Picture Perfect (7 page)

Then again, we weren’t exactly kind to them, either. Over the years we’d learned to give back as good as we got.

Adam spread out a large T-shirt on the sand and sat on it, while Heather unfolded a beach towel. I grabbed the towel from where I’d tossed it in the sand, being careful to take out my camera first and place it carefully on top of my tank top.

Spencer dropped right onto the sand, soaking wet. “You look almost blue.” He reached out and touched my arm. “You know what it is?
You’ve got that ballerina skin. Gets cold faster.”

“I know, I’m pale and—look, would everyone quit with the ballerina comments already? I’m not a ballerina!” I laughed, but I was serious. You know the expression, beating a dead horse? This was the same thing. It hadn’t even been all that funny—or true—the first time.

“Maybe you just have thin skin,” Adam said.

“Ballerinas don’t have thin skin and neither do I,” I said.

“Could have fooled me,” Spencer commented.

I turned over and buried my face in the towel, wishing that everyone would stop talking about me. I was so tired and sleepy from getting up early that morning, and the sun felt so warm and nice…I could almost fall asleep, right here. In fact, I should.

“Let’s not just sit around,” Adam said. “Let’s do something. I know—I stashed a Wiffle Ball and bat in my bike bag—I’ll go get it and we can play Wiffle Ball.”

“How about playing the napping game?”
I mumbled into my towel.

“How about the game where we find a beach with other people on it?” Heather asked. “I’ll go with you, Adam. I left my bike bottle on the bike and I need some water.”

Spencer sifted grains of sand onto the back of my feet while they were gone. “Come on, get up.”

“Why?” I muttered, still facing the sand.

“You know Adam—you have to play Wiffle Ball whether you want to or not. Besides, if you just lie here, facedown, you’ll miss something else. I’m not sure what, but something. And everyone at home will ask how your amazing Outer Banks vacation was, and you’ll have to say, ‘Um, I slept through it.’ Then you’ll get to Linden and everyone will have to sit around in a circle during orientation and talk about their summer. Everyone will be bragging about canoe trips and mountaineering and NBA basketball camp—”

“How do you know all this?”

“I’ve, you know. Talked to friends. I’ve heard that’s what they do,” Spencer said.

“Oh.”

“You won’t have anything meaningful to say. You’ll start yawning, thinking about this trip.”

I sat up and rubbed the side of my face. “Well, whose fault would
that
be?” I readjusted myself so I was comfortably facing the ocean, and leaned back on my elbows.

“Yours. Totally yours,” Spencer said. “And if I have to sit near you at any point during fresh-person orientation, I will disavow any and all knowledge of this trip.”

“Oh, me too. It’ll be like we never met,” I said.

Are we flirting?
I wondered.
I think we’re flirting. Why isn’t Heather here to tell me? Or, better yet, to STOP me?

I’d never told her about how I’d pined for Spencer that last trip, how I was convinced we were meant for each other.

Thank goodness only two of us had to be embarrassed for me on that account: me and Spencer. This was almost the first time we’d been alone so far this trip (not counting our
balcony argument), and I was expecting it to be dreadfully awkward. But so far, it wasn’t bad.

We sat and watched the water for a minute. In the distance I could see a large freighter that appeared to be moving at a snail’s pace. I watched as the waves rolled onto the sand, the water bubbles foaming and then popping. “Why is being near the ocean so relaxing? I could sit here all day,” I mused. “Tide coming in—”

“Actually, it’s going out,” Spencer said. “See how the dark line where the water ends is going down?”

“Oh. Well, whatever,” I said. He always had to be right.

“So, do you spend a lot of time at the ocean? I mean, did you, um, go anywhere on spring break this year?”

“No, my parents didn’t want me to,” I said.

“You’ve been sheltered. Overprotective ’rents.”

“Exactly. I think we’ve already established that.”

“You should have gone to New Orleans,” Spencer went on.

What did he mean? With him? To see him?

