“And your point is?” I asked.
“So I read somewhere that it can take up to fifteen tries to get a kid to eat broccoli before his taste buds acclimate to it. And that’s about what it took with you. You eat it now like it’s no big deal! My point is, maybe it’s the same with music.”
My aunt directed a meatball-tipped fork at her sister. “I think you’re onto something.”
Mom continued. “So at first, classical music may taste like broccoli, but after enough tries it may taste like, I don’t know . . .” She held up her food tray. “Spaghetti and meatballs.”
Aunt Willow walked over to my mom with a bottle of wine and refilled her glass. “Little sister, you get wiser by the day. Cheers.”
Across the lake, a crescent moon rose like a neon-white thumbnail clipping. Eventually, Mom and Aunt Willow took Grub back to the cottage to play Monopoly, but Rose and I stayed by the water a while longer. Though it had gone unspoken, both of us had been waiting for this moment of privacy for what seemed like an eternity. I’d been eyeing the hammock hovering between two trees near the shore.
“I have an idea,” I whispered.
“Hammock?”
I smiled back at her. “You read my mind.”
As we stood, I noticed the half-full bottle of wine my aunt had left behind. I glanced over my shoulder. Coast was clear. I snagged the bottle.
“What are you doing?” asked Rose in a way that was not so much accusatory as complicit and excited.
“Come on!” I whispered. I took her by the hand and led her between the ancient oaks to the waterfront. We kicked off our shoes and stood on either side of the hammock. After a brief discussion over the best way not to catapult each other into the water, we counted to three and fell into the yarn-like mesh. It folded us into the middle like a couple of netted codfish.
Not such a bad thing.
I pulled the cork out of the bottle with my teeth, which made a loud THOOP!
“Shhh! I don’t want to get caught,” whispered Rose.
“Don’t worry, they’ll never know.” I offered her a drink.
Rose smiled, but shook her head. “You first.”
I put the bottle to my lips and took a swig. It was much more sour than I expected, but it instantly made my stomach feel warm and tingly. “A very fine vintage,” I joked. “Now you.”
Rose held the bottle with both hands, took a tiny sip, then flashed her eyes wide. “It’s good!” she whispered, then took another.
We each took a couple more drinks before I put the cork back in the bottle and stuck it between us.
“Thanks for bringing me here,” said Rose after a while.
I gazed at Rose, her face painted inky blue from the dim moonlight. She looked like a movie star. I almost blurted out how I felt about her, something I’d wanted to tell her for a while, but lost my courage and laughed through my nose.
“What?” Rose asked.
I shook my head. “Nothing. Just you.”
Rose moved her legs against mine. Her skin was so smooth. I could taste the wine on her lips.
Around midnight, Rose and I walked back to my aunt’s cottage and buried the empty wine bottle at the bottom of her recycling bin. Rose had been given the downstairs guest room, while I’d be claiming an air mattress in the attic. We kissed good night in the kitchen.
Twice.
Three times.
Eventually, Rose went to her room and I walked up the creaky attic stairs.
TWENTY-EIGHT
I WOKE TO THE SOUND OF A BIRD DIRECTLY OUTSIDE THE ATTIC WINDOW. Its relentless alarm came in question form: Po-tee-weet? Po-tee-weet? I decided the human translation was either “Are you up?” or “Where all the ladies at?”
I opened one blurry eye to check my phone. 10:13.
Shit!
I overslept.
I rolled off my half-deflated air mattress—a maneuver about as graceful as slipping on ice—and threw on trunks and a fresh shirt. Down the stairs I stumbled, rubbing sleep from my eyes. I burst through the door at the bottom expecting to see everyone at the breakfast table, but it sat empty.
Not empty—there was a note.
Zeus,
Hope you slept well. We’re down on the pier. Feel free to heat up breakfast leftovers in the microwave.
—A. W.
After inhaling a cold vegetarian breakfast burrito, I headed for the water.
The pier had already begun to fill with people. I zigged around beach chairs and zagged under umbrellas. At the end of the pier, Rose sat on a wooden bench with my family, wearing a bright yellow bikini that showed all the right things.
“Hey there, sleepyhead. I like the new look.” She passed a hand over my hair as I sat next to her. “It goes well with the crease marks on your face.” She traced a line along my cheek where my face had been mashed into the pillow.
“Very funny,” I said, smoothing my hair down.
“Who’s ready for a boat ride?” asked my aunt, dangling the keys.
Soon, Aunt Willow’s twenty-one-foot maroon Wellcraft Sportsman, which I’d nicknamed the SS Ron Burgundy, was backing out from its lift. Rose and I sat up front, Aunt Willow drove, Mom rode shotgun, and Grub sat crouched in the back with his Nerf gun aimed at the shore.
As we made our way out of the bay and into the lake proper, we veered left, hugging the shoreline. Aunt Willow gave us a guided tour, pointing out various lakefront homes: the Wrigley Estate; the Playboy Club Hotel, Hugh Hefner’s original Playboy Mansion; the Driehaus Estate, famous for its million-dollar party every year with changing themes. I imagined their owners frolicking in diamonds and blowing their noses with wads of hundred-dollar bills. And then I pictured our Buffalo Falls apartment, and me riding Mom’s old Schwinn across the bridge delivering salads. The injustice I felt at that moment registered somewhere shy of jealous and a hair past envious, hovering around bitter. But the feeling soon passed when Rose crossed her bare feet over mine. I looked at her in that bikini, wishing I’d worn sunglasses. The curves, the belly button, the bouncing, the—
“See that one?” My aunt pointed to another mansion. “The woman who lives there owns an art gallery where I sell some of my paintings. She’s having her big summer soirée tonight.”
I looked at the labyrinthine landscaping that cut its way uphill, where a four-story brick house shadowed a sprawling lawn. A large white tent had been set up in the yard, and uniformed workers buzzed around it like bees. It was one of the fanciest properties we’d seen yet.
“How cool would it be to go to that party?” said Rose.
My aunt laughed. “We can go if you like. All I have to do is let Sylvia know. She invited me, but I didn’t want to cancel plans with you guys.”
Rose looked at me eagerly. “Want to go?”
“Are you sure you want to hang around a bunch of old artsy people?” I asked.
“Watch it, buster!” said my aunt with a wink. “We’re not all ancient. Besides, Sylvia mentioned her grandson and his friends would be there. They’re about your age, I think.”
I looked back at Rose, who had plastered a cheesy smile on her face and held her hands folded under her chin—a face you couldn’t say no to.