Chapter 19
“You sure it was all correct?” I scan the form while an impatient clerk waits for me to hand it over. I don’t know whose idea it was to make the standard font size on any and all official applications a size ten.
“Yes. I looked over it twice.”
I tap my finger against the paper before sliding it through the gap in the glass partition. The clerk snatches it before it fully leaves my fingertips.
“Take this.” She hands me a slip. “And head to room nine.”
Harper bounces excitedly, her face masked with a smile that runs cheek to cheek. We head down the hallway and she adjusts the posterboard she’s got tucked under her arm. I try to ignore the stares that come.
“Did you have to bring that inside?”
“Yes,” Harper says adamantly.
When we arrive at court room nine, I reach for the door, pulling open so she can enter. “It’s a little embarrassing.”
Harper giggles. “You sound like Lucas.”
Maybe I sound like him, but as soon as I step into the room and see the other dozen soon-to-be attorneys, I feel the exact opposite of Lucas .
Old. I feel really fucking old.
“Give me those,” Harper hisses, motioning to my sunglasses sitting on top of my head. I pull them down, pushing back the strands of hair they were holding in place.
I’m directed to take a seat next to the future gang of overgrown, toddler-litigators and Harper heads to the back of the courtroom to sit with the other supportive patrons who were roped into coming today.
For fifteen minutes, I fidget, twiddling my thumbs, picking pieces of nearly invisible lint from my suit jacket. I peak over my shoulder, finding Harper staring, practically bouncing in her seat. She holds a thumbs up and scowls when I roll my eyes at her ridiculous enthusiasm, but it’s only half-hearted. Maybe I like having an audience, even of just one.
Even if it is Harper.
I’m tempted to loosen the tie Harper had secured before we left the house when the judge enters and we all stand.
The entire process is as anticlimactic as I imagined it would be. One by one we’re called up, standing in front of the judge for no more than a minute and half as we swear and sign ourselves in.
“Riley Monroe.”
I’m relieved by the time my name is called because my legs are about to fall asleep and I can only rock and fidget in my seat for so long before someone notices and calls my credibility into question.
I don’t even make it to the aisle before Harper is on her feet, clapping. “Go, Riley! Bravo!”
As if it wasn’t bad enough to be the only one in this group old enough to grow a proper beard, I’m the only one who brought a one-woman cheer squad.
My cheeks burn as I make my way up to the judge. But do you know what they also do? They fucking hurt from how hard I’m smiling. And I could give two-shits about this entire process. I could give even less about saying, My name is Riley and I’m officially a licensed attorney.
I’m smiling so fucking hard because now I know what it’s like to have someone proud of me. And I’m smiling extra hard because it’s Harper.
“Move to your right. I want to get more of the courthouse behind you.”
I take a step to the side, but Harper lowers the phone.
“What?” I exclaim. “I moved.”
“The sign is crooked,” she points out, using her free hand to make a lifting motion.
Looking over the posterboard, I shake my head at what’s written on it.
ADMITTED TO THE BAR ASSOCIATION
Harper stamps her foot. “Please?”
“Is this what you put Lucas through every year on his first day of school?” I do my best to level the sign.
“And last,” Harper corrects me. “He’s usually a hair more cooperative, but not by much. Come on, one more.”
“Hey, man, congrats,” a stranger tells me as he makes his way up the stairs. “Took the bar twice and never passed.”
Harper beams.
“I hear from experience third time is the charm,” I offer.
“Got it!” she exclaims.
“Thank god,” I mumble, lowering the poster board as she approaches. I point to my sunglasses she wears. “Can I have those back now?”
Harper ignores me and approaches someone coming out of the courthouse. “Excuse me? Would you mind taking a picture? ”
I knit my brows together as she hands her phone to the woman.
“We have to have one photo together. The last one was years ago,” she reminds me. “We should upgrade it.”
I think of the photo that lives on the fridge, the one Harper often covers with others.
“This would make him so happy, Riley,” Harper whispers, looking up at me. “You and me together.”
I know Nate would be happy to see these photos. But what I’m not sure about is how he’d feel knowing how good it feels to wrap my arm around his wife’s waist, how easily she fits against me. How would he feel knowing I’m smiling for the camera like an idiot because even though I’m annoyed by Harper’s adorable enthusiasm, I’m overjoyed it brought her this damn close?
“Congratulations on your achievement. You’re a beautiful couple,” the woman holding the phone says.
