Chapter 2 #3
than ever. She had chopped her dark waves to her shoulders, gotten a new set of business casual clothes at Macy’s post-Christmas
sale, and had even started curling her eyelashes to make her blue eyes pop. As a summa cum laude early graduate en route to
a job at a major ad agency in New York City, she had never felt so confident—or so good at pretending to be confident. That
false confidence, she realized later, was the reason Micah had been drawn to her in the first place. He had loved her combination
of conviction and cluelessness.
Augie took a sharp breath and turned away from the windows. Just keep working, she told herself. She walked to check the lower patio one last time. Empty.
Augie was ready to give up when, as she took a step up the stairs and flicked off the lights, she heard a noise. She paused
with one hand on the banister, picturing herself in a horror movie, the slow, doomed turn. She lunged for the switches and
whipped around.
As the lights bounced back on and she looked across the foyer, Augie wondered if she had fainted. Fallen. Blacked out. Because there, out in front of her—it couldn’t be, could it? But it was, wasn’t it?—there he was.
Boat guy. Sex guy.
Augie stared, blank and blinking, waiting for the mirage to disappear. But he was squinting back at her, his expression shifting
from confusion to recognition to, finally, delight.
“No way,” he said, a wide white smile breaking across his face. “Allie?”
Augie’s stomach dropped.
He looked different, yet the same. To be fair, she’d only seen him once, in a bathing suit, then naked. Still, he was unmistakable:
tall, scruffy but handsome, strong but soft—the type of guy who didn’t have a six pack, but still looked perfect shirtless,
with defined pecs and the sexy kind of chest hair. He had a head of thick dark hair and slightly too-long sideburns. The deepest
golden tan. His eyes were a bright copper that reminded Augie of pennies. She’d told him this at the lake. Driven by cocktails
and the honesty you only have with strangers, she had grabbed his face, looked back and forth between his pupils, and said
she wanted to see if Abe Lincoln was hidden in his eyeballs. She felt a fresh sting of embarrassment.
It wasn’t until he started moving toward her that Augie noticed all he was carrying. Two teal backpacks, a swim bag, a teddy
bear, a tennis racket. It weighed him down, the straps pulling on his broad shoulders. Augie stood in shock as she watched
him approach, taking in his black Rainbow Kitten Surprise T-shirt and silver gym shorts. It wasn’t until he dropped the bags
right in front of her and went in for a hug that she came to, the smell of him sending her back to the boat and making her
feel weak.
“Sorry,” he said, registering the fact that she hadn’t hugged him back. “Hope that wasn’t weird.” His smile flattened but rose again as he held her gaze.
Augie didn’t know what to think. Was someone playing a joke on her? Was this all an elaborate plan? A reckoning? A punishment?
All she could do was stare at him. He raised his eyebrows as the silence pulsed between them, and Augie suddenly realized:
He didn’t seem as surprised to see her as she was to see him.
“No, it’s okay, I’m sorry, it’s just”—she felt her face flush—“what are you doing here? You aren’t from Aldon Lakes, are you?”
“Oh, no, definitely not. Are you? Didn’t you say you lived in New York?”
“I’m . . . only here for a bit,” Augie stammered, taking a step back up the stairs. “But really, what are you doing here?
Were you looking for me?”
He laughed the laugh she remembered, like dice shaking in a tin. “Okay, so, this is a hard question, because the answer is
both yes and no. I wasn’t stalking you, I promise—I had no idea you worked here—but I did see you at that happy hour Wednesday,
so, yes, since then, I have been looking for you. Hoping to run into you. Maybe . . . lightly stalking.” He tugged the side
of his hair, still smiling. “I tried to get your number from the guys at the party, but they didn’t have it, or wouldn’t give
it to me. And I couldn’t find you online. So, I’m super excited to see you now, seriously. I really thought you said you lived
in New York.” His voice was both confident and vulnerable in a way Augie found refreshing.
She pawed at her bowtie, chewing her lip. She couldn’t believe her lies were coming back to haunt her. It had felt so easy—so
liberating—to be someone else that afternoon: Allie Von Braun from New York City. Of course she couldn’t get away with it.
“What do you mean you saw me Wednesday? At the Club? Why were you there—why are you here now?”