“Because,” he continued, “the area could use more volunteers. But most people our age are too busy watching TV—”

“I volunteer plenty,” I said. “I teach beginning dance and stretching classes for seniors at a retirement home. I organized a dance marathon at school that raised money for Special Olympics. Plus, I’m in a troupe that performs for hospital fund-raisers. So don’t assume so much about other people, okay?”

“Okay.” Spencer looked momentarily at a loss for words. “Sorry, Mother Teresa.”

I jumped up as Adam and Heather returned, carrying the long, skinny bat and white plastic ball.

“I want Mother Teresa on my side,” Heather said as Adam started to create a diamond, using clumps of dried seaweed for the bases. “Girls versus boys.”

“Really?” Spencer asked. “Don’t you think…um…”

“No, I don’t. Really, I want to be on Emily’s
team. She kicked your butt in volleyball, didn’t she?” Heather reminded him.

“Did I mention I haven’t played Wiffle Ball in about three years?” I said as I took position at home plate, the bat resting on my shoulder. This wasn’t going to be pretty.

Adam lobbed the first pitch to me, and I took a swing at it and missed. I tossed the ball back toward him, but it only made it halfway. “You sure you want to play?” I asked as we went through the same routine three more times.

“Come on, you’ll get it this time,” Heather said. “Don’t give up.”

I concentrated as hard as I could, took a big swing, and knocked the ball over to the left, past Adam, just as Heather’s cell rang and she answered it. I was so shocked by the fact I’d gotten a hit that I stood there for a second without moving. Then I bolted for first base. I hit the seaweed base and turned to keep going, but my foot sank into the sand at a weird angle, and I yelped. It felt like I’d twisted my
ankle. I hopped up and down while Spencer ran over to tag me out.

“I know you don’t know much about baseball, but you’re supposed to keep going,” he said. “What dance is that?” he asked.

“The leave me alone hop,” I grunted. “This kills.”

“Spencer, help her already!” Heather cried. She was talking on her cell phone.

“I think I sprained my ankle,” I told him as he put his arm around my waist to steady me, and guided me to a sitting position.

“Is it really sprained?” Spencer asked. “Because I’d hate Wiffle Ball to be the cause of you giving up your dance career—oops.” He snapped his fingers. “You already did that.”

I laughed, despite the fact my ankle was throbbing uncomfortably. “It wasn’t a dance career,” I said. “Think of it as my sport. Like how you played…wait a second. What
did
you play?”

“Lacrosse,” he said. “Badly. So. How does it feel now? You know, I could take a look. I’ve twisted my ankle a dozen times.”

“Fine. I guess.” I heard Heather shrieking and looked over to see her and Adam chasing after the Wiffle Ball, which was blowing away down the beach.

Spencer put his hand on my ankle and gently pressed all sides of it. I winced, but more from the fact he was touching me again and sort of giving me a massage than from the fact that it did sort of feel like my ankle was swelling. I’d had serious ankle injuries before, too, and this didn’t feel like one of them. But I hadn’t ever had a cute boy treat them before, either.

Cute boy? What am I saying? This is Spencer
.

Anyway, even if he is sort of cute, I can’t like Spencer again
, I thought. I didn’t get it. How could I still be physically attracted to someone so rude and arrogant? Didn’t my brain try to screen out these things?

But I had a feeling my brain was on vacation, like me, when it came to that sort of thing. My brain was not involved.

“You know what? I’ll be okay,” I said. “It doesn’t hurt as much anymore.”

“You sure?”

I nodded. “I’ll just rest it for a while before we pedal home. But maybe you should help them—they look clueless.” I pointed at Heather and Adam who were standing onshore helplessly watching the ball go out with the tide.

Spencer shrugged, slowly letting go of my foot. “It’s only a Wiffle Ball. We can buy another.”

“Spencer, do your Al Gore thing. Think of the environment. Birds could choke on that.”

“You’re right!” He jumped up, ran off, and dove into the water, leaving me sitting there to contemplate what had just happened.

“N
o, don’t worry, you look fantastic. Only, how about we do this?” Heather made a last-minute adjustment to my hair, un-clipping the barrette and letting my hair fan out over my shoulders.

“Really?” I asked.