I don’t know how Nate would feel that I don’t correct her.
But neither does Harper.
Harper’s idea of celebrating involves offering to buy me lunch at the diner on the Boulevard. My idea of celebrating usually involves a few beers. But it’s only eleven when we leave the courthouse—too early for both of those things.
“I’ve got another idea.”
Harper finally rolls up the posterboard. “What?”
“You’ll like it,” I tell her. “Trust me.”
She settles back against the seat and doesn’t argue, only tilts her head over the door, holding her hand out to cut through the air as I drive us toward the water. I grip the steering wheel tighter because I’ve got the urge again to pull back her hair so it doesn’t obstruct my view of her face.
Riley , I lecture. Get out of your head .
That’s kind of exactly what I want to do. I want to get out of my own head that’s filled with happiness and a hint of frustration that I can’t see the smooth, pink apple of Harper’s cheek or the gentle slope of her nose. I want to flee from the walls of my mind that seem to be sandwiched with nothing more than thoughts of how damn beautiful Harper is, and more, how she showed up for me today.
I grunt, cursing myself, thankful that the rush of the wind masks the noise.
Harper gasps.
“You’re taking me to surf.”
I hum, but don’t give her anything more than that. I’ve got nine fingers squeezing the steering wheel so hard, it doesn’t matter that my left index finger lays idly against it. I could crush it with less than full force.
“Really?”
Harper’s stare bores into me, but I don’t look at her. Instead, my eyes flicker between the road and the hand she’s placed right below my shoulder. Even through a shirt and suit jacket, I swear I can feel her warmth so intensely it’s like skin on skin.
“Today?”
“Y-yeah,” I push out. “Today.”
I change lanes, taking the merge toward the beach. Harper’s hand drops from my arm and I resume breathing.
She rocks and shimmies in her seat and I can’t not look now. Reaching up, Harper tucks a strand of wild, flying hair behind her left ear, giving me access to the huge smile she has on her face.
It’s not the smile itself, but knowing I put it there that has me smiling. But the shared joy is short lived on my part.
What the fuck is wrong with you ?
A sign for Oceanside’s Boulevard comes into view, and I clear my throat. “I’ve gotta do something first.”
“What?”
Clear my head of how pretty you are .
My breaks squeak as I pull into an open parking spot I nearly missed. “Just something. Go ask Finn for a suit and change.”
I get out of the car but immediately stop. Taking a deep breath, I loosen the tie and slip it off my neck, handing it to her.
“Riley,” Harper calls for me as my feet hit the boardwalk, but I don’t think there’s any stopping me even if she begged and pleaded.
The thought brings a different image of Harper begging, and it doesn’t include her begging me to stop.
God damn it.
Heat creeps up my body beneath my clothes. The beach is relatively empty, but I don’t care how crazy I look struggling to slip out of my loafers and twist free from my suit jacket. I’m desperate and frantic to cool off, to wash the obscenity from my mind that I’m not only attracted to my best friend’s wife…but I like her.
A lot.
I faintly hear Harper call from the distance when I begin to sink in the damp sand as the cool water washes over my sock-covered feet. The tide creeps up to my ankles, to my shins, to my knees. Each inch of me it covers takes some weight and tension from my body, and I run further out like I weigh nothing, like I’m full of nothing, especially these confusing thoughts.
I dive under the wave and find that even though air is trapped in my lungs beneath the surface, I can finally breathe. I’ve been purged of this kind of ludicrous betrayal that fills my veins.
When I surface, though, I’ve got Finn and Harper looking at me like I’m just ludicrous in general.
And, maybe Finn has a right to given what happened after Nate’s funeral.
He approaches the shore. “Riley?”
I shake the hair that has fallen loose from my face. “I’m straight.” For emphasis, I give him a thumbs up. Now he’s really looking at me like I’ve gone mad .
I see Harper jogging toward us.
“Go suit her up for me,” I yell to Finn. “I need a second.”
I weigh about thirty more pounds than normal with my clothes drenched, so it takes serious effort and time to get back to shore. But by the time I do, Finn turns, taking Harper with him back up to The Surf Shack.
And maybe I have gone mad, and not just because I thought this plunge of a baptism would work. And maybe these feelings for Harper developed because we’re spending so much time together in this sort of dysfunctional family unit neither of us wanted.
I make it to the sand, leaning forward and pressing my hands to my knees. When I straighten, Harper looks over her shoulder and even in the distance I make out the shy, playful smile on her face. And shit, the shape of her mouth like that—the shape of happiness—it cuts me deep.
