lightening cable that connects to CarPlay, I feel a wave of déjà vu for the second time today.
It’s the 2024 version of letting me choose a CD from his six-disc player.
I accept the cable, plug it into my phone and press shuffle on my favorite summer driving playlist. I hear the first chords of “Invisible String” by Taylor Swift and immediately skip it, then skip five more songs to cover it up. Shaboozey feels much safer.
Over the course of the short drive to my apartment my senses go into overdrive. Sebastian’s profile tugs at my periphery. I feel the warmth from his body, smell his sweat mixed with the rain. I shiver.
It’s the longest six minutes I’ve experienced in a while.
We pull up outside my apartment and Sebastian puts the Jeep in park.
“Thanks for the ride,” I say, reaching for the door handle, “and the coffee.”
I’m about to push the door open, bracing myself to reenter the rain, when his hand catches my forearm. His touch sends a ripple of goose bumps along my wet skin.
He says, “Wait.”
I do as I’m told. I turn to face him, but instead of contextualizing the request, he just stares at me.
I stare back.
I don’t have the best track record when it comes to reading signals from guys.
Junior year of high school I was convinced Isaiah Thompson was going to ask me to prom.
Turned out he really did just want my help editing his Common App essay.
On the flip side, when Justin Taylor from my freshman intro to journalism course kept bringing an extra coffee and a chocolate pretzel to study group for me, I thought he was just being friendly.
I was shocked when he asked me to a fraternity mixer the next semester, and we wound up dating on and off throughout college.
But I don’t think the way Sebastian is looking at me right now leaves much room for misinterpretation. And even if I’m wrong, I know that what Maren said to me on the beach earlier is true.
I need to figure out what’s going on with Sebastian Nikolaou.
“Do you want to come inside?” I ask, finally. “We could dry off. Order a pizza. We never did get to eat lunch.”
It’s an absurd question, considering the state we’re in. Surely he wants to get home as fast as possible, away from the rain and into a dry change of clothes. But as his green eyes continue to hold mine I think maybe it isn’t so absurd at all.
He kills the engine and says, “I have some gym clothes in the trunk. I’ll grab them.”
We dart through the rain to get to the entrance of my building, then run up the two flights of stairs to my unit, my flip-flops squeaking the whole way.
The key is slippery in my hands but I manage to get us inside on the second try.
I close the front door behind us, then lean against it and slide to the floor, doubled over in another fit of laughter, the shock of the rain momentarily quelling the fire that had been burning between us in the Jeep.
“Holy shit,” Sebastian says, kicking off his Vans. His shirt drips water onto the floor. And then he’s sliding down next to me, laughing just as hard.
When we both start to catch our breath, he turns to me. “I wanted to kiss you in the snack bar the other day,” he says.
The admission is a ripple in my universe. How many hours have I dedicated to decoding Sebastian Nikolaou—attempting to decipher the meaning in his words and actions? I’d spent years wishing we were on the same page, and now that we finally were it was disorienting.
“I did, too,” I say, shakily. “Yesterday, and a lot of other times.”
He closes the distance between us in one quick, graceful motion, and then his lips are on mine.
His palm is cool from the rain as it cups my cheek, but his mouth is impossibly warm.
I’ve thought about our brief, hesitant kiss all those years ago a thousand times, but this—this is something entirely different: slow and hungry and sure.
His tongue brushes my lips—a question—and I part them in reply, letting his heat fill my mouth. His hands find my hips and guide them until I’m straddling him, running my hands through his curls. Each kiss is harder and more urgent than the last.
My hands wander from his hair to his arms to the hem of his shirt.
I slip one hand beneath it, press my palm against his stomach.
The faintest groan escapes his lips, which I take as permission to add my other hand.
He winds up pulling the shirt over his head, doing away with it altogether. Even better.
I’m suddenly desperate to get out of my wet clothes, too.
Reading my mind, he places a hand on each of my hips, slowly pushing up the hem of my cover-up, exposing my thighs.
I raise my arms over my head so he can pull it off the rest of the way, leaving me in the white bikini I’d felt so self-conscious in when I’d run into him at the beach just a few hours ago.
Only now, I want him to see me.
He presses his lips to mine again and I let my hands rove over his chest, his arms. He pulls back, locking eyes with mine as he reaches his hands around my back and touches the bow that holds my bathing suit top in place.
I’m about to suggest we relocate to my room when I feel him slow down our pace, then stop altogether.
He presses his forehead to mine and says, “We should dry off.”
I try not to let this sting. He reaches into the drawstring bag he grabbed from the trunk and produces a dry T-shirt with the sleeves cut off. Tugs it on. The moment has passed.
And then another thought occurs to me: Maybe he thinks he’s made a mistake. Crossed a line. It’s so soon after Claire. He’s probably on the rebound, and realizing the potential complications of rebounding with me.
Suddenly feeling exposed, I pull the wet cover-up back on and brace myself for his exit. I’ll send him a text tomorrow. Apologize for getting carried away. Assure him I didn’t get the wrong idea. Downplay the whole thing.
I’m already drafting the message in my head when he pulls out his phone and begins scrolling. Maybe he’ll pretend his mom needs him. Sorry to run, but something came up at the restaurant! Fine. I’ll play along.
He turns the phone to me. On the screen is a contact page for Gio’s—a pizza place a few blocks away.
“Why don’t you go change?” he asks, with an encouraging smile. “I’ll call it in.”