Full Share (Shore House Book 1) (6 page)

“Where’s Heather?” Rob asked, and it was the first time I noticed she wasn’t with us. I should have recognized the quiet calm her absence allowed.

“She was talking to a guy when I left her at Mama Celeste’s. She said she was fine, and he bought her pizza.” Mila shrugged, offering pizza as the great influencer of safety ratings.

She was always fine. Heather took care of Heather.

What a strange thought. I still viewed my former roommate—who was often too fucked up to know what was going on around her—as one of the most self-centered people on the earth. She held the spot right next to my mother.

In that moment, I realized why I never really fell in love with Heather. It wasn’t that she was such a liability. She was too much like what I was running from. Maybe that was why I kept coming back. Heather was the perfect substitution. I lowered my head and closed my eyes. It was too sunny out to consider my mother.

“Text her,” Tank said, stealing me from my internal therapy session.

Mila pulled her phone from her bag and texted Heather. “I’m sure she’s fine,” she said as she pressed the last few buttons and then rested her phone on her bathing suit bottoms.

Tank stood and surveyed the group of us. The wounded soldiers of our battalion. “You guys look like hell.” Not a word was spoken from any of us. “Seriously, you’re the walking dead. Let’s go in the ocean. It’ll heal you. It’ll cure the injuries of last night.”

“No way. I’ll drown,” Mila said, and lowered the back of her chair, ending her portion of the conversation.

“Come on!”

“I’ll go in with you,” I said but didn’t move. My mind craved the ocean, but my body was revolting.

“All right! Let’s go.” Tank turned toward the ocean but noticed I was still settled comfortably in my chair. “Come on. Let’s go,” he repeated as he returned and held his hand out for me to take it.

I rested mine in his and let him pull me to my feet. He held it the entire walk to the water and then let it drop without a hint of significance. Tank and I were childhood friends who’d somehow just met.

“I saw you had a roommate last night,” he said as we stopped and let the surf hit our feet.

“Ah, it’s cold.” I winced. “It’s too cold to swim.”

“It’s the cold that’ll make you feel better. You’re hung over and foggy. Your body needs to be shocked. It needs to feel something.” Tank shook his fists in the air.

“My body wants to go back to sleep. Now that my room’s empty.” I smiled at Tank, letting him know I didn’t think of Mila as an intruder. “How did you know Mila stayed over?”

“I snuck into your room last night to ask you to smoke, but all three of you were passed out.”

“Why weren’t you passed out?”

“I couldn’t sleep. My mind was racing.”

“Do Mila and Jack hook up a lot?”

Tank took two more steps into the freezing water until it was to his knees. He waved me in with him, and I followed, certain that was as deep as I was going to go. “They have a history. They were the king and queen of the prom.” Laughter shook my chest. “What’s so funny?”

I stifled my reaction. “I don’t know.” I actually couldn’t place the humor myself. “I just can’t see Jack as the prom king.” Part of his appeal to me was his seeming unawareness of how other people viewed him, or maybe he was aware and just didn’t care. He never seemed to be fighting for attention. Prom king sounded like an honor Rob would campaign for, not Jack.

“It was a long time ago. I don’t think he really cared. That’s what happens when you’re quarterback of the football team. The byproducts are unusual.”

“Did they date?”

Tank walked deeper into the water, and I winced as I took another step into the frigid ocean. “One drunken night, Mila thought she was in love with him, but he cured her of it when he explained he didn’t want a girlfriend.”

“Oh.” I dwelled on my own disappointment for a moment.

“We were all getting ready to leave for college. Mila was just scared to go. She needed an anchor to our hometown, which Jack was smart enough to see before the rest of us. He’s always been the smart one.” Fear of what Jack saw in me took my mind off the icy water for a moment. “He’s an old soul. He sees things the way they’re intended to be, not necessarily the way they’ve turned out.”

I wanted to stop talking about what Jack saw. The beach house was my hideaway, not a place to be
seen
by the hot guy I was sharing a porch with. “Tank, I’m freezing.”

“We’ve got to run in. This tiptoeing just makes it harder.”

“No. I think I should get out.”