“Tonight, I’m the best man, can’t you tell?” He held out the sides of his T-shirt.
“Seriously.” Augie forced one unconvincing laugh. “You’re not supposed to be here.”
“All right, my apologies.” He pressed his hand to his chest, faux offended, as he stepped forward. “But I work here, too.
Kind of. Okay, I guess that’s a stretch. I don’t technically work here here, but we’re at the pool all the time. I think it counts for something.”
Augie studied the bags, the pile of junk between them. “Who’s ‘we’?”
“Well, if you’d like the full job description”—he crossed his arms and pulsed his elbows in the air, his biceps pressing to
his sides. That chest, those arms, Augie could feel them around her, the way his hands had climbed all over her—“I’m a manny.
I’m here for the summer.”
Augie’s cheeks flushed deeper. The summer? He was supposed to be her one-night—day—stand. To mean nothing. Be no one. Number three. She was never supposed to see him
again.
His face clouded as he finally seemed to process her stress.
“I thought I’d mentioned that before, but maybe not. Telling girls you’re a manny isn’t exactly the best pickup line.”
“I don’t understand. What even is a manny?”
“Manny,” he repeated flatly. “Nanny, but male. Man-ny.”
Augie tried to recall their conversations on the boat. They hadn’t talked much. They’d met late in the day, and she’d assumed
he was like the other guys: a hockey player sophomore at St. Cloud. Still, she remembered the moment she first saw him.
Augie and Leah had been at the party about two hours when the guys decided to tie all three boats together in the center of the lake.
They were silly and tipsy from endless sun and margaritas, and they’d been dancing on the back of the smallest boat when the wave of a passing pontoon made Augie stumble.
As she fell backward, someone had caught her.
He’d introduced himself as he helped her to her feet, but she’d been too busy laughing with Leah to pay attention.
She’d barely looked at him as she replied she was “Allie Von Whatever.” It wasn’t until the sun shifted and he pulled up his sunglasses that she did a double take, instantly sobering.
Those eyes. Penny eyes. That’s when she’d made the joke about Abe Lincoln, grabbing his cheeks to look closer as his smile pressed into her palms.
“If that’s a compliment, I’ll take it,” he said, still grinning, their faces inches apart. When the boat rocked again, Augie
grabbed his arm for balance.
“Of course it is. Who doesn’t like Abe?” Augie didn’t add that she had always been obsessed with pennies—that she and her
dad used to collect them, constantly searching for glints of copper on the sidewalk.
“All right, Mary Todd. I’ll take it.” He’d laughed then—that rasp!—and Augie was so charmed that as the boat swayed again,
she let herself bump into him. He didn’t push her away. Instead, as the music switched to an old middle school hit, he slid
both her arms up around his neck, and they started dancing—laughing and joking as he grabbed her hips, spun her around. At
one point, she caught sight of Leah over his shoulder mouthing, “SO HOT,” and Augie had to smile. It was the most fun she’d
had in months. She loved being Allie Von Braun.
Augie wasn’t sure how many songs had passed after that, but eventually, they started dancing closer, the space between their bodies dissolving.
She felt the heat of his skin on hers, his breath on her neck, and a new pull took over.
So, as the boats started toward shore, Augie grabbed Leah and asked for a pep talk.
Asked for The Babe’s keys. As the sun lowered, the boats docked, and everyone made their way to the beach, she’d led him down to the cabin.
“Look, I’m a babysitter, okay?” he said now, bringing Augie back to present. “I know it’s not the sexiest summer job, but
it’s a good gig. Good money. Like I said, we spend all day at the pool. We’re here all the time. So.” He lifted his palms
as if feeling for rain.
Augie gripped the stair’s banister, unnerved by the desire she still felt for him. Micah’s face flashed in her mind, which
made her want to cry.
“I was never supposed to see you again,” she blurted out.
They both went quiet. His ears and neck tinged red.
“Okay. Got it.” He pointed a finger at her in a way that told her he was trying to make light of the comment.
Augie’s throat stung.
He picked up a backpack and let it hang off one shoulder.
“You know, I really am just here picking up Max and Cooper,” he said, turning defensive. “I’m not actually stalking you. Before
this week, I had no idea you worked here. That you even lived here.” His face twisted as he picked up another bag. “I gotta
go. The boys are falling asleep, and the Crawleys want to stay later. It sounds like a real party.” He looked to the ceiling
as the color drained from Augie’s face.