“Really. God, I’d kill for your hair. Show it off,” she said.

I ran my fingers through my hair, combing it a bit. “I guess I’m just more used to having it held back.”

“The ballet and gymnastics years. I know. It took me months to stop doing that,” she said.

“Do you miss it?” I asked.

“What? The hairstyle?”

“No, the gymnastics,” I said.

“Sure. Of course, who wouldn’t?”

“Do you think maybe you’ll get back into it sometime? At Linden, maybe?”

“There’s a club, so I’ll check it out—it wouldn’t hurt to try. Plus, it’s always a good way to meet people, make friends. But it sort of seems like—that was my former life. As a kid. You know? I couldn’t go back even if I wanted to. In some ways, I do want to, but…anyway. What about you?”

“I guess I’ll still dance. I’ll just try other things, too,” I said.

“Like partying,” Heather said.

I laughed. “Well. I wasn’t exactly thinking
that
.”

“Come on, get with the program. You know what? Maybe those guys from Kur-ulla will call soon, too. We might end up staying out late. Are we ready for that?” asked Heather.

I shrugged, wondering what else I could do to prepare myself. “Ready as we’ll ever be, I guess.”

“Oh, come on, you can do better than that.
How about some enthusiasm?”

I frowned. “You sound like my mother.”

Heather clapped her hand over her mouth. “Forgive me,” she whispered through her fingers. “That was definitely not my intention.”

We headed outside without inviting Adam and Spencer to come along at the same time. If they decided to show up, too, that was fine, but we didn’t want to walk in the door and appear to be “with” them. That would ruin everything.

“Do you think they’ll think we’re too young?” I asked as we walked around the back of our house to theirs.

“Does who think that?” Heather asked.

“Blake and Trevor,” I said in a soft voice. “I mean, they could be twenty, or twenty-one, even.” Somehow, the prospect of my first fling being with someone that much older than me seemed a little unlikely. Not to mention a bit off-putting, in some way.

We stopped outside the door, and I heard music coming from inside.

“Eighteen-year-olds go out with twenty-one-year-olds all the time,” Heather said.
“What are you talking about?”

I’m talking about a totally inexperienced eighteen-year-old,
I thought. Except I wasn’t talking. Just thinking. And maybe, sort of, worrying. The way I was acting around Blake, flirting and all—that really wasn’t me. That was just a part I was playing, trying to keep up with Heather.

I don’t know the first thing about actually hooking up with someone,
I thought as we walked in and I saw Blake standing by the kitchen counter, talking to several other guys.

The house next door seemed to have the exact same layout as our rental. A couple dozen people were hanging out on the first floor, sitting at the kitchen’s long, tall counter or playing pool or lounging on the comfy living room chairs. “How do they know so many people?” I asked Heather as we edged into the room.

“They’re popular?” she suggested. “Which is never a bad quality. Or, you know,
almost
never.”

“Hey! You guys came!” Blake greeted us with a big smile. He seemed genuinely happy to see us.

“Sure, of course we did,” said Heather. “Nice place. Looks kind of familiar. How long are you guys staying here, anyway?”

“A few weeks. My family owns this,” Trevor said. “My extended family, I should have said—my parents, aunts and uncles, grandparents. We split up the time between families—my folks and a couple of their friends will be here next week, so it’s not going to be as much fun,” Trevor explained. “That’s why we need to have all the parties
now
.”

I nodded. “Good idea.”

“Or, how about this: Maybe we could get
all
the sets of parents to share one house and we could share the other,” Heather suggested.

“Oh, yeah. They’d go for that.” Trevor shook his head and laughed. “How about if you suggest it? They might take it better, coming from you.”

“Be careful. She can talk people into anything,” I warned him.

“These guys are from Wisconsin. Staying next door,” Blake told the rest of the group.

“Wisconsin, huh? Have you defrosted yet?” asked one of his friends.

“Actually, I was thinking that it’s kind of hot in here,” said Heather.

“Yeah. We’re fine. It’s not that cold.
All
the time,” I said.