I might’ve never wanted to be in this situation.
I might’ve tried to run away from it.
But damn, I want to stick around now.
“Now what?”
Now what? I’m going to smack Finn upside the head for putting Harper in this wetsuit that isn’t more than a long-sleeved one piece and has her ass on full display.
“Riley?”
I rub my face. “You’re…you’re too far forward.”
Remaining on her stomach, Harper lifts her head to look up at me. “I’m where I was before.”
“No you’re not.” I bend down and lift her ankles and she giggles when I pull her back. “Now you’re where you were tomorrow. Now, go. Paddle.”
Harper’s body rises and falls with the sigh she lets out but she raises one arm and cycles the other, mimicking a paddling motion and not being careful to toss sand in my direction as she does. In fact, I notice her hands are cupped.
“Extend your arms.”
She does, pushing up, but her placement is wrong.
“Keep them on deck. Don’t hold the rails.”
I wait for Harper to correct and I hate myself for letting my eyes linger on the curve of her ass cheeks peeking out of the bottom of the wetsuit. I thought her in yoga shorts, spreading her legs on that hoop was bad.
No. Wetsuit Harper is another level of torture.
I’m thankful for the constraint of my own wetsuit because my traitorous dick twitches.
“Front leg in position.”
Here’s where Harper has a bit of an advantage compared to other beginner surfers. She’s strong but super limber so the motion is fluid and natural.
And, of course, she does the next step—releasing her hands—without me giving the command.
“Good.” I swing my hands before clapping them together. “Again.”
Still holding position, she twists her neck back to me. “I thought surfing happens in the water.”
“To surf, you need to stand .”
Harper looks down, her feet still in place.
“You think you’re not going to eat shit?” I ask, reading her confidence.
Lifting her shoulders, she shrugs gently.
“Fine,” I huff, and I pull up the top half of my wet suit. “Dinner on you if you fall the first three times.”
Harper lugs the long board easier than I thought she could, making it past me before I fully tug my zipper up. She stops when her ankles are barely submerged and looks back at me, the nerves edged into her face. I could tease her, but I’m not really in that kind of mood .
“I’m here.”
Apparently the reassurance of my presence was all Harper needed because she turns back to the ocean and marches on.
“I’ve got it,” she insists, trying to hold the board steady as she lays it down, pushing against the current and fighting to keep it steady enough to mount.
I grab onto it. “I know you do, but let me help you with this part.”
I move with her deeper into the water, lightly holding onto the board so she doesn’t have to drag my weight as she fights the tide.
“Wait,” Harper says as I help her turn the board so she faces the shore. “How will I know when to go?”
“I’ll tell you. But if you do it right, you’ll know.”
Harper takes an anxious breath.
“Don’t be nervous.” I loosen my hold entirely. We’re deeper now and even though my toes graze soft sand, I know I’m about to have to tread.
“I’m not.”
“You are. It’s okay if you fall, just try to drop to the side. It’d be a shame if you smacked that pretty face into the board.” My words make Harper’s eyes round, but the situation at hand makes it easy for me to move past it. I give her a push. “Paddle.”
I try to focus on the speed and shape the wave takes so I can prompt her as I did before, because if you can’t nail a pop up, you’ll never surf.
But I can’t really focus on the wave below Harper. I just focus on her.
And she needs no prompting. After the smallest bout of hesitation, she rolls her body so smoothly and naturally, like she’s doing yoga on top of a wave. It’s then I realize her back foot is flexed, not flat.
“Get that foot down!” I yell.
“Riley!” she screams. “Riley I’m doing it!”
She is, but also, she’s not listening. Because with that back foot arched, she loses her balance, and then topples over. Barely under the water for three seconds, Harper lifts her head, and, much to my delight, brushes her blonde hair from her face. “Okay. I almost did it.”
There’s a lightness to Harper’s joyful tone even as she struggles to regain control of the board. She stumbles again, but rights herself before turning the board back out toward the surf and away from the beach, trudging forward into the deeper water.
I paddle over to help her again.
“No,” she splashes me. “I’ve got it.”
And got it, Harper does. But after she hops on her board and turns it to face the shore, she peeks over her shoulder. When she finds me, she smiles and I’m reminded by something Nate wrote in his letter.
She’ll just need to know someone’s there.
I didn’t know back then just how happy I would be now to be that someone.