“But you guys were just friends, right?” Daniel asked. “I mean, it was never…” He trailed off.
“Are you asking me if Harper and I ever dated?” Alex asked.
“Yeah, I guess,” Daniel said, sounding uncomfortable. “Or, you know, if you ever hooked up or anything.”
“No, never,” Alex said.
“Why not?” Daniel asked.
“I don’t know.” Alex sighed. “We just didn’t. It never occurred to us. It’s like asking why you never hooked up with your sister or something.”
“I don’t have a sister.”
“You know what I mean,” Alex said.
“I do, but that’s so … strange,” Daniel said.
“Why is that so strange?” Alex asked.
“I don’t know. She’s a pretty girl, you’re a teenage boy. I guess I just don’t understand how you could just be friends for so long without anything happening.”
“Guys and girls can be friends. It happens. I mean, you and Harper are friends.” Then it finally seemed to dawn on Alex what they were talking about. “Oh. You and Harper aren’t just friends.”
“No, we are,” Daniel replied quickly. “I mean … we … I … It’s complicated.”
“How is it complicated?” Alex asked.
“Well, for starters … I think she hates me,” Daniel said.
“She does not hate you,” Alex assured him.
“Yeah?” Daniel sounded hopeful. “How do you know?”
“You wouldn’t be in this car,” Alex said. “She wouldn’t even let you near her car if she hated you. And you’d know. Harper can be a bitch when she wants to.”
“So, then … what’s the deal?” Daniel asked.
“I have no clue,” Alex said. “I don’t know anything about your ‘complicated’ relationship. But Harper’s not that big into dating.”
Daniel sighed loudly at that. “Yeah, I got that from her.” He turned to Alex. “Was she burned by a past boyfriend or something?”
“No, I don’t think so. She just…” Alex paused, thinking. “You know how nuts she’s going over Gemma missing?”
“Yeah?”
“Well, she’d be like that if I went missing or Marcy or her dad,” Alex said. “Well, probably not quite as bad for me or Marcy, but she’d still do everything she could to find us. She feels like she needs to take care of everybody. And as much as she loves Gemma and her friends, I think she just looks at a boyfriend as another person she’d have to take care of, and she doesn’t feel like she has time for that.”
“But I don’t want her to take care of me,” Daniel said. “If anything, I want to take care of her.”
“That’s not how Harper works,” Alex said. “If she wasn’t worrying about everyone and trying to make sure everything was all right, she wouldn’t know what to do with herself.”
“So what you’re saying is that I can’t change her mind?” Daniel asked.
“It is incredibly difficult to change Harper’s mind,” Alex allowed. “But what I’m saying is that I’ve never dated her, and I have no idea how one would go about doing that.” He let out a deep breath. “Hell, I don’t even know how to date my own girlfriend.”
“I don’t know,” Daniel said. “I thought you were doing pretty good. Gemma seemed super into you. If she hadn’t gotten turned into some bizarre mythical creature, I’m sure the two of you would be doing just fine.”
“This is just how my life goes,” Alex said. “I have enough trouble dating girls, and now I have to figure out how to date a mermaid.”
“Sorry, man,” Daniel said, laughing a little. “But if anybody can handle it, I’m sure you can.”
“Thanks for the pep talk,” Alex said, laughing himself.
“Anytime,” Daniel said. “How far away are we anyway?”
“Um…” Alex rustled the map. “I think we’re almost to Myrtle Beach now, and then it’s roughly forty-five miles after that. So we’re getting close.”
Things were quiet after that, and Harper felt guilty about the way she treated Daniel. She didn’t want to stop hanging out with him, but she wondered if she was being fair to him.
Eventually she fell back to sleep while debating what she should do about Daniel. Alex woke her up when they finally reached the town. The sky was just beginning to lighten with very early morning sun, and Harper stretched in the backseat.
“Stay close to the beach,” she directed Daniel. She let him continue driving, preferring to look around and scope out the area. “They’re probably staying in a house by the ocean.”
“How will we know when we find it?” Daniel asked.
“I don’t know.” Harper shook her head. “We’ll have to keep a lookout for the girls themselves. We probably won’t be able to find their house, but we’ll be able to see them on the beach or in the water.”
“They have that song, too,” Alex pointed out. “We should listen for that.”
They drove around for a long time, with all three of them growing frustrated the longer the search went on. They ended up driving out of town, hugging the coast as the sun rose higher in the sky.