“Don’t give up, Nora. Let’s go!” He ran into the next wave and dove before it crested above him, disappearing under the water. He finally came up for air, shaking his hair out of his eyes and smiling at me as though life had just been injected into every inch of his body.

He drew me to him. I was miserably cold but content as long as Tank was near me. I dove in, too, but came up wrapping my arms around my chest. My hard nipples rubbed against my arms, reminding me the water was too cold for swimming.

Tank dove into the water toward me and pulled me into a bear hug when he surfaced. My teeth chattered.

“Think warm thoughts,” he said and rubbed my biceps.

“Maybe we could get out and think warm thoughts on the hot sand?”

He released me and dove under water again. He came up floating on his stomach with his head up, facing me. “Swimming is the human equivalent of flying.” I just watched him as he turned over, rolling like a torpedo through the water. “Suspended above the earth, moving through space . . . it’s amazing, don’t you think?”

I’d taken swimming for granted.

Tank’s smile infected me with enthusiasm. I dove into the water and followed him deeper into the ocean.

“Do you realize there are some children who will never learn to swim? Never feel this?” Tank and I floated next to each other with our toes facing the sun. “They’ll forever have their feet on the ground and never soar through time like you can do only in the water. It’s tragic.”

I lifted my head to see the face that had spoken such somber words. Tank’s mood changed quicker than I could keep up. I was still marveling at the wonder of swimming, soaring through time, and now he was pulling me deep into the realization of our privilege and the divisions that displayed it.

“I need to get out,” I said, and when Tank finally smiled again I caught the next wave to shore. I tightened my core and rode it until it died out in the shallow water. I straightened my bathing suit and stood. Tank was still floating on his back out past the breakers. It seemed the sun was only shining on him.

“You dressed?” Jack asked as he peeked onto our porch from the kitchen. I was buttoning my denim shorts. I’d just completed an eighties aerobics routine trying to exchange my tank top for my towel without all of Dewey seeing me through our walls of windows. “I’m collecting money for dinner.” He stopped as a thought occurred to him. “Are you going to be here for dinner?”

I brushed my wet hair. It would be so much easier to shower and get ready to go out if I had my own room. Or a room. “Yes. How much do you need?”

“Everyone’s putting in ten dollars. Tank and I are going to go shopping and grill.”

I dropped the brush and searched through my bag for my wallet, which was painfully thin after last night. I took the remaining bills out and counted them. “How about nine dollars, and I won’t eat that much?”

“Perfect.” He took the money and put it with the stack already in his hand. “Any requests?”

“Nope. Whatever you make will be fine.”

Jack just stared at me as though he hated the word “fine”, which was ridiculous. “Of course.” He still didn’t leave. “I feel like I should say something about last night, or apologize maybe.”

“Last night?” I tried to sound nonchalant.

“Yeah, the way you looked at me this morning. You seemed . . . uncomfortable with Mila in my bed.”

I couldn’t shake my head fast or hard enough. My hands flew up in front of me. My eyes partially closed. I was a poorly managed puppet. “Who you have sex with is none of my business.”

“We didn’t have sex.”

Oh, God.
More head shaking.
Please make this stop.
“Really. This conversation is the only uncomfortable part of Mila being in your bed.” Jack half smiled and put me at ease. “Or should I say on your mattress, because we porch people aren’t good enough for actual beds.” Jack scanned the pathetic sleeping arrangements we shared. “Do you want me to switch rooms with Mila? Maybe give you guys some privacy?”

“No!” he practically yelled at me. “There’s nothing going on between Mila and me. She was just lonely.” I cringed at his words and then regretted sharing that with him. “Look, Mila has always been about the moment. She likes to
feel
things and experience sensations. She’s going to go through life talking like she’s high all the time.” I took in his expression. He was being both critical and sweet at the same time. He could say the same things in front of Mila without a hint of criticism. “She was lonely and wanted a warm body to sleep next to. That’s all last night was.”

“What if she’s lonely again?”

Jack stayed silent, and I tried to figure out what I was saying. More specifically, what I could say next to end this conversation. “Where’s your phone?” he asked. I stared at him as if he were crazy. “I think we should exchange numbers.” I raised my eyebrows at him. “And if either of us is going to have company, we can text and let the other know.” I sighed, finally realizing this plan would make things less awkward. “Although, if it’s Mila, there’s no reason for you to avoid us. We’re just friends.”