We made small talk with different people and played a bad game of pool with two other girls, which took us at least half an hour. I managed to sink a couple of striped balls by accident, which would have been good if Heather and I weren’t supposed to knock in the solid ones.

At one point I spotted Adam across the room. Where was Spencer? I wondered. Was he that antisocial? And then I remembered that I didn’t care about Spencer and he could take care of himself, anyway. If he wanted to sit inside and read all night, and be surrounded by parents greedy for every last detail of his personal life, then so be it.

“Hey, where’ve you been?” asked Blake.

“Losing. Badly.”

“Billiards aren’t your thing?”

“No. And pool’s not, either.” We both laughed.

“Beach volleyball?”

I wrinkled my nose. “Mmm…not so much.”

“That’s okay.” He put his arm around my shoulder and squeezed. “You know what? I’m really glad you decided to spend your vacation here.”

“Well, I don’t know if I decided anything, but me too,” I said. “I mean, same goes for me. And you.”

Blake laughed. “I think I know what you mean.”

“Well, that makes
one
of us.” I rolled my eyes. I didn’t know what I was saying, but I did realize that it didn’t make much sense.

“It’s such a coincidence that you’d be here,” Blake went on.

I laughed. “You invited me!”

“No,” he said, putting his hand on my arm. “Not
here
, tonight. I mean, here, next door.”

“Oh. Right. Um, how so?”

“Well, because we wouldn’t have met. Usually you end up at these places, and you could be staying next to anybody. Could be
some old people. Some young brats. Or snobs, or people who tell you to turn down the music all the time. That ruins everything.”

“Right.” I nodded.

“So instead, you’re here. It’s so awesome.”

There was an awkward pause. I tried to think of something to say. It wasn’t easy. Then I remembered something. “You know what? I got the best pictures of you guys from earlier today.”

“You did? When?”

“You were on your boogie boards, surfing. Hold on, I’ll show you.” I reached into my shorts pocket. Cell phone—check. Camera? No check. “I can’t believe it. I forgot my camera.”

“Oh, well, I’ll see ’em another time.”

“No, I mean, this is really weird for me. I take it
everywhere
,” I said. “I think I’d better go check my room to make sure I didn’t lose it.” That would be a nightmare. Without my computer here, I hadn’t had a chance to back things up.

“I’ll come with you,” Blake offered. “Sometimes it helps to have another person look.”

“Oh? Right. But, um, do you really think you should leave your own party?” I asked, suddenly feeling nervous about the prospect of being alone with Blake.

“It’s only for a few minutes. Right?”

“Right,” I said.

“We’ll get your camera and come right back,” he said.

“We’d have to,” I said. “Otherwise everyone would miss us.”

“Well, I don’t know about
that
.” Blake laughed.

On our way outside, I saw Spencer and Adam talking to a couple of girls in the kitchen, while they helped themselves to chips and soda. So Spencer had made it after all. I waved at Heather, who was perched on a stool by the pool table, watching the latest game.

Blake followed me up the four flights of stairs. “You’re way up here? Cool,” he commented. “You have privacy.”

“You’d think so,” I said as I opened the door. “So, um, this is my room. Now, about that camera…”

“You get a balcony, too? Cool.”

“Ah! Here it is.” I picked up my camera from my bed, where I’d left it and followed him out onto the balcony. In the dark, I clicked through photos, trying to locate the ones of Blake from that afternoon.

Blake leaned over my shoulder to look at the display screen. “Hold on, I can’t see anything.” He pushed back my hair so that it fell over my shoulder and wasn’t in his way. Then he put his hands on my waist and pulled me back toward him so I was leaning against him, and vice versa. “Okay, start the slide show.”

I’d never stood so close to a guy before, let alone someone as good-looking as Blake, let alone someone that good-looking who I was kind of interested in. It was all I could do to remember how the camera operated.

All of a sudden, I heard a door slide open. I wondered which room it belonged to, and tried to ignore it.

Blake laughed as we scrolled through a shot where he wiped out on a wave. “Okay, y’all are not allowed to take any more pictures
of me falling on my face.”

“The camera doesn’t judge,” I told him.

“Emily?”

