CHAPTER 1
The Scars Are Many
I KICK MY FEET IN THE COLD OCEAN WATER AND OPEN MY EYES FOR a fraction of a second before the sunlight blinds me, and I shut them again. The glare is still strong and heating my skin, deepening the tan that has built from my hours outside. The dock presses against my back, but the wood is smooth and soft from age, so I meld into it. My hand moves over the slats, and I trace the familiar texture. I will never tire of this dock. So much has happened here, been revealed here.
Pain and truth, yes, but it’s also a place where friendship and love have been solidified.
Maine has become my place of healing and stability.
A breeze rushes across my body, and I inhale deeply, taking in the strong salty air. Late August here on Frenchman Bay in Bar Harbor, Maine, has brought ideal weather with sunny days tinged by a crispness that tells me fall will be here soon.
I kick the water harder. For a moment, a sense of melancholy washes over me. Fall means that Chris’s brother Eric and their sister, Estelle, will return to Matthews College for their senior year, and my brother, James, will go back to Colorado for his. The twins should have graduated last spring, but both changed majors and had to register for additional required courses. I hate that they’re leaving soon because this summer has been a dream. The Shepherd siblings, my brother, and I have been under one roof, all safe, all finding peace.
So, I brush my brief sadness away. I really can’t complain about anything.
My calm reflections on peace, however, are short-lived when I am suddenly doused in icy water.
“Sabin!” I scream, throwing my hands in front of my face way too late to stop the deluge of water that soaks me. When I wipe my eyes enough to see, I sit and look up. “You’re a prick!”
But I can’t help laughing, even while shivering from the shock of the chill. Also, the swim trunks he’s wearing are covered in sock- monkey prints, and that does nothing to lessen my laughter.
“You’re a prick!” I scream again.
“But you love me anyway.” Setting down a large plastic bucket, Sabin smiles broadly with a bit more pride at his stealthy attack than I’d like to see.
I do my best to glare at him.
“Say you love me anyway!” he demands. “Say it!”
I stick out my tongue and reach for my nearby towel.
Sabin gets to it before I do and holds it above his head. “Lady Blythe McGuire,” he says all too seriously, “I suggest you say that you love me anyway, or this towel is going to sleep with the fishes!” He waves it around in the air. “Like a tragic victim of a mafioso vendetta!”
I stand and start to jump up and down in a desperate attempt to grab it, but I’m no match for Sabin’s height or his incessant giggling. “Fine. I give up. I cave! I’ll say it! I love you anyway.”
He cups a hand to his ear. “I’m sorry. What? Once more—with feeling.”
“Sabin! I’m freezing!” I say, laughing. “I love you anyway! Sincerely! With as much feeling as a very cold person can muster!”
“Victory!” he hollers, lowering the towel.
I go to take hold of it, but he lands it on my head, covering my face, and then he wraps a big arm around me so that I can’t move. I feel him furiously rubbing the top of my head while I giggle and try to squirm free.
“I’m going to kill you,” I mutter through my laughter.
“You poor thing,” he says. “Sopping wet! Bitterly cold! Your moment of sunny solitude interrupted so callously! Who would do such a thing? Let’s dry you off.”
He starts rubbing the towel over my face and then drops it to my back so that I’m pinned between it and him as he wildly yanks it back and forth, spinning me from side to side. These days, he’s much too strong for me to even think about getting free, so I accept that I’m basically putty in his hands until he’s had his fill of goofiness.
Finally, he stops, and I dizzily look at him. “Sabin?”
“Yes, my lady?”
“I see two of you.”
“Lucky girl!” He leans his forehead down against mine. “Oh, whatever shall you do with two Sabins?”
“I can barely handle one.”
Sabin wipes the towel over my cheek. “Missed a spot.”
I shiver, and he pulls me into his hold. A Sabin hug is always a good place to be. Today, his chest is hot from the sun, and it helps warm me.
He’s lost a lot of weight over the past year, and I notice that I’m more fully against him than I used to be when he’d hug me. For a moment, I miss his big belly. Of course, he looks a lot better, but the absence of his soft extra weight is undeniable.
About once a month, he’ll agree to go on a run, but he bitches and moans most of the way. Running a section of the Boston Marathon with me last spring was not, it seems, a catalyst for taking up regular routes. Yet I can feel that he’s getting more muscular and less flabby, thanks to the lifting that Chris has been pushing him to do and the work he’s been doing with James on the house all summer. My architect-to-be brother redesigned one of the bathrooms, and Sabin was totally on board with smashing tile, hauling out the old tub, and lugging materials up and down the second floor.
I touch a hand to Sabin’s bicep and squeeze. “You’re getting all beefy, Sabe.”
“I’m quite sexy, you know. It’s sickening how ripped I am. I don’t know how any other dudes can stand to be around me because my macho manliness is too much to bear.” He steps back and begins striking a series of clichéd poses in which he flexes his muscles.
I shake my head in amusement, but the truth is that he does look good. His black hair flops around his face as he moves, and his green eyes twinkle. While he’s not exactly ready for underwear modeling, the change in his physique is obvious. He looks healthy, and even his face has slimmed down a bit. It turns out that Sabin had cheekbones under the fullness.
After he finishes the umpteenth muscle stance, I step closer and touch a hand to his cheek, rubbing the scruff. “Are you ever going to shave this off, so we can see your pretty face?”
“That would be too much hotness to handle. I need my scruffiness to minimize the impact.” He shakes his face against my palm and grins.
I suppose the big sideburns and perpetual five o’clock shadow suit him.
“You shouldn’t make jokes, Sabe. I’m really proud of you.” Now, it’s my turn to embrace him, and I slip my arms around his stomach. “I’m so glad you’re staying with us. I couldn’t stand to lose the twins, James, and you.” I squeeze him hard.
He is such a source of solace and stability for me. Of that, I am constantly aware and constantly appreciative. I feel like I can’t explain that wholly to him, but I try to remind him of it as much as possible. It just never feels like enough.
There aren’t the right words or right phrases to encapsulate how powerfully he’s become part of my being, how to convey how I worry about him, how I celebrate him, how I mentally fuss over every hour he is awake. Maybe it should feel creepy, but Sabin’s mother died years ago, and he doesn’t have a girlfriend or other close friends. He’s a young guy still, and I cannot help but feel that someone should watch over him, that someone should love and adore and hover.
But I say what I can—for now. “You’re my best friend, Sabin. I feel like you always have been, even before I knew you.”
He pauses for a moment and then rests his chin on top of my head. “And you’re my best friend. Of course you are.”
I rub his back and move to his side. He actually has a waist, and I’m almost entranced by the way he’s changed. “You’ve done so much since rehab—”
“Oh God, don’t call it rehab. That’s such a hideous word. Let’s just say, I was at a spa getaway, suffering from exhaustion, like a celebrity.”
