Chapter 20
Luke
Never will I ever flirt with a girl in a foreign country again.
I want to have a good time with Cassie, but she keeps trying to ditch Harper. And I get it, Harper has turned into a third wheel, but this is Harper’s trip. If anyone should be the third wheel, it should be me. Or maybe the issue is that Cassie shouldn’t be here in the first place.
Cassie talks the entire drive to the waterfall, telling me about everything she’s seen in Iceland so far. Eventually she also dives into a rant about how she’s a kindergarten teacher and that she’s trying to find something fun about Iceland to work into a lesson plan or craft.
“I’m leaning toward something volcano related. Maybe we’ll just do some volcano painting, but I feel like I could probably come up with something better. Of course, we can always make a volcano, but that’s more of an older kid thing.”
Eventually, we pull up to the next parking lot. Another massive waterfall sits in front of us. She puts the van into park and hops out.
This waterfall is just as tall as the last one, but it’s much wider—the volume of water coming down is at least five times as much. Where the last waterfall was tall and elegant, this one is large and regal.
There are birds flying around the rocks surrounding the waterfall, looking like tiny specks in comparison.
Plenty of tourists are at the base of the waterfall taking photos, but a few scatter along the long set of wooden steps that bring you right up to the very top where the water cascades off the face of the cliff.
“Coming?” Cassie says when I linger at the van.
“We told Harper we’d start making lunch.”
“I figured we’d just do PB and J. And we can make that super quick once she gets here. We’ll just check it out while we wait for her.”
She comes and takes my hand, pulling me toward her.
PB and J was all we packed for lunch, but when Harper told us to make lunch, I assumed that was code for “Wait for me to get there before you do anything fun.”
But I guess just walking up a little closer is fine, just to kill time.
We’re at the edge of the pool of water taking pictures until Cassie is satisfied. We start walking back to the car, but instead of going all the way to the parking lot, she makes a turn for the stairs that will take us all the way up to the top of the cliff.
“Cassie,” I say.
“Come on!” she says, stopping just long enough to stick her tongue out at me. “Bet you can’t catch me!” She starts taking the steps two at a time.
“We have to wait for Harper.”
“We’ll go up again when she gets here.”
She takes off up the steps. Where this girl gets her energy from, I have no idea. She’s at least one flight of stairs ahead of me when I start making my way up.
Turns out I’m really out of shape. After about a minute of taking the steps two at a time, trying to keep up with Cassie, I start huffing and puffing. Every now and then, she stops just long enough to make sure I’m following.
I have no idea how long it takes to get up, but eventually we reach the top after what feels like dozens of flights of stairs, though I’m sure the actual number isn’t that impressive.
Cassie beats me, though not by much. We’re both so breathless when we get to the top that we both start laughing, perhaps a little giddy.
I lean on the railing, my heart rate all over the place, the laughter making it harder to catch my breath.
“Beat you,” Cassie says, coming up to whisper in my ear, her own breathing still heavy.
I reach out for her, wrapping my arms around her so she can’t run off again. Maybe Cassie reads it as romantic, but I’m mostly doing it to keep her in one spot.
“We weren’t supposed to come up here without Harper,” I tell her. I mean the words seriously, but my breathlessness doesn’t make it sound that way.
“And what are you going to do about that?” she teases. She arches an eyebrow, shamelessly flirting.
I could kiss her. It could be as simple as leaning down and letting myself have a fun fling while on vacation.
She kissed me once already. Wes, I know, would probably be disappointed that the girl in my arms isn’t Harper, but he doesn’t know the extent to which Harper just doesn’t feel that way for me.
When in Rome, I tell myself.
I let a second or two pass, both of us just staring at each other, our breathing slowing but our heart rates still high. When I close the distance between us, I feel Cassie’s hands come up behind my neck, pulling me closer to her.
When our lips meet, she stretches up to get closer. I loosen my grip on her, but she uses it as an opportunity to kiss me again, deeper. The kiss feels off, like my hands are in the wrong place, or I’m standing wrong. I try to force the thoughts away and just enjoy the kiss.
I feel her smile against my lips, pulling away just enough to look at me.
“Been trying to do that all day,” Cassie murmurs.
