“I’d pay serious money to see Rid campin’ for real.” Link flopped down next to Ethan.
“Your allowance isn’t serious enough to get me to go camping, Shrinky Dink.” Rid tried to figure out a way to sit down on a stone near the fire pit without ripping the thin black spandex skirt she was rocking.
“Havin’ a little trouble with your nano-skirt, there?” Link patted the makeshift seat next to him.
“No.” Ridley twirled the pink stripe in her hair. Lena speared a marshmallow on a stick, laughing as Ridley took another pass at sitting on the rock.
“Can’t rest your dogs while you’re strapped in that butt Band-Aid?” Link was enjoying himself.
Ridley was not. “It’s a micro-mini. From Miu Miu. And what would you know? You can’t even dress a salad.”
“I’ve got my own kind of flair, Babe. And I don’t need to buy mine at Meow Meow.”
Ridley gave up on the rock, squatting instead at the edge of a log just down from Link. “Flair? You? You wash your face with shampoo and brush your teeth with a washcloth.”
“What’s your point?” Link raised an eyebrow.
Lena looked up. “Enough. Don’t tell me you two are still going at it. This has to be some kind of record, even for you.” She waved her stick and her marshmallow caught on fire.
“I mean, if you’re referring to that one night—” Rid began.
“It was more of a conversation,” Link said. “And she did blow me off—”
“I said I was sorry,” Rid countered. “But you know what they say. Once a Mortal…”
Link snorted. “Mortal? I wouldn’t believe a Siren if she—”
Lena held up her hand. “I said not to tell me.” Ridley and Link looked away from each other, embarrassed.
“It’s all good,” Link said stiffly.
“Camping.” Ridley changed the subject.
Lena shook her head. “No, this is not camping. This is… I don’t actually know the verb for it. S’moring?” Lena caught a glop of brown and white goo between two graham crackers, shoving the whole thing into Ethan’s mouth.
Ethan made a sound like he was trying to say something, but he couldn’t open his mouth enough to make any actual words.
“I take it you like my s’moring?” Lena smiled at him.
Ethan nodded. Tonight, in his oldest Harley-Davidson T-shirt and ratty jeans, he looked the same as he had the day Ridley first met him, after basketball practice at the Stop & Steal. Which was crazy, if you thought about everything that had happened to him since then. The things that boy has been through in the name of my cousin. And people think Sirens are hard on the opposite sex. He’d do anything for her.
A little voice in Ridley’s head pointed out the obvious: Loved and together is the opposite of unloved and alone. Ridley could barely stand to watch a relationship that functional.
She shuddered and shook her head, recovering. “S’moring? Don’t you mean snoring? Because this is no way to spend our last night together. There are enemies to be made. Laws to be broken. Cheerleaders to—”
“Not tonight.” Lena shook her head, spearing another marshmallow.
Rid gave up, grabbing a bag of chocolate bars to console herself. Sirens loved their sugar, especially this one.
“Speak for yourself. I think this is brilliant,” said Liv, stuffing her face with a gooey chocolate–marshmallow–graham cracker mess. “Melted chocolate and warm marshmallow coming together as one—on the same graham cracker? That’s democracy at its best. This is why I love America. S’mores.”
“Is that the only reason?” John nudged her.
“The only reason? Yes. No,” Liv teased, licking a finger. “S’mores, the Dar-ee Keen, and the CW.” She shot him a playful look and he smiled, tossing a marshmallow into Boo Radley’s open mouth. Boo thumped his tail appreciatively.
Twenty-five marshmallows later, Boo was a little less appreciative and the fire was burning down to embers, but the night was far from over.
“See? No tears. No good-byes,” Lena said, breaking up the ash with her burnt-black stick. “And when we go, no one is allowed to say anything you’d read in a cheesy greeting card.”
Ethan drew his arm around her. Lena was trying, but all the sugar in the world wasn’t going to make this good-bye go down any easier.
Not for the six of them.
Ridley made a face. “If you want to boss people around, Cuz, start a sorority.” She rummaged through a bag of empty chocolate wrappers. “It’s our last night together. So what? Accept it and move on. Tough love, people.” Ridley talked a good game, but deep down she knew her own tough love wasn’t all that much tougher than her cousin’s marshmallow meltdown.
They just had different ways of showing it.
Lena grew still, gazing into the dying fire. “I can’t.” She shook her head. “I’ve left too many people behind too many times. I won’t do it again. Not to you guys. I don’t want everything to change.” She reached for Boo, burying her hands deep in his dark fur. His head dropped down to his paws.
The six friends fell silent, until only the crackling remnants of the campfire could be heard.
Ridley was uncomfortable with the silence, but more uncomfortable with all the feelings talk that had preceded it, so she kept her mouth shut.
It was finally Link who spoke up. “Yeah, well, change happens. I used to really love these things,” he said, squeezing a marshmallow between his fingers. He shoved John, who was sitting on a rock between Link and Liv. “Dude. When you turned me into an Incubus, you shoulda warned me about the whole we-don’t-need-to-eat-and-everything-tastes-like-crap thing. I would’ve eaten a bunch a stuff for my last meal.”