“Stop. There’s nothing wrong with rehab.”
“It wasn’t really rehab. It was excruciating intensive therapy.” “Well, you haven’t had a drink since you left. That’s sort of rehabish.”
“Alcohol wasn’t really my problem, sweetheart. That was a poorly thought-out coping mechanism, I’m told. A replacement for actual self-analysis and change. Boring psychobabble.” He pauses for a bit too long. “And can we not do this? I did what I had to do, and now, it’s done. It’s handled.”
I didn’t mean to stumble into this conversation. Talking about his past, everyone’s past...it’s a bit of an unspoken rule that we don’t go there. There are details that he cannot bring himself to share with me, and I get that. I want him to have privacy and containment, if that’s what’s helpful.
I know that Sabin feels ashamed, and I’ve learned not to dig too much with him. Whatever he’s been doing to free himself from his childhood trauma seems to be working, so I give him space. But I also want him to know that I acknowledge what he’s pushed through, and I’m proud of him.
“Sorry. I just meant to tell you how much I love you, and I’m glad you moved in here.”
We stay quiet and listen to the gentle splash of waves as the tide finishes coming in.
“This fall, we can go apple-picking and jump in leaf piles and...and...do things with pumpkins.”
“Do things with pumpkins?” he asks with a small laugh.
“You know, carve them, make pumpkin bread, smash ’em up. Whatever you like.”
“Okay.” He kisses the top of my head.
“And, you know, you’ll perhaps disappear for the night with another tourist and crawl home in the morning. Then, I’ll make you pancakes while I avoid hearing lurid details and lecture you on how stupid one-night stands are.”
“And I’ll tell you how sexy and awesome they are and how I’m just adding to my glowing reviews on Yelp.”
“Shut up. You’re worth more than a Yelp review. You’re more like Zagat’s.” I hold his waist in my hands and squeeze. “Seriously, look how lean you’re getting.” Then, I put my palms on his chest. “And these pecs!” I throw my arms around his neck and tightly hold him. “God, my best friend is gorgeous.”
“Blythe...stop...” Sabin starts. It’s unlike him to look embarrassed, but he does now.
“Mmm?”
“Blythe, don’t...” He sets his hands under my arms and eases me back. “It’s just...you can’t...”
I look up and see that his face has a more serious expression now. “What? What is it?”
He half-smiles and tucks a stray hair behind my ear, but he doesn’t say anything.
“Sabe, what is it?”
Suddenly, he twirls me around and then yells, “You can’t stop me from doing a cannonball!” Then, he lets me go and leaps from the end of the dock, tucking his knees into his chest, before pounding into the water.
Just because he’s dropped some pounds doesn’t mean that he’s a small guy by any means, and the splash he makes when he crashes through the water’s surface soaks me again.
My dog, Jonah, barks sharply, and I turn to see him running, soon passing me, before flying off the dock to reach Sabin.
Even though I’m not a fan of the freezing water, I still do laps every few days. Jonah though has logged more hours swimming than I have. That’s mostly because Sabin spends at least an hour a day playing with him, throwing a tennis ball into the water over and over for Jonah to retrieve. There’s nothing my German shepherd loves more than swimming with Sabin, and it tires Jonah out almost as much as going with me on my runs.
I hold a hand up to my eyes and watch as Jonah paddles to reach Sabin, who is now floating on his back while lazily kicking his feet and sweeping his hands through the water, letting the gentle current determine his drift.
A voice carries my way. “With a little imagination, that white bathing suit is practically see-through.”
I laugh. “It is not.” I pivot on my feet and try not to look as stupidly in love as I feel. I’m sure I’m failing, but I’m all right with that.
Chris walks slowly down the steps from the house to the beach area. Part of me wants to rush to meet him, and the other part wants to just watch him. It doesn’t matter that we live together, that I’m with him every single day. I have the same strong reaction, the same unyielding surge of love that rips through me, every time I see him.
I don’t feel the cold on my skin that should be amplified by the breeze. All I can feel now is that Christopher Shepherd is my home and my heart.
The late-afternoon sun hits his face, and even the sound of Jonah’s barking and Sabin’s whooping can’t distract me. Chris is even tanner than Sabin, and the loose white button-down he’s wearing with jeans is damn hot. His hands are tucked into his pockets as he looks at me almost shyly.
Most of the time, he exudes nothing but confidence. Chris is entitled to any self-assuredness and sense of capability he has. I adore that about him, and I rely on it. Still, even after all our time together, Chris has moments where his stance when he’s around me is almost nervous, hesitant. There’s a questioning air in his approach, as if he needs to check that I’m still completely engulfed in him.
The answer is always yes.
The few seconds of insecurity he can’t control are not really about me. They’re flashes of his history, which did nothing to breed trust. In Chris’s blip of tentativeness, I see a little boy who is alone, who has made himself responsible for shielding his siblings from a sickly abusive father, and who is desperately frightened that he might fail. A boy who fears he might not be accepted and loved because he is not worthy of anything but savage outrage and psychotic delusions.
I am still trying to glue together the broken pieces of this person I love. He manages his tortured side with remarkable skill, but even Chris, with his endless supply of strength and clarity, could not survive all that he did without scars.
And the scars are many, and they are deep.
Together though, we are overcoming both his past and mine. When he is a few yards away from me, I cannot stop myself from walking quickly into his arms. I put my hands on his face, run a finger over his lips, and study him as though we’d been apart for months, not hours.
He smiles at me with curiosity. “You okay?”
I nod slowly and don’t take my eyes from his. I am flooded again with the rush of what the entirety of us feels like, what it means for us to be together. “We’re doing it, aren’t we?”
Because he understands me more intuitively than anyone else could, he nods back. “Yes, Blythe, we’re kicking heartbreak’s ass.”
The power in this truth brings my lips to his, and I kiss the love of my life with more meaning and connectedness than I was ready for. My eyes sting a bit, and my chest tightens with emotion. The taste of his mouth and the feel of his hold as he keeps me close will, without fail, shut down the rest of the world, so I let myself disappear into him.
Then, Chris slows our kiss, dipping me in his arms until my head is hanging upside down.
He strokes a hand down my front and smiles. “Like I said, practically see-through...”
I laugh and grab his hand to pull myself up. He turns my back into his chest, and I catch sight of Sabin in the water. I like how he is drifting, seeming to be without worry, without abandon.
“Our boy taught himself how to float, didn’t he?” I say. “You can’t drown when you know how to float.”
Chris says nothing for a few minutes. “Maybe. But the water is pretty calm today. There could always be a storm.” He rubs my shoulders. He breathes against me. He waits. “It’s hard to float in a storm.”
He’s right, but it’s not the optimistic attitude I was hoping for. I lift my chin and look back at him. “Let’s just enjoy the moment, okay?”