I force a smile back at her and lead us to the end of the path to see the waterfall.
It’s even more impressive being level with it, looking down at the water as it crashes to the earth. Dozens of birds are flying below us and landing on the rock faces angled around the waterfall.
We don’t linger too long before turning around and making our way back down. This time we don’t race. That is, until I look up and notice Harper has pulled into the lot. She’s standing at Cassie’s van, knocking at the door.
“Shoot,” I say.
“What?”
“Harper’s waiting for us.” I pick up my speed again, trying to get down the stairs as quickly as possible. I have no idea if Cassie’s following me, or if she’s taking her time to get down. Either way, guilt weighs me, thinking about how we went to the top of the waterfall without Harper.
When I finally get back to the parking lot, Harper’s back in our rental car eating her sandwich for lunch.
She doesn’t look up until I open the passenger door and sit down.
As soon as I’m sitting, I glance quickly back at the stairs where Cassie is still making her way down, one slow and agonizing step at a time.
I don’t know Cassie well enough at this point to be able to predict her emotions, but I imagine running away to another girl won’t put her in good spirits.
“So you want to just meet up at the airport next time?” Harper asks, so stone-faced I’m not sure if she’s joking or furious.
“What?” I ask, out of breath from the run.
“You and Cassie seem to be getting on great. I’m clearly just a third wheel. So I’ll make your life easier. You two can hang out in her van. Bang it out if you want, I don’t care. And I’ll see you at the airport.”
Harper’s tone is so even, so matter-of-fact that it’s worse than if she were yelling at me.
“Cassie leaves Thursday,” I say, because it’s the first thing I can think of, my logical brain responding before the damage-control part of my brain has a chance to keep up.
“Oh!” Harper says. Mad. Definitely mad. “Okay, in that case, I’ll pick you up on Thursday from wherever you two end up.”
“I came here with you.”
“Oh, I know.” She turns to me, her face looking a little hysterical.
“But I wasn’t sure you knew. You want to go hang out with some random girl you found?
Fine. Go ahead. But don’t tell me to meet you somewhere and then ditch me.
God, I was afraid to even look in the van to see if you were in there for fear of finding you two going at it.
Instead, you were just hiking down from the top of the waterfall, already done sightseeing.
Did you forget about me? Or did you plan on having me go up to see the waterfall by myself while you two went to the next place?
Did you just want to play leapfrog all day, passing each other at each checkpoint to make sure the other wasn’t dead?
Because if that’s the case, I’d rather just spend the day alone. ”
“Harper—”
She shoots daggers at me, her face bright red. Her hair is somehow both wind-swept and soaked now, dotted with flecks of mud from the last waterfall. Her braid from this morning has loosened. Yet again, I have to stop myself from reaching over and tucking it behind her ear.
What am I doing?
“Your girlfriend’s coming,” she says, her voice off, like she’s trying to stop herself from crying.
And right on cue, there’s a knock at the window. Cassie’s standing there, all smiles, unaware of the ball of fury sitting next to me. I’m surprised, actually, that Cassie isn’t more mad at me for running off, but I appreciate not being sandwiched between two angry women.
I open the door for Cassie so I can talk to her, but I don’t get up from my seat.
“Want to each lunch in my van? There’s room for everyone,” she says.
It seems like a bit of a peace offering, but Harper won’t look at her.
“I’m good,” she says, keeping her eyes on the dashboard of the car.
“Luke?” Cassie asks.
“I’ll stay with Harper.” I try not to notice the way Cassie’s face flickers with a hint of jealousy.
“It’s fine,” Harper says. She gives her sandwich another bite, ignoring me. “I’m going to finish my sandwich and then go check out the waterfall. Since you guys already looked around, you can eat your lunch.”
“Okay, we’ll be in the van if you need us.” Cassie grabs my hand and gives me a gentle tug. I don’t want to go, but with Cassie pulling me away and Harper not wanting anything to do with me, my place seems clear.
“I’ll go with you when you’re ready, Harper, so you don’t have to be alone,” I say, slowly getting out of the car to follow Cassie to her van.
Harper doesn’t acknowledge me. She keeps her eyes trained forward, and I’m not sure if it’s my own guilt making me see things, but I swear I see a tear running down her face.