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A woman Kai recognized as Spazzy's sister stood by one of the sliding doors, looking outside where Spazzy and his friends were in the pool. It was a hot, sunny summer day, but Spazzy's sister was wearing navy blue slacks and a light blue polo shirt. When she saw Kai, she came toward him with her hand held out.

“Hi, I'm Jillian Winthrop,” she said, shaking his hand in a businesslike manner. “You must be Kai. Caleb has said so much about you.”

It took Kai a moment to remember that Caleb was Spazzy's real name. Somehow he had the feeling that Jillian wouldn't appreciate hearing her brother referred to by his nickname.

“I hope it's mostly been good,” Kai said.

“Oh, yes, he's … he's quite taken with you,” Jillian said. The look she gave him felt piercing, protective, and suspicious. As if she was trying to peer inside and make sure that Kai's intentions regarding her brother were good. At the same time suspecting him merely because he wanted to be friendly to a guy who behaved so strangely.

“He's a cool guy,” Kai said.

Jillian forced a smile on her face, as if deep down she secretly believed that that could not possibly be true, but was willing to go along with it. In the meantime Kai could see that Spazzy had been right. His sister dressed, acted, and sounded like she was much older, but she was just a few years older than Bean at most.

“Well, I'm sure you'd like to join your friends,” Jillian said, guiding him toward the
glass doors facing the pool. “It's very nice to meet you.”

“You too,” Kai said, and stepped outside into the sunlight. At first no one noticed him. Shauna and Spazzy were sitting at the edge of the pool with their feet in the water and their backs toward him. Bean was lying on his back on a big silver raft the size of a mattress, his eyes covered by shades and his long black braid hanging over the edge of the raft and into the water. Booger was swimming under the crystal blue surface with a mask and flippers. On a nearby table under the shade of an umbrella was a large hero sandwich sliced into sections and a big bowl of chips. On the ground beside the table was a cooler filled with ice and sodas. Music was playing on some outdoor speakers.

“Hey, look who's here!” Booger said after popping up for air. Everyone turned and said hello to Kai. Spazzy got up. While he still jerked and ticked a bit, it wasn't nearly as pronounced as it had been the first few times Kai had been with him.

“Glad you could make it,” Spazzy said, and pointed at a cabana behind the diving board. “You can go in there and change into your bathing suit.”

“No, that's okay,” Kai said.

Spazzy blinked very quickly, and his eyebrows formed a puzzled V. “What do you mean? This is a pool party, dude.”

“Yeah, well, I spend so much time in the water that it doesn't matter that much to me,” Kai said. The truth was he kept meaning to buy some surf trunks, but his father barely gave him enough money to eat, and the ding repairs he did at Teddy's were going toward paying for the custom-shaped thruster she'd given him. Any extra money he got seemed to slip through his fingers for drinks and surf wax.

Spazzy licked the back of his hand, then sniffed it, then licked it again. Kai realized he was deep in thought. He gestured toward the cabana and spoke in a low voice the others wouldn't hear. “There's plenty of trunks inside. And when you're done, make sure you take a pair home with you.”

For a moment Kai was tempted to say that he appreciated the offer, but didn't need it. But it wasn't true. That would have been pride talking.

“Thanks, man,” he said, and went into the cabana. On the shelves were lots of matching, fluffy blue-and-white-striped towels. Hanging
on hooks were a dozen different men's and women's bathing suits. At first Kai couldn't understand why Spazzy and his sister would need so many. Then he realized that the suits were different sizes and were probably meant for guests. Kai found a pair of green-and-blue trunks and pulled them on. Then he grabbed a towel and went back out.

Spazzy was sitting with Shauna on the edge of the pool again. “You hungry?” he asked.

Kai shrugged a little. The truth was he hadn't even been thinking about food until he saw that hero, but now it was looking pretty good.

“Go ahead, have some,” Spazzy said. “Just don't fill up. You don't want to spoil your appetite for later.”

“What's later?” Kai asked.

“A clambake on the beach.”