I shook my head again and said, “None. Of. My. Business.”

“Phone.”

I unlocked it and handed Jack my phone. He dialed his own. We stayed looking at each other as it rang behind us. There was something about him that rose above the rest of this. Tank was right. He was an old soul. When the ringing stopped, Jack placed my phone in my hand, grabbed his, and left me standing alone in our screened-in porch.

“What the fuck? Can these assholes play their music any louder?” was Stone’s way of drawing our attention to the hip-hop anthems that had been our dinner music for the last two hours. The house behind us was nothing if not dedicated to the genre. “Seriously. If I go over there and kick their asses, maybe they’ll turn it down.”

“Would you calm down?” Jack said, and Stone stopped talking. “Seriously, it’s the beach. It’s happy hour. Be happy, man.”

Stone took a swig of his beer and rubbed his temples. There was a storm brewing inside him. He left me tense in the same way Heather left me disappointed. They never did anything directly to me; just being in their presence had the overwhelming sense that what you thought might occur, would.

Mila stepped out of the back porch wearing a long navy sarong wrapped and tied above her chest in a way that made it appear like a well-constructed dress rather than one large square she’d whipped into shape. That was what she was wearing to drive back to the real world in. Some homegrown runway-worthy frock. Her hair was still damp from the shower and hung down her back perfectly.

I, on the other hand, had on a pair of cutoff jeans and a gray tank top with “Slightly Dark and Twisted” written on it. I was a black cloud next to the Saudi princess who’d recently flown in from Paris for a reading of some kind.

Mila stopped and rested her hand on Stone’s shoulder. His face softened and he reached up and held her hand there. Just her touch soothed him, and her presence soothed me. She was pure light in a house sometimes filled with darkness.

Heather stepped into the backyard, still wearing the clothes she had on last night. Her hair was a mess, lying flat against her face, which was almost unrecognizable without her signature makeup.

“Well, well, well, look what the cat dragged in,” Stone said, pleased with the topic.

“Fuck you, Stone,” Heather said and picked up a kabob from the table. She bit into the chicken on the end and winced because it was too hot.

“Those just came off the grill,” I said too softly for anyone to hear.

“How was last night?” Mila asked with a collusive voice. She knew before she’d left Heather at the pizza place exactly how last night was.

“Uneventful.” Her words were drowning in sadness. She walked into the house through the porch that was my bedroom.

Rob sat on top of the picnic table right next to the food, assuming no one would mind. He played his guitar and sang, sometimes joining in with the hip-hop songs in the background and other times switching to some of his original compositions.

I recognized all of them. I stared as he shut his eyes when he sang the high notes and leaned back during the instrumentals. He was a born performer. His father had given him one year to explore “this band thing” and then he was required to report to his uncle’s brokerage firm for an entry-level position. Since Rob took five years to graduate college with his communications degree, his year of exploration had just begun last month.

Blaire coughed. The noise stole my attention from Rob, and when I looked up, she was staring at me. She hated me. Couldn’t say I blamed her.

Tank was grilling, wearing an apron that said “Kathy’s Kitchen” over his boxer shorts, and when Heather walked past us to her car he yelled, “Hey! It’s the fantastic eight.” Everyone turned to him. I wasn’t even sure what question was most prevalent in my mind. There was a lot going on in my vision. “The eight full shares in the house.” Heather paused and examined us. Based on her glare, she hated every single one of us. “We’re all here. You never know when that’s going to be the case again. We should take a picture.”

It should be every weekend, but I let Tank go on. He seemed to have a better grasp on the universe than I did. Tank stuck his head in the house and yelled for a half share to come out and take our picture.

Blaire rushed to sit next to Rob on the picnic table. Stone turned his chair around to face the camera. Mila and I leaned into Jack, and Tank put his arm around Heather, who stood with her arms crossed at her chest and hatred occupying her face. Tank looked like he’d never been happier with the tiny bit of horror wrapped in his arms. As soon as the picture was taken, Heather walked into the house without a word to any of us, and I followed her.