Chris laughs softly. “Okay.”
When I turn back to Sabin, I notice that I’m relieved I can still see him, as though I were worried he had drowned when I looked away. Even at this distance, I can see that he’s watching Chris and me. I wave lightly, and he waves back before paddling himself in the opposite direction.
The necklace that I wear every day now burns against my chest in the sun. My fingers fumble through the letter charms for Christopher, Estelle, Eric, and me until I find the S for Sabin. The silver shape feels the same that it always does, but I rub it between my fingers to be sure of its presence.
It’s still here, and Sabin is still here.
Jonah swims to shore, shakes himself off, and comes to stand with Chris and me.
We all watch Sabin, now alone in the vast ocean.
CHAPTER 2
Lobsters and Absence
AFTER I’VE SHOWERED AND DRESSED FOR DINNER, I PAUSE AT THE top of the stairs and listen to the beautiful sounds echoing up to the second floor. It’s the sounds of my family—Estelle’s riotous laughter, Chris clanging pots as he sets them on the stove, James doing his best Prince imitation along with the music.
The floorboards behind me creak, and Eric emerges from his room. His dark hair has been freshly buzzed, showing off the stunning angled bone structure all the siblings have, and I reach out and rub the top of his head the way I do each time he cuts it this short.
He grins. “Hey, Blythe.”
“You ready to head back to school tomorrow?” I’m trying to feign excitement for him, but it’s not easy. I can already feel the silence that will envelop the house.
Eric nods. “I am. It’s going to be a tough year of work, but changing to a history major feels right.”
I raise an eyebrow. “Academics is the only draw to return then?”
He blushes slightly. “Obviously, there’s Zach. I’m glad he’s staying near school this year.”
I manage to keep from clapping my hands together. “So, things are still good?”
“You don’t have to keep checking,” he says gently. “We’re really good.”
“Sorry that I’ve been hovering.” I shrug. “Can’t help it.”
“Well, you’re pretty much my sister, so I won’t fault you.”
Eric and Zach have been back together for more than six months. I know how much they love each other, but Eric is one to lay low and not gush about his love life, so the occasional prod seems reasonable.
Estelle’s voice screeches up to us, “Fifty bucks on Alexander! He’s a motherfucking winner, if ever there were one! Check out my badass boy!”
“Uh, who is Alexander?” Eric asks.
I shake my head. “Absolutely no idea.”
“Oh, yeah? Fifty on Moses!” James hollers.
Eric and I head down the wide wooden staircase that wraps around and lands us in the grand living room, and we both walk cautiously through the dining room and into the kitchen.
I’m still somewhat stupefied at the size of the kitchen. This house must have been a bed-and-breakfast at some point because the oversize stainless steel appliances and matching stainless counters are far too much for a traditional house. The Shepherds, James, and I, however, are far from traditional, so we make good use of it.
I can’t begin to imagine what my parents were thinking when they bought this house for just themselves and James and me. Because they never got to move in and spend summers here, I am doing what I can to fill it with family and love for as much of the year as possible.
Cheering and clapping greet us when we enter. Chris is standing on a chair with a whistle in his mouth and his hands up in the air. He glances at me, winks, and simultaneously blows the whistle as he throws his arms down. Estelle and James each set a lobster on the kitchen floor and go wild. Masking tape marks off a racecourse, and about fifteen feet from the twins are two orange traffic cones with rainbow flags stuck in them. This is presumably the finish line.
I roll my eyes but laugh.
“Blythe, get over here on the girls’ side and cheer for Alexander the Red with me. James is going down like a little bitch!” Estelle has on a red flippy mini skirt, white tank, and white sneakers, and she’s drawn a small megaphone outline on her cheek with what I presume
is eyeliner. She’s let her black hair grow a bit longer than usual so that it covers her ears and hits the back of her neck. For the first time in ages, she’s left it solid black without any sort of neon streak running through it.
“You’re seriously racing lobsters?” I ask.
“It’s our last night in Maine. Seems fitting,” James answers for her before screaming at his lobster, “Moses! C’mon, dude! Stop walking in circles, you moron!”
My brother’s cheeks are flushed, and I’m not sure if it’s from the apparent excitement over this lobster race or because Estelle is jumping up and down, flashing her black lace panties at him.
I go to Estelle’s side and try to copy her rather elaborate cheerleader moves. Given how slowly these lobsters are moving, I think I might have time to perfect this routine.
“Estelle, one more blatant leg kick like that, and I’m going to disqualify you,” Chris warns her.
She sticks out her tongue at him. “Fuck you! All is fair in lobsters and war!” Then, she turns her back to James and bends over, briefly flipping up her skirt.
“Estelle! God!” Eric groans, covering his eyes.
I’m about to ask where Sabin is, but just then, a skateboard appears from under Chris’s chair, and Sabin pops out from behind him.
“I will conquer you all!” he roars, gesturing to the lobster atop the skateboard rolling across the tile.
His contestant easily passes the other two lobsters that have thus far done nothing but veer off course. Estelle and James scream in protest, but Sabin is already bounding after his lobster that has soared through the finish line and continued into the dining room.
“No way! Chris, tell him that’s cheating!” James demands.
Chris jumps down from the chair and throws up his hands. “Estelle said it. It seems, all is fair in lobsters and war. We never actually said skateboards weren’t allowed.” He walks toward Sabin and high-fives him, entwining their fingers, before giving him a hug and patting his back.
Sabin makes a crazy swoon face as he grabs Chris by the waist and lifts him up, causing the two of them to stumble across the floor. “Older brothers are the bestest ever,” he singsongs.
“No, older brothers suck!” Estelle stomps her foot and rescues her lobster from the potential Chris-Sabin stampede. “For failing me,” she informs Alexander, “you will be steamed and eaten by the enemy.” She turns to Sabin, offering him her losing contestant. “He’s all yours.”
“Gladly, my darling sister.” Sabin sets Chris back on the floor and makes lobster claws with his hands, pinching his way toward Estelle.
James strides to Estelle with Moses in one hand and the other beckoning her. “Come here, missy. I think Moses belongs to you then, tail meat and all.”
She crosses her arms but steps into him and takes the lobster. “Given that you are not one of my nasty brothers, I accept. Besides,” she says as she walks to the stove, “I always did like your tail.”
The rest of the boys let out a raucous, “Oh!” as James grabs Alexander and Sabin’s lobster and meets Estelle by the boiling pots.
Eric catches my eye, and I smile. There might be hope for James and Estelle after all.
As far as I know, they haven’t touched each other all summer. Not that I want lurid details, but I’ve been hoping that they’d find their way back together. I never thought Estelle would voluntarily retile a bathroom either, so stranger things have happened for sure.