Kai put a slice of hero and a big handful of chips on a paper plate, grabbed a Coke from the cooler, and joined Spazzy and Shauna at the side of the pool. He let his legs dangle in the pool water. The temperature was perfect. Bean drifted over on the raft. Booger surfaced near them and held on to the edge of the pool. Kai watched as both of them stared
at the scars on his right leg. Neither said anything.

“Water feels great, huh?” Bean said.

Kai nodded and bit into the hero.

“Spazzy can make it any temperature he wants,” said Booger. “It's a heated pool.”

“So you could actually use it all year round?” Shauna asked.

“I guess,” Spazzy said. “Only we close the house just before Labor Day and don't come back until after Memorial Day.”

“You mean, for nine months of the year nobody uses it?” Bean asked.

Spazzy nodded. “Not while my sister and I are back in California at school.”

“What does Marta do?” Shauna asked.

“She takes care of our house in California,” Spazzy explained.

“But you just said you and your sister were at school,” Booger said.

“We go home on the weekends sometimes, and that's where we go for holidays,” Spazzy said. He wasn't bragging. In fact he sounded as if he almost didn't realize that not everybody had two homes that were hardly used.

“Is all this, like, since nine-eleven?” Kai asked.

“Oh, no, my parents always had these houses,” Spazzy said.

“What did they do?” Shauna asked.

“Like in business,” Bean added in case it wasn't clear.

“They worked for the family business,” Spazzy said. “It's a company my great-grandfather started.”

“What kind of company?” Bean asked.

Spazzy began to twitch and blink. “You're gonna laugh. You know those plastic screens with the blue or pink stuff at the bottoms of urinals?”

Shauna frowned, but Kai, Bean, and Booger grinned knowingly.

“Serious?” Kai asked.

Spazzy nodded. “The Winthrop line of disposable urinal screens with or without integral deodorant blocks in fresh mint, fruity cherry, or bubblegum.”

“Whoa, that's
way
more information than I needed,” Bean said. He floated closer, so that the edge of the raft bounced against Shauna's knees. “Don't turn around,” he whispered. “Spazzy, your sister's still standing by that window, watching us.”

“I told you, she's super overprotective,”
Spazzy said, twitching and ticking again. “This is the first time I've ever had friends over. I mean, like, its the first time I've
ever
had friends, period. At least around here.”

“Does she have any friends?” Bean asked.

“Back at college,” Spazzy said.

“So you guys come here for the whole summer and, well, you know,” Booger said.

“Like, have no friends?” Spazzy finished the sentence for him. “Basically. But we still have fun. We go to the beach and take drives and we see a lot of movies.”

“I thought she didn't like to take you where there were crowds,” Kai said.

“We have a system,” Spazzy said. “My sister figures out when the cineplex is gonna be the least crowded. We either go in and sit down way before everyone else or we come in at the last second, when it's already dark. It's not that hard.”

Shauna leaned forward and spoke in a low voice. “Why don't we ask her to come out and join the party?”

“No way,” Spazzy said. “I mean, you can ask, but she'll never do it.”

“Why not?” Booger asked.

“She just won't,” said Spazzy.

“How old is she?” asked Shauna.

“She just turned twenty.”

“That's silly,” said Shauna. “She's only two years older than Bean.”

“A year and a half,” Bean said. “I turned eighteen in January.”

“Look, you can ask, but she won't do it,” Spazzy said. “You'll see. She's like forty years old trapped inside a twenty-year-old body.”

“Help! I'm trapped in a forty-year-old body,” Booger said.

“It's no joke,” Spazzy said. “Not when you have to live with her every day.”

A
fter a while Jillian did come out of the house, but only to suggest they shower and change into dry clothes before heading down to the beach for the cookout.

“It sometimes gets a little buggy in the evening,” she said. In one hand she held out a spray bottle of Off! and in the other some kind of Cutter bug stick. “I brought out both of these, in case some of you prefer the spray while others like the rub-on type.”

She left them on the table and took the tray with the rest of the hero sandwich inside. The ice cooler had wheels and Marta wheeled it in.

“Two kinds of bug spray?” Booger said. “She really is like forty.”