“The Crawleys? Danika and Bill?” she choked out. “That’s who you work for?”
“Yeah!” He looked excited, as if this was good news. “Do you know them?”
Augie couldn’t help it then. She sat down on the stairs. On top of being here, in her life, at the Club, he had to be working for the Crawleys? While Augie had never liked them, since that happy hour, she’d resigned herself to hating Mrs. Crawley. Augie didn’t usually
throw around the word hate, but there was no other way to describe how she’d felt when Mrs. Crawley had bumped into her—yelled at her—and made her drop
that tray. It hadn’t even been Augie’s fault, yet of course, she was the one who’d had to apologize in front of everyone.
This was how the Club worked. This was how the world worked.
“I guess I know them, sort of.” Augie could not picture Chat living at the mansion they’d built down the block. While you
couldn’t see their house from the road, photos from Zillow had been passed around. It was magnificent—all glass walls, modern
angles, slate roofs. Augie even remembered the price tag: three and a half million.
“But wait, so how long are you in town? With them?”
“I’m only here for the summer. I’ll go to Europe this fall, finally, if I can save as much money as I hope. So, don’t worry.
I’m leaving the whole country at some point. You’ll never see me again.”
Augie swallowed, recalling the first time he had mentioned Europe. They had just gone down into the boat cabin, and he’d been
rambling on about his travel plans. She couldn’t fault him for it—given she’d asked if he wanted to go down to the cabin “to
talk.” She was still endeared when he took it literally, though. She would never forget his face when, in the small, confined
cabin—the bed tucked into the alcove behind them, the swivel table to their side—she’d untied her bikini and let her top fall
to the floor. Mid-sentence, he’d finally stopped talking.
“Hey, are you okay?” He dropped the backpacks and came toward her, crouching in front of her as he rested his elbows on his
knees like a baseball umpire. Again, the smell of him—new car and soap and grass—engulfed her.
Augie held her head in her hands. She knew she was being dramatic, but she wasn’t okay.
This wasn’t okay. No matter how special the day with him had been, she did not need more distractions or stress.
What she really needed was to get it together.
She could not fail whatever test this was.
She couldn’t let another man throw her off course.
Augie breathed in, exhaled through her teeth, and stood up so fast she felt lightheaded.
A second later, he reluctantly rose to meet her.
“I’m sorry,” Augie said, her tone forceful. She adjusted her bowtie. “I can’t do this right now. I’m on the clock, and I guess
you are, too, so let’s keep to our jobs. Let’s pretend the boat never happened.”
As soon as the words left her mouth, she knew he was reliving the memory, too. Silence swelled between them.
“Whatever you want.” His T-shirt lifted as he scrunched his shoulders to his neck. “You don’t have a boyfriend, do you?”
“No,” Augie snapped. “No. I do not.” She again fought back thoughts of Micah. “Okay, really, I have to go. Let’s just keep
our distance. I have a lot going on right now. So, good luck with the Crawleys. Have a good summer.”
She took a few fast steps up the stairs.
“Hey, wait,” he called after her. “I don’t want to overstep, or piss you off, but can I at least know your real name?”
Augie slowed to a stop. She turned around, feeling even more humiliated.
“Because you said Allie before, but your name tag says Augie. I’m still Chat, by the way.” He smiled softly, teasing yet kind.
Chat. It was almost as weird as her name. She didn’t know how she had missed it. She didn’t have it in her to explain, so she simply
pointed to her name tag. The lights above reflected off the fake gold.
“Okay. It’s nice to meet you, Augie.” He raised his hand and pretended to shake the air in front of him. “And I’ll assume that while Allie lives in New York, you do live here?”
Augie sighed. Normally, she’d be irritated by such a remark, but something about it felt more flirty than snarky; through
and through, he seemed like a good person.
“It’s okay if you were trying to impress me,” he added while picking up the teddy bear and tennis rackets. “I’ve never been
to New York.”
Augie turned back to the stairs.
“You’re not missing anything,” she said as she reached for the railing. Still, a second later, she looked back over her shoulder.
“It’s nice to meet you, too, Chat.”
She hated to realize it was true.