I watch her and James for a moment, and I bite my lip when he slips an arm around her waist. I know that she went to therapy last year, but the conversation she and I had about it involved her narrowing her eyes and speaking in an Austrian accent.
“And how has your hideous childhood impacted your psychological and sexual functioning?”
That was followed by oversharing in a typical Estelle fashion.
“I haven’t had sex since I nailed your brother in the hammock last summer. So, how do you think I’m doing? I mean, I’m not getting rope burns in weird places, but I am buying stock in batteries, okay? An abstinent woman cannot have enough vibrators, right?”
I’m not sure how long the self-imposed abstinence will continue, but the truth is, it’s good for her. She spiraled into such a weird dysfunctional place with men and then started to pull my brother into it. It seems very unlike her not to be getting laid every chance she gets, but James seems willing to wait. I haven’t heard him mention any girls from college, so his tie to Estelle must run deeper than I know. For that, I’m glad.
“B, where’s my potato salad? And my coleslaw? And my corn on the cob?” Sabin’s voice booms through the kitchen as he exaggeratedly rubs his hands over his stomach. “Sabin be hungry! Sabin need eats!”
I grab his hand and drag him to the fridge. “Hold out your hands. You can carry the salads to the table, and I’ll wrap the corn in foil for the grill, okay?”
Sabin diligently takes the oversize containers and grunts. “Is good, Blythe. Sabin like woman feed me. More dead animal, less vegetable.”
“Okay, caveman. There’s steak, too.”
On cue, Chris passes us with a platter of marinated steaks, and he delivers his own grunt. “We grill animal, yes?”
“Argh, yes. Animal.” Sabin lumbers like a Neanderthal, following Chris out of the kitchen.
“If you’d like some help from someone less cavemanish, I’m yours,” Eric offers. “I suppose I could go club a wild boar or something for you, but I’m also very good at setting tables.”
“Ah, the voice of sanity,” I say with a smile. “I would love help.”
Eric and I are silent as we lay out plates and silverware. Both of us are hyperaware that it could be a long time before we all have dinner together in this house.
Next summer, the twins and James will have graduated. It would be perfectly normal for them to go off and get jobs outside of this small tourist area in Maine. I expect it. I don’t like it maybe, but I expect it. I want everyone to explore and flourish and be wonderful. But I also want to keep this group close to Chris and me.
“Please don’t look so sad,” Eric finally says. “We’ll see you again. A lot.”
“Okay.” I can’t look at him.
This summer has been idyllic with hours on the beach, poorly played volleyball in the yard, canoeing, hiking through Acadia National Park, and digging for clams. More than that, it’s the unification of this group of formerly lost souls. It’s been a syrupy lovefest for the past three months, and I wish it could last forever.
I think about that stupid fucking saying, Absence makes the heart grow fonder, and I want to barf. I’m already beyond fond of everyone, so I’m all set.
I mentally shake my head. I’m not going to feel sad. We are all lucky to have this summer and to have each other. Every one of us is in a far better place than we were before, so I try to focus on that and not on the fact that this magical summer can’t last forever.
Besides, I remind myself, Sabin is staying, and that’s huge.
If he puts his mind to it, he can make as much noise as all of us combined, so it’ll hardly be quiet around here.
I wince as Estelle lets out a slew of profanity, and she comes running from the kitchen, screaming and laughing, as James chases after her. They both tear out onto the deck, and I hear them running down the steps.
“Hey! Don’t go far! Dinner is soon!” I call after them.
Two hours later, when our long farm table is cluttered with empty lobster, clam, and mussel shells and we’re all a bit drunk on flavor, James stands and raises his glass. “A toast!”
“A toast!” we all call back.
“To Chris and Blythe, for letting us invade their house and run amok like the unruly brats that we are!”
“Hear, hear!” echoes around us.
Chris and I both shake our heads in protest.
“We wouldn’t have it any other way.” Chris fiddles with the place mat.
“He’s right,” I say. “This is your home. Always.”
“Good. Because we don’t have anywhere else to go, so you’re stuck with us.” Estelle stretches her arms above her head. “I have to finish packing. Early flight.”
James is out of his chair like lightning. “I’ll help.”
“I’ve still got laundry to do,” Eric says. “And, well, I want to call Zach. But we’ll help clean up first.”
I wave him away. “It’s your last night. Send-off dinner and all. Go do what you need to do.”
“Thanks, Blythe,” he says. “We’re all going to miss you. But we’ll call and text all the time.”
“Promise?” I ask.
“Promise!” Eric, Estelle, and James all shout before heading upstairs.
Sabin rises from his seat. “I’ll do all the grunt work, kids.”
“You’ll do no such thing.” I move to lift the bowl of shells in front of me.
Sabin snatches it away. “Relax, B. I got this.”
Chris’s arm goes over my shoulder. “Does this mean I get a minute alone with you?” He leans over and lightly kisses my neck.
“Apparently.” I sigh with pleasure when his tongue touches my skin, and he growls.
“Dance with me,” he whispers.
“What?”
Chris stands and pulls me up before walking us toward the
French doors that lead out to the deck. I barely noticed the music earlier with all the dinner banter, but now, I hear it.
He slips one hand around my waist and takes my hand in his free one, lifting it up. Then, he starts to slowly rock us. It takes a full song for us to turn in a complete circle. The sound of the music and the feel of him against me are intoxicating, and it makes it hard for me to pay attention to much else. He’s as mesmerizing as the day I met him.
His cheek goes against mine. “Do you remember this song?”
“Of course.”
It was on the first playlist that Chris ever made me, the one that helped me run through the pain. I know every second of this song, every layer of its sound.
“We’ve loved each other forever,” he says softly.
“On the day I was on the dock and you were on the shore, I fell in love with you. I didn’t know it, but I did.”
“Before that.” He tightens his fingers around my side. “Forever.”
I don’t care that it’s not possible, that what he’s saying doesn’t make logical sense, or that it doesn’t sound like him. Christopher Shepherd is not a dreamer, not prone to magical thinking. But he is, I’m learning, changing. He’s believing and hoping, and the edges of his black-and-white world are blurring.
“Forever,” I agree. I say this not to feed his romantic side, but because I know it to be true.
The sunset casts fierce orange and pink light into the room, and I lean against Chris while we dance. Slowly, we keep turning until I can no longer see the sparkle of the ocean or the tiers of color in the sky.
Now, I see Sabin, leaning against the doorframe to the kitchen, with a dishcloth in one hand and a glass in the other.
I smile at him, and he smiles back—or I think he does. Maybe it’s a sad smile. Maybe it’s just the way the setting sun hits his face. I lock my eyes on his and try to figure out what he’s thinking, but I can’t.
So, I shift my gaze, but in my peripheral vision, I can see that he’s still watching Chris and me.
Something is brewing with Sabin, but I don’t know what it is.
