“Oh, right,” he said. “So, look. About yesterday. My boss . . . she’s kind of intense. She doesn’t mean to be rude.”
“No?”
He smiled, barely. “Okay, maybe she does. But it’s kind of a New York reflex. Not entirely her fault.”
“It’s fine,” I told him. “I’m used to it.”
“She’s just really stressed about the time crunch we’re under with this thing, doing the editing and filming . . .” He trailed off, as if suddenly realizing that I was just standing there, waiting to leave. “She’s really talented.”
“She makes movies?”
“Documentaries.” He ran a hand through his hair. He was a bit on the skinny side, not really my type, but I could see that for some girls he’d be cute. “We’re finishing up this project about a local artist that she’s been working on for three years now.”
“Artist?” I said. “Who’s that?”
“Clyde Conaway.”
“The guy that owns the bike shop?”
“Among other things,” he said. “You know him?”
“As much as anybody here does,” I replied. “Since when is he an artist?”
“You don’t know his story?”
I shook my head.
“Oh, man, it’s extraordinary. Colby kid becomes hot modern artist, then abandons all to move back to small coastal town and become local eccentric, even as his work is still in serious demand? There’s a real mystery there. Everyone wants to know why.”
“Because he’s Clyde,” I told him. “Nothing he does makes any sense.”
He pointed at me. “We should interview you. I’m going to talk to Ivy about it.”
I smiled, shaking my head as I slid into my seat. “Believe me, I’d be no help. I don’t know anything about him. Thanks anyway, though.”
When I cranked the engine, though, he didn’t move. He just stood there, so I had to go right past him. When I did he smiled, putting his earbuds back in. “Nice talking to you, Emaline.”
“You too. Enjoy your stay.”
He nodded, and I headed down the street. At the next stop sign, though, I looked back. He was still standing there in front of Summer Daydream, looking up at it. What kind of person would think a girl like me would live in a house like that? The same kind who thought there’d be interest in a movie about Clyde Conaway. In other words: Not From Around Here.
4
“HOLD ON. DID you hear that?”
Luke groaned right into my ear, then rolled off me. “Emaline.”
“I’m serious. Listen.”
We lay there, side by side, completely quiet. In the distance, like always, there was the ocean. Nothing else.
“You know,” he said after a moment, “it’s getting hard not to take this personally.”
“Do you want a repeat of what happened in April?”
“No,” he replied. “But I also don’t want to waste the only time alone we’ve had in months being paranoid.”
“It has not been months,” I pointed out, but he wasn’t listening, already too busy migrating back to my pillow, one hand smoothing over my stomach, then hip bone.
“Feels like it,” he mumbled into my neck.
I rolled my eyes. Luke and I didn’t differ on much, but when it came to this one issue, we were often at odds. If you asked him, I was a dull prude. As far as I was concerned, he was a sex addict who could never get enough. Somewhere in the middle was the truth, not that we’d ever gotten close enough to see it.
“It was last week,” I pointed out, as he unbuttoned my jeans, picking up where he’d left off. “Wednesday or Thursday.”
“It was the week before,” he said, shifting his weight so I could slide them down over my legs.
“Do you realize you are picking the wrong moment to split hairs?”
“Do you realize we can’t have a moment at all as long as you’re talking?”
I loved my boyfriend. I really, really did. But ever since my mom had come home unexpectedly this spring while we were spending our lunch hour doing pretty much this same thing, I’d been skittish. One minute we were happily occupied, secure in the knowledge that we had the whole house to ourselves, and the next she was pushing open my bedroom door to get a full-on view of something none of us ever wanted her to see. I still got red-faced thinking about it, while my mom was so traumatized she couldn’t look at me in the eye for over a week. I would have pointed out that this was yet another reason she should stay out of my room, if either of us could talk about it without the risk of exploding from shared embarrassment. In fact, we’d never discussed it at all beyond a curt conversation (lacking eye contact) during which she confirmed that 1) I was on birth control and 2) I knew I was never, ever to do it under this roof again.
And we didn’t. At least for a while. But when you’re in a committed relationship with someone you love, fooling around in a parked car or in the dunes at the beach just feels . . . dirty. Not to mention uncomfortable. Add in the fact that Luke’s mom was always home—this was not an exaggeration, she worked from home and had no hobbies other than her family—and it wasn’t too long before we ended up playing with this particular fire again. Now, though, even when we were alone, something was different.
If I was honest, though, there was probably more to this than just what happened in April. Like the fact that while, for the first year or so we were together, Luke and I were all about falling in love—the stuff that happens pre-walking into the sunset—we’d now crossed over, right to the little irritations that crop up in relationships after that. Like the other person drives too fast (or slow), watches too much football (or not enough), or wants to fool around all the time (or never). He was such a great guy, I knew that any other girl would be able to overlook any of his not-so-great aspects. But I was me. Unfortunately.