I looked down and saw Spencer, who I had
just
seen at the party, leaning over his balcony railing, looking up at us.

“I didn’t know you guys were out here,” he said.

“Well, we are,” I said as Blake slowly released my waist. Was Spencer trying to ruin this moment for me?

“You guys hear about the storm that’s coming?” Spencer said.

“No,” I said through gritted teeth.

“What storm?” asked Blake.

“Supposed to be major. Strong winds. Hurricane-like,” Spencer said.

“When?” I asked.

“Not sure exactly. They’re talking about it making landfall sometime tomorrow.”

Are we really out here discussing the weather, when I could—and should—rightfully be kissing Blake?
“I didn’t hear anything about a big storm,” I said.

“Oh, it’s all over the news. Tropical storm Brittany.”

“I thought only hurricanes had women’s names,” Blake commented.

“Anyway. Well, you guys, uh—see you back at the party! Oh, and Emily—your dad was looking for you. He might be on his way up, actually.”

Blake coughed and took a step back into the room. “You know what? I should get back to the party.”

“Really?”

He made a beeline for the door. “Really. Like I said, I probably shouldn’t leave my own party.”

You didn’t say that!
I wanted to call after him as he disappeared down the staircase.
I said that! And I take it back!

I stood there at the top of the steps, half fuming and half relieved. Fuming was winning.

Two minutes later, Spencer’s mother opened the door, with a mud mask covering her face. His dad was lying on the bed, his back propped on pillows, watching TV. He waved hello.

“Emily! What’s up?” Mrs. Flanagan asked. “Everything okay?”

“Sure.”

“Really? You look a little flushed,” she commented.

I put my hand to my cheek. “It’s the sun. Lots of time in the sun.”

“Be careful with that. You could do a mud mask with me. Or would you like some moisturizer? I have some excellent organic tea tree oil and coconut—”

“Thanks, but no thanks. Excuse me. I need to see Spencer.”

“Oh, okay. I should have known, right? Have we told you yet how happy we are that you’ll be at school together?”

Only about a hundred times
. “I’m happy, too,” I told her with a smile.
Just absolutely thrilled to pieces.

She smiled and gestured toward a side door. “He’s right in there. Got back a few minutes ago.”

“Emily, how’s it going?” Mr. Flanagan asked as I walked past him.

“Just great,” I said.
If it weren’t for your annoying son, it might be…going. Somewhere.

I knocked on the door, heard Spencer call “Enter!” and slipped inside. His bed took up most of the room. His clothes lying all over the floor took up the rest of it. He was sitting in a small wicker chair by the door to the balcony.

“I see what you mean.”

“What?”

“About the suite thing.” For a second, I forgot my mission. I looked at all the stuff in his room, making my way across the T-shirt-covered floor to where he sat—not that I needed to be any closer to talk to him. “I didn’t even know you
brought
this many clothes.”

“So, did the party, um, break up?” he asked without making eye contact.

“Right. That’s why I came to see you. What was
that
all about?”

“What? It
is
windy. I just thought—”

“You just thought you’d interrupt my night with a fake storm, that’s what. And just because you sacrificed your nonexistent social life to help out after a hurricane—which I totally
admire by the way and I wish I didn’t right now—we’re supposed to believe you when you invent stories about tropical storms, which isn’t even funny, and you should know it isn’t funny, because after all you saw the damage firsthand—”

“Whoa, whoa! Take a breath, why don’t you?” Spencer said, laughing, kicking back, looking completely relaxed, while I fumed on.

“It comes down to this,” I said. “You pretty much ruined my night. You were at the party, then we left, then the next thing I know you’re back here—
checking
on us?”

“I got bored at the party. There wasn’t anyone to talk to.”

I narrowed my eyes at him. “There were
dozens
of people to talk to.”

“Yeah, but no one interesting.”

“I bet you didn’t even try. I bet you just stood there and decided they weren’t interesting on your own.”

“Unlike you and Heather, I’m not here to try and make new friends—or get dates.”

“Well, maybe that’s why you’re doing
everything you can to make sure
we
don’t,” I said.