The Scars Are Many
I KICK MY FEET IN THE COLD OCEAN WATER AND OPEN MY EYES FOR a fraction of a second before the sunlight blinds me, and I shut them again. The glare is still strong and heating my skin, deepening the tan that has built from my hours outside. The dock presses against my back, but the wood is smooth and soft from age, so I meld into it. My hand moves over the slats, and I trace the familiar texture. I will never tire of this dock. So much has happened here, been revealed here.
Pain and truth, yes, but it’s also a place where friendship and love have been solidified.
Maine has become my place of healing and stability.
A breeze rushes across my body, and I inhale deeply, taking in the strong salty air. Late August here on Frenchman Bay in Bar Harbor, Maine, has brought ideal weather with sunny days tinged by a crispness that tells me fall will be here soon.
I kick the water harder. For a moment, a sense of melancholy washes over me. Fall means that Chris’s brother Eric and their sister, Estelle, will return to Matthews College for their senior year, and my brother, James, will go back to Colorado for his. The twins should have graduated last spring, but both changed majors and had to register for additional required courses. I hate that they’re leaving soon because this summer has been a dream. The Shepherd siblings, my brother, and I have been under one roof, all safe, all finding peace.
So, I brush my brief sadness away. I really can’t complain about anything.
My calm reflections on peace, however, are short-lived when I am suddenly doused in icy water.
“Sabin!” I scream, throwing my hands in front of my face way too late to stop the deluge of water that soaks me. When I wipe my eyes enough to see, I sit and look up. “You’re a prick!”
But I can’t help laughing, even while shivering from the shock of the chill. Also, the swim trunks he’s wearing are covered in sock- monkey prints, and that does nothing to lessen my laughter.
“You’re a prick!” I scream again.
“But you love me anyway.” Setting down a large plastic bucket, Sabin smiles broadly with a bit more pride at his stealthy attack than I’d like to see.
I do my best to glare at him.
“Say you love me anyway!” he demands. “Say it!”
I stick out my tongue and reach for my nearby towel.
Sabin gets to it before I do and holds it above his head. “Lady Blythe McGuire,” he says all too seriously, “I suggest you say that you love me anyway, or this towel is going to sleep with the fishes!” He waves it around in the air. “Like a tragic victim of a mafioso vendetta!”
I stand and start to jump up and down in a desperate attempt to grab it, but I’m no match for Sabin’s height or his incessant giggling. “Fine. I give up. I cave! I’ll say it! I love you anyway.”
He cups a hand to his ear. “I’m sorry. What? Once more—with feeling.”
“Sabin! I’m freezing!” I say, laughing. “I love you anyway! Sincerely! With as much feeling as a very cold person can muster!”
“Victory!” he hollers, lowering the towel.
I go to take hold of it, but he lands it on my head, covering my face, and then he wraps a big arm around me so that I can’t move. I feel him furiously rubbing the top of my head while I giggle and try to squirm free.
“I’m going to kill you,” I mutter through my laughter.
“You poor thing,” he says. “Sopping wet! Bitterly cold! Your moment of sunny solitude interrupted so callously! Who would do such a thing? Let’s dry you off.”
He starts rubbing the towel over my face and then drops it to my back so that I’m pinned between it and him as he wildly yanks it back and forth, spinning me from side to side. These days, he’s much too strong for me to even think about getting free, so I accept that I’m basically putty in his hands until he’s had his fill of goofiness.
Finally, he stops, and I dizzily look at him. “Sabin?”
“Yes, my lady?”
“I see two of you.”
“Lucky girl!” He leans his forehead down against mine. “Oh, whatever shall you do with two Sabins?”
“I can barely handle one.”
Sabin wipes the towel over my cheek. “Missed a spot.”
I shiver, and he pulls me into his hold. A Sabin hug is always a good place to be. Today, his chest is hot from the sun, and it helps warm me.
He’s lost a lot of weight over the past year, and I notice that I’m more fully against him than I used to be when he’d hug me. For a moment, I miss his big belly. Of course, he looks a lot better, but the absence of his soft extra weight is undeniable.
About once a month, he’ll agree to go on a run, but he bitches and moans most of the way. Running a section of the Boston Marathon with me last spring was not, it seems, a catalyst for taking up regular routes. Yet I can feel that he’s getting more muscular and less flabby, thanks to the lifting that Chris has been pushing him to do and the work he’s been doing with James on the house all summer. My architect-to-be brother redesigned one of the bathrooms, and Sabin was totally on board with smashing tile, hauling out the old tub, and lugging materials up and down the second floor.
I touch a hand to Sabin’s bicep and squeeze. “You’re getting all beefy, Sabe.”
“I’m quite sexy, you know. It’s sickening how ripped I am. I don’t know how any other dudes can stand to be around me because my macho manliness is too much to bear.” He steps back and begins striking a series of clichéd poses in which he flexes his muscles.
I shake my head in amusement, but the truth is that he does look good. His black hair flops around his face as he moves, and his green eyes twinkle. While he’s not exactly ready for underwear modeling, the change in his physique is obvious. He looks healthy, and even his face has slimmed down a bit. It turns out that Sabin had cheekbones under the fullness.
After he finishes the umpteenth muscle stance, I step closer and touch a hand to his cheek, rubbing the scruff. “Are you ever going to shave this off, so we can see your pretty face?”
“That would be too much hotness to handle. I need my scruffiness to minimize the impact.” He shakes his face against my palm and grins.
I suppose the big sideburns and perpetual five o’clock shadow suit him.
“You shouldn’t make jokes, Sabe. I’m really proud of you.” Now, it’s my turn to embrace him, and I slip my arms around his stomach. “I’m so glad you’re staying with us. I couldn’t stand to lose the twins, James, and you.” I squeeze him hard.
He is such a source of solace and stability for me. Of that, I am constantly aware and constantly appreciative. I feel like I can’t explain that wholly to him, but I try to remind him of it as much as possible. It just never feels like enough.
There aren’t the right words or right phrases to encapsulate how powerfully he’s become part of my being, how to convey how I worry about him, how I celebrate him, how I mentally fuss over every hour he is awake. Maybe it should feel creepy, but Sabin’s mother died years ago, and he doesn’t have a girlfriend or other close friends. He’s a young guy still, and I cannot help but feel that someone should watch over him, that someone should love and adore and hover.
But I say what I can—for now. “You’re my best friend, Sabin. I feel like you always have been, even before I knew you.”
He pauses for a moment and then rests his chin on top of my head. “And you’re my best friend. Of course you are.”
I rub his back and move to his side. He actually has a waist, and I’m almost entranced by the way he’s changed. “You’ve done so much since rehab—”
“Oh God, don’t call it rehab. That’s such a hideous word. Let’s just say, I was at a spa getaway, suffering from exhaustion, like a celebrity.”