“Told you so,” said Spazzy.

They showered in the cabana and changed clothes.

“So when are we gonna light the bonfire?” Booger asked once they were ready to head down to the beach.

“I guess after dinner when it gets dark,” Bean said. “Spazzy, you think your sister will let you come down to the fire?”

“It's doubtful,” Spazzy said.

“What if we invite her, too?” asked Shauna.

“That's even more doubtful,” said Spazzy.

From the pool area they followed a wooden walkway over the dunes and out to the beach. Because this part of Sun Haven was mostly residential and didn't have motels or resorts, the beach here had fewer people on it. Halfway to the water there was yet another surprise awaiting them. A balding man with a gray ponytail, and wearing a white apron, was cooking lobster, chicken, and hot dogs on a grill. Once again there was a cooler with drinks, bowls of chips, plastic plates, knives, and forks.

“Do you guys, like, ever cook for yourselves?” asked Booger.

Spazzy's faced flushed slightly. “Not much. I mean, Marta does most of the cooking.”

“You're rich, aren't you?” Booger said.

“I don't know,” Spazzy said. “I never asked.”

“But you could have anything you want, right?” said Booger.

“Hey, Boogs, chill,” Bean said. “That's like private stuff. Maybe the dude doesn't want to talk about it.”

“I don't care,” said Spazzy. “I mean, I guess you're right. I can get whatever I want, but all I ever want is music and surfing magazines and videos, and maybe a couple of wet suits and boards. There's nothing else.”

A kid wearing a black helmet and goggles shot past on an ATV glancing briefly at the cookout before continuing down the shoreline.

“How about an ATV?” Booger asked.

“Are you kidding?” Spazzy said. “My sister would never let me.”

“Dinner's ready,” said the man with the ponytail.

Spazzy let the others go first. The ponytailed man offered everyone half a lobster or chicken. Kai hesitated.

“Take the lobster,” Spazzy said.

“I've never had it,” Kai said.

Shauna looked up. “You've never eaten lobster?”

Kai shook his head.

“That's amazing,” Shauna said. “I practically grew up on the stuff.”

“Yeah, but your father was a lobsterman,” Bean said.

“Take the lobster, Kai,” Shauna said. “I'll show you how to eat it.”

Kai took the lobster, a baked potato, and a small dish of melted butter. When the ponytailed man handed him some folded white plastic, a small metal fork with thin tines, and something that looked like a nutcracker, Kai gave Shauna a look. She nodded for him to take those things too. They sat down together in the sand.

“Okay, first the lobster bib,” Shauna said, unfolding the plastic. It was a thin white bib with a picture of a red lobster on it, and reminded Kai of the bibs people put on infants at mealtime. She tied the ends around her neck so that the bib hung down in front of her. “This is so you don't get lobster juice all over your clothes”

Kai didn't put it on right away. “Somehow I manage to eat a lot of things without getting food on me.”

“Not lobster,” Shauna said. “Just put it on, okay?”

Kai unfolded the bib and put it on.

“Now, in my family, we always start with the claw.” Shauna picked up the lobster's body in one hand, took the lobster's claw arm in the other and twisted it off. Then she clamped the nutcracker around the claw and squeezed. When the claw broke, juice sprayed against her bib.

“See?” she said. Using the thin fork, she dug out the succulent white lobster meat inside.

Kai followed her example and dipped a chunk of claw meat in melted butter, then ate it. It was delicious.

“Pretty good, huh?” Shauna asked.

“I could get used to this,” Kai said.

“I bet.”

While she showed him how to get the meat out of the lobster's arms, Kai asked, “What were you and Deb Hollister talking about today?”

“Nothing”

“Yeah, right.”

“Is everything okay?”

They looked up. Jillian had come down to the beach. Even though it was still an hour before sunset and pretty warm out, she'd knotted a white sweater over her shoulders.

“It's great,” said Shauna. “Thanks so much.”

Everyone nodded in appreciation.

“Oh, it's nothing,” Jillian said.

A slightly awkward silence followed. “Well, have fun,” Spazzy's sister said, and started back up the beach.