“Stop. There’s nothing wrong with rehab.”
“It wasn’t really rehab. It was excruciating intensive therapy.” “Well, you haven’t had a drink since you left. That’s sort of rehabish.”
“Alcohol wasn’t really my problem, sweetheart. That was a poorly thought-out coping mechanism, I’m told. A replacement for actual self-analysis and change. Boring psychobabble.” He pauses for a bit too long. “And can we not do this? I did what I had to do, and now, it’s done. It’s handled.”
I didn’t mean to stumble into this conversation. Talking about his past, everyone’s past...it’s a bit of an unspoken rule that we don’t go there. There are details that he cannot bring himself to share with me, and I get that. I want him to have privacy and containment, if that’s what’s helpful.
I know that Sabin feels ashamed, and I’ve learned not to dig too much with him. Whatever he’s been doing to free himself from his childhood trauma seems to be working, so I give him space. But I also want him to know that I acknowledge what he’s pushed through, and I’m proud of him.
“Sorry. I just meant to tell you how much I love you, and I’m glad you moved in here.”
We stay quiet and listen to the gentle splash of waves as the tide finishes coming in.
“This fall, we can go apple-picking and jump in leaf piles and...and...do things with pumpkins.”
“Do things with pumpkins?” he asks with a small laugh.
“You know, carve them, make pumpkin bread, smash ’em up. Whatever you like.”
“Okay.” He kisses the top of my head.
“And, you know, you’ll perhaps disappear for the night with another tourist and crawl home in the morning. Then, I’ll make you pancakes while I avoid hearing lurid details and lecture you on how stupid one-night stands are.”
“And I’ll tell you how sexy and awesome they are and how I’m just adding to my glowing reviews on Yelp.”
“Shut up. You’re worth more than a Yelp review. You’re more like Zagat’s.” I hold his waist in my hands and squeeze. “Seriously, look how lean you’re getting.” Then, I put my palms on his chest. “And these pecs!” I throw my arms around his neck and tightly hold him. “God, my best friend is gorgeous.”
“Blythe...stop...” Sabin starts. It’s unlike him to look embarrassed, but he does now.
“Mmm?”
“Blythe, don’t...” He sets his hands under my arms and eases me back. “It’s just...you can’t...”
I look up and see that his face has a more serious expression now. “What? What is it?”
He half-smiles and tucks a stray hair behind my ear, but he doesn’t say anything.
“Sabe, what is it?”
Suddenly, he twirls me around and then yells, “You can’t stop me from doing a cannonball!” Then, he lets me go and leaps from the end of the dock, tucking his knees into his chest, before pounding into the water.
Just because he’s dropped some pounds doesn’t mean that he’s a small guy by any means, and the splash he makes when he crashes through the water’s surface soaks me again.
My dog, Jonah, barks sharply, and I turn to see him running, soon passing me, before flying off the dock to reach Sabin.
Even though I’m not a fan of the freezing water, I still do laps every few days. Jonah though has logged more hours swimming than I have. That’s mostly because Sabin spends at least an hour a day playing with him, throwing a tennis ball into the water over and over for Jonah to retrieve. There’s nothing my German shepherd loves more than swimming with Sabin, and it tires Jonah out almost as much as going with me on my runs.
I hold a hand up to my eyes and watch as Jonah paddles to reach Sabin, who is now floating on his back while lazily kicking his feet and sweeping his hands through the water, letting the gentle current determine his drift.
A voice carries my way. “With a little imagination, that white bathing suit is practically see-through.”
I laugh. “It is not.” I pivot on my feet and try not to look as stupidly in love as I feel. I’m sure I’m failing, but I’m all right with that.
Chris walks slowly down the steps from the house to the beach area. Part of me wants to rush to meet him, and the other part wants to just watch him. It doesn’t matter that we live together, that I’m with him every single day. I have the same strong reaction, the same unyielding surge of love that rips through me, every time I see him.
I don’t feel the cold on my skin that should be amplified by the breeze. All I can feel now is that Christopher Shepherd is my home and my heart.
The late-afternoon sun hits his face, and even the sound of Jonah’s barking and Sabin’s whooping can’t distract me. Chris is even tanner than Sabin, and the loose white button-down he’s wearing with jeans is damn hot. His hands are tucked into his pockets as he looks at me almost shyly.
Most of the time, he exudes nothing but confidence. Chris is entitled to any self-assuredness and sense of capability he has. I adore that about him, and I rely on it. Still, even after all our time together, Chris has moments where his stance when he’s around me is almost nervous, hesitant. There’s a questioning air in his approach, as if he needs to check that I’m still completely engulfed in him.
The answer is always yes.
The few seconds of insecurity he can’t control are not really about me. They’re flashes of his history, which did nothing to breed trust. In Chris’s blip of tentativeness, I see a little boy who is alone, who has made himself responsible for shielding his siblings from a sickly abusive father, and who is desperately frightened that he might fail. A boy who fears he might not be accepted and loved because he is not worthy of anything but savage outrage and psychotic delusions.
I am still trying to glue together the broken pieces of this person I love. He manages his tortured side with remarkable skill, but even Chris, with his endless supply of strength and clarity, could not survive all that he did without scars.
And the scars are many, and they are deep.
Together though, we are overcoming both his past and mine. When he is a few yards away from me, I cannot stop myself from walking quickly into his arms. I put my hands on his face, run a finger over his lips, and study him as though we’d been apart for months, not hours.
He smiles at me with curiosity. “You okay?”
I nod slowly and don’t take my eyes from his. I am flooded again with the rush of what the entirety of us feels like, what it means for us to be together. “We’re doing it, aren’t we?”
Because he understands me more intuitively than anyone else could, he nods back. “Yes, Blythe, we’re kicking heartbreak’s ass.”
The power in this truth brings my lips to his, and I kiss the love of my life with more meaning and connectedness than I was ready for. My eyes sting a bit, and my chest tightens with emotion. The taste of his mouth and the feel of his hold as he keeps me close will, without fail, shut down the rest of the world, so I let myself disappear into him.
Then, Chris slows our kiss, dipping me in his arms until my head is hanging upside down.
He strokes a hand down my front and smiles. “Like I said, practically see-through...”
I laugh and grab his hand to pull myself up. He turns my back into his chest, and I catch sight of Sabin in the water. I like how he is drifting, seeming to be without worry, without abandon.
“Our boy taught himself how to float, didn’t he?” I say. “You can’t drown when you know how to float.”
Chris says nothing for a few minutes. “Maybe. But the water is pretty calm today. There could always be a storm.” He rubs my shoulders. He breathes against me. He waits. “It’s hard to float in a storm.”
He’s right, but it’s not the optimistic attitude I was hoping for. I lift my chin and look back at him. “Let’s just enjoy the moment, okay?”
Chris laughs softly. “Okay.”
When I turn back to Sabin, I notice that I’m relieved I can still see him, as though I were worried he had drowned when I looked away. Even at this distance, I can see that he’s watching Chris and me. I wave lightly, and he waves back before paddling himself in the opposite direction.
The necklace that I wear every day now burns against my chest in the sun. My fingers fumble through the letter charms for Christopher, Estelle, Eric, and me until I find the S for Sabin. The silver shape feels the same that it always does, but I rub it between my fingers to be sure of its presence.
It’s still here, and Sabin is still here.
Jonah swims to shore, shakes himself off, and comes to stand with Chris and me.
We all watch Sabin, now alone in the vast ocean.
CHAPTER 2
Lobsters and Absence
AFTER I’VE SHOWERED AND DRESSED FOR DINNER, I PAUSE AT THE top of the stairs and listen to the beautiful sounds echoing up to the second floor. It’s the sounds of my family—Estelle’s riotous laughter, Chris clanging pots as he sets them on the stove, James doing his best Prince imitation along with the music.
The floorboards behind me creak, and Eric emerges from his room. His dark hair has been freshly buzzed, showing off the stunning angled bone structure all the siblings have, and I reach out and rub the top of his head the way I do each time he cuts it this short.
He grins. “Hey, Blythe.”
“You ready to head back to school tomorrow?” I’m trying to feign excitement for him, but it’s not easy. I can already feel the silence that will envelop the house.
Eric nods. “I am. It’s going to be a tough year of work, but changing to a history major feels right.”
I raise an eyebrow. “Academics is the only draw to return then?”
He blushes slightly. “Obviously, there’s Zach. I’m glad he’s staying near school this year.”
I manage to keep from clapping my hands together. “So, things are still good?”
“You don’t have to keep checking,” he says gently. “We’re really good.”
“Sorry that I’ve been hovering.” I shrug. “Can’t help it.”
“Well, you’re pretty much my sister, so I won’t fault you.”
Eric and Zach have been back together for more than six months. I know how much they love each other, but Eric is one to lay low and not gush about his love life, so the occasional prod seems reasonable.
Estelle’s voice screeches up to us, “Fifty bucks on Alexander! He’s a motherfucking winner, if ever there were one! Check out my badass boy!”
“Uh, who is Alexander?” Eric asks.
I shake my head. “Absolutely no idea.”
“Oh, yeah? Fifty on Moses!” James hollers.
Eric and I head down the wide wooden staircase that wraps around and lands us in the grand living room, and we both walk cautiously through the dining room and into the kitchen.
I’m still somewhat stupefied at the size of the kitchen. This house must have been a bed-and-breakfast at some point because the oversize stainless steel appliances and matching stainless counters are far too much for a traditional house. The Shepherds, James, and I, however, are far from traditional, so we make good use of it.
I can’t begin to imagine what my parents were thinking when they bought this house for just themselves and James and me. Because they never got to move in and spend summers here, I am doing what I can to fill it with family and love for as much of the year as possible.
Cheering and clapping greet us when we enter. Chris is standing on a chair with a whistle in his mouth and his hands up in the air. He glances at me, winks, and simultaneously blows the whistle as he throws his arms down. Estelle and James each set a lobster on the kitchen floor and go wild. Masking tape marks off a racecourse, and about fifteen feet from the twins are two orange traffic cones with rainbow flags stuck in them. This is presumably the finish line.
I roll my eyes but laugh.
“Blythe, get over here on the girls’ side and cheer for Alexander the Red with me. James is going down like a little bitch!” Estelle has on a red flippy mini skirt, white tank, and white sneakers, and she’s drawn a small megaphone outline on her cheek with what I presume
is eyeliner. She’s let her black hair grow a bit longer than usual so that it covers her ears and hits the back of her neck. For the first time in ages, she’s left it solid black without any sort of neon streak running through it.
“You’re seriously racing lobsters?” I ask.
“It’s our last night in Maine. Seems fitting,” James answers for her before screaming at his lobster, “Moses! C’mon, dude! Stop walking in circles, you moron!”
My brother’s cheeks are flushed, and I’m not sure if it’s from the apparent excitement over this lobster race or because Estelle is jumping up and down, flashing her black lace panties at him.
I go to Estelle’s side and try to copy her rather elaborate cheerleader moves. Given how slowly these lobsters are moving, I think I might have time to perfect this routine.
“Estelle, one more blatant leg kick like that, and I’m going to disqualify you,” Chris warns her.
She sticks out her tongue at him. “Fuck you! All is fair in lobsters and war!” Then, she turns her back to James and bends over, briefly flipping up her skirt.
“Estelle! God!” Eric groans, covering his eyes.
I’m about to ask where Sabin is, but just then, a skateboard appears from under Chris’s chair, and Sabin pops out from behind him.
“I will conquer you all!” he roars, gesturing to the lobster atop the skateboard rolling across the tile.
His contestant easily passes the other two lobsters that have thus far done nothing but veer off course. Estelle and James scream in protest, but Sabin is already bounding after his lobster that has soared through the finish line and continued into the dining room.
“No way! Chris, tell him that’s cheating!” James demands.
Chris jumps down from the chair and throws up his hands. “Estelle said it. It seems, all is fair in lobsters and war. We never actually said skateboards weren’t allowed.” He walks toward Sabin and high-fives him, entwining their fingers, before giving him a hug and patting his back.
Sabin makes a crazy swoon face as he grabs Chris by the waist and lifts him up, causing the two of them to stumble across the floor. “Older brothers are the bestest ever,” he singsongs.
“No, older brothers suck!” Estelle stomps her foot and rescues her lobster from the potential Chris-Sabin stampede. “For failing me,” she informs Alexander, “you will be steamed and eaten by the enemy.” She turns to Sabin, offering him her losing contestant. “He’s all yours.”
“Gladly, my darling sister.” Sabin sets Chris back on the floor and makes lobster claws with his hands, pinching his way toward Estelle.
James strides to Estelle with Moses in one hand and the other beckoning her. “Come here, missy. I think Moses belongs to you then, tail meat and all.”
She crosses her arms but steps into him and takes the lobster. “Given that you are not one of my nasty brothers, I accept. Besides,” she says as she walks to the stove, “I always did like your tail.”
The rest of the boys let out a raucous, “Oh!” as James grabs Alexander and Sabin’s lobster and meets Estelle by the boiling pots.
Eric catches my eye, and I smile. There might be hope for James and Estelle after all.
As far as I know, they haven’t touched each other all summer. Not that I want lurid details, but I’ve been hoping that they’d find their way back together. I never thought Estelle would voluntarily retile a bathroom either, so stranger things have happened for sure.
I watch her and James for a moment, and I bite my lip when he slips an arm around her waist. I know that she went to therapy last year, but the conversation she and I had about it involved her narrowing her eyes and speaking in an Austrian accent.
“And how has your hideous childhood impacted your psychological and sexual functioning?”
That was followed by oversharing in a typical Estelle fashion.
“I haven’t had sex since I nailed your brother in the hammock last summer. So, how do you think I’m doing? I mean, I’m not getting rope burns in weird places, but I am buying stock in batteries, okay? An abstinent woman cannot have enough vibrators, right?”
I’m not sure how long the self-imposed abstinence will continue, but the truth is, it’s good for her. She spiraled into such a weird dysfunctional place with men and then started to pull my brother into it. It seems very unlike her not to be getting laid every chance she gets, but James seems willing to wait. I haven’t heard him mention any girls from college, so his tie to Estelle must run deeper than I know. For that, I’m glad.
“B, where’s my potato salad? And my coleslaw? And my corn on the cob?” Sabin’s voice booms through the kitchen as he exaggeratedly rubs his hands over his stomach. “Sabin be hungry! Sabin need eats!”
I grab his hand and drag him to the fridge. “Hold out your hands. You can carry the salads to the table, and I’ll wrap the corn in foil for the grill, okay?”
Sabin diligently takes the oversize containers and grunts. “Is good, Blythe. Sabin like woman feed me. More dead animal, less vegetable.”
“Okay, caveman. There’s steak, too.”
On cue, Chris passes us with a platter of marinated steaks, and he delivers his own grunt. “We grill animal, yes?”
“Argh, yes. Animal.” Sabin lumbers like a Neanderthal, following Chris out of the kitchen.
“If you’d like some help from someone less cavemanish, I’m yours,” Eric offers. “I suppose I could go club a wild boar or something for you, but I’m also very good at setting tables.”
“Ah, the voice of sanity,” I say with a smile. “I would love help.”
Eric and I are silent as we lay out plates and silverware. Both of us are hyperaware that it could be a long time before we all have dinner together in this house.
Next summer, the twins and James will have graduated. It would be perfectly normal for them to go off and get jobs outside of this small tourist area in Maine. I expect it. I don’t like it maybe, but I expect it. I want everyone to explore and flourish and be wonderful. But I also want to keep this group close to Chris and me.
“Please don’t look so sad,” Eric finally says. “We’ll see you again. A lot.”
“Okay.” I can’t look at him.
This summer has been idyllic with hours on the beach, poorly played volleyball in the yard, canoeing, hiking through Acadia National Park, and digging for clams. More than that, it’s the unification of this group of formerly lost souls. It’s been a syrupy lovefest for the past three months, and I wish it could last forever.
I think about that stupid fucking saying, Absence makes the heart grow fonder, and I want to barf. I’m already beyond fond of everyone, so I’m all set.
I mentally shake my head. I’m not going to feel sad. We are all lucky to have this summer and to have each other. Every one of us is in a far better place than we were before, so I try to focus on that and not on the fact that this magical summer can’t last forever.
Besides, I remind myself, Sabin is staying, and that’s huge.
If he puts his mind to it, he can make as much noise as all of us combined, so it’ll hardly be quiet around here.
I wince as Estelle lets out a slew of profanity, and she comes running from the kitchen, screaming and laughing, as James chases after her. They both tear out onto the deck, and I hear them running down the steps.
“Hey! Don’t go far! Dinner is soon!” I call after them.
Two hours later, when our long farm table is cluttered with empty lobster, clam, and mussel shells and we’re all a bit drunk on flavor, James stands and raises his glass. “A toast!”
“A toast!” we all call back.
“To Chris and Blythe, for letting us invade their house and run amok like the unruly brats that we are!”
“Hear, hear!” echoes around us.
Chris and I both shake our heads in protest.
“We wouldn’t have it any other way.” Chris fiddles with the place mat.
“He’s right,” I say. “This is your home. Always.”
“Good. Because we don’t have anywhere else to go, so you’re stuck with us.” Estelle stretches her arms above her head. “I have to finish packing. Early flight.”
James is out of his chair like lightning. “I’ll help.”
“I’ve still got laundry to do,” Eric says. “And, well, I want to call Zach. But we’ll help clean up first.”
I wave him away. “It’s your last night. Send-off dinner and all. Go do what you need to do.”
“Thanks, Blythe,” he says. “We’re all going to miss you. But we’ll call and text all the time.”
“Promise?” I ask.
“Promise!” Eric, Estelle, and James all shout before heading upstairs.
Sabin rises from his seat. “I’ll do all the grunt work, kids.”
“You’ll do no such thing.” I move to lift the bowl of shells in front of me.
Sabin snatches it away. “Relax, B. I got this.”
Chris’s arm goes over my shoulder. “Does this mean I get a minute alone with you?” He leans over and lightly kisses my neck.
“Apparently.” I sigh with pleasure when his tongue touches my skin, and he growls.
“Dance with me,” he whispers.
“What?”
Chris stands and pulls me up before walking us toward the
French doors that lead out to the deck. I barely noticed the music earlier with all the dinner banter, but now, I hear it.
He slips one hand around my waist and takes my hand in his free one, lifting it up. Then, he starts to slowly rock us. It takes a full song for us to turn in a complete circle. The sound of the music and the feel of him against me are intoxicating, and it makes it hard for me to pay attention to much else. He’s as mesmerizing as the day I met him.
His cheek goes against mine. “Do you remember this song?”
“Of course.”
It was on the first playlist that Chris ever made me, the one that helped me run through the pain. I know every second of this song, every layer of its sound.
“We’ve loved each other forever,” he says softly.
“On the day I was on the dock and you were on the shore, I fell in love with you. I didn’t know it, but I did.”
“Before that.” He tightens his fingers around my side. “Forever.”
I don’t care that it’s not possible, that what he’s saying doesn’t make logical sense, or that it doesn’t sound like him. Christopher Shepherd is not a dreamer, not prone to magical thinking. But he is, I’m learning, changing. He’s believing and hoping, and the edges of his black-and-white world are blurring.
“Forever,” I agree. I say this not to feed his romantic side, but because I know it to be true.
The sunset casts fierce orange and pink light into the room, and I lean against Chris while we dance. Slowly, we keep turning until I can no longer see the sparkle of the ocean or the tiers of color in the sky.
Now, I see Sabin, leaning against the doorframe to the kitchen, with a dishcloth in one hand and a glass in the other.
I smile at him, and he smiles back—or I think he does. Maybe it’s a sad smile. Maybe it’s just the way the setting sun hits his face. I lock my eyes on his and try to figure out what he’s thinking, but I can’t.
So, I shift my gaze, but in my peripheral vision, I can see that he’s still watching Chris and me.
Something is brewing with Sabin, but I don’t know what it is.