There’s also this trip Mom planned . . . I try not to think about the fact that she hasn’t mentioned it since the day I got home from Boston.
“I just mean, if I get in and get a scholarship,” I tell Emmy. “If I moved to New York, I’d be like five hours away, and I’m not sure if Mo—?”
“One step at a time.”
“I’m trying, but you know it’s not that simple, Emmy.”
She nods as the microwave dings. That delicious melted-butter scent fills the room as she pours it into the batter. “Nothing ever is. The question is what do you want, Gracie?”
I stare at her. “What do I want?”
She smiles, but it’s a sad smile, full of years of Maggie drama and pity over the fact that I’m clearly shocked by the question.
Because what the hell do I want?
Life with Mom has never been a matter of want. It can’t be. It’s a tangle of needs and necessity, paycheck to paycheck, the future like a distant city on a map in the middle of some foreign land. All those wishes pressed into my fingertips were just that—?wishes. And no one really expects a wish to come true.
Do they?
Chapter Twenty-One
JANELLE MICHAELSON LOOKS LIKE A BALL HAS BEEN surgically attached to her stomach. A huge perfect-for-dodgeball kind of ball. She waddles onto the boat, a few packs of hot dog buns in her arms.
“Hi, Grace,” she says, her face red, like the simple greeting totally drained her.
“Hey. Here, let me.” I take the buns from her and toss them into the laundry basket full of bags of chips and ketchup and mustard bottles. “Haven’t seen you in a while.”
“Yeah.” She collapses onto the cushioned bench seats near the stern and rubs her belly. “I’ve been setting up the nursery for Emily, and considering I move about a foot an hour, it takes me all day.”
“Emily? Is that what you’re naming her?”
Janelle nods. “After Emmy, but still different enough to be her own, you know? Macon was very insistent, and I love the name, so I didn’t fight him.”
“That’s sweet.” And it is, but for some reason, a knot rolls up my throat and I have to look away. I distract myself with unwrapping packages of hot dogs so Macon can grill them on the little stove down in the boat’s cabin.
“Did Luca tell you he designed her crib?” Janelle asks, pulling her gold-brown hair off her neck and fanning.
“No. That’s awesome.”
“It’s shaped like a boat. I mean, sort of. As much as a crib can be shaped like a boat. Macon’s building it and taking his sweet time.”
I laugh. “He does like to do things right.” When we were kids, Macon always made Luca’s and my Halloween costumes and was beyond meticulous. He enjoyed doing it, but I think Emmy mostly put him up to the whole thing. She knew Mom could never afford to buy me one. The time I went as a rain cloud—?sparkly silver rain included—?and Luca was the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man from Ghostbusters and kept falling down porch steps because he couldn’t bend his legs remains one of the best nights of my life, which is laughingly depressing when you think about it.
“Don’t worry, Nelly, I’ve got this,” Macon calls, stepping aboard with a flowery canvas bag overflowing with food hanging from one arm, a pile of blankets in the other.
“Oh, I’m not worried,” Janelle says, winking at me. She and Macon have one of those relationships where they’re constantly heckling one another, all of their jokes eventually leading to massive and very public make-out sessions.
Kimber and Luca come up from below deck, her cheeks flushed and a grin on his face. Speaking of massive make-out sessions. The three of us walked here together, Eva still in the shower when we left, and I don’t think there was a single second when Luca wasn’t touching Kimber’s shoulders, waist, neck, hair, hand, whatever. Now they’ve both stripped down to bathing suits only, and it seems like Kimber’s hot-pink bikini is about to make Luca combust. He keeps glancing at her ass and then her boobs and then ripping his gaze away like he thinks he shouldn’t be glancing at her ass and her boobs because he’s a gentleman. Kimber’s doing her share of ogling Luca’s slim and toned chest, his tanned skin golden under the sun, so I think it’s okay. The two of them would be pretty damn cute if I wasn’t slightly annoyed with both of them.
“Did you remember your suit?” Luca asks, elbowing me.
I pull my tank top over my head, revealing my faded black halter-style tankini top that’s bordering on too small. He shoots me a thumbs-up, but that’s it. No threat about tossing me to the dolphins, a joke he cracks nearly every time we board Emmaline.
We haven’t really talked about our argument two weeks ago, nor have we argued again. We’ve just . . . existed. We’ve been polite, laughed a little about picky or crabby customers, helped each other cover tables when a rush hit LuMac’s. Once he asked if I’d told Eva any more about Maggie. I offered an ambiguous shoulder shrug that Luca clearly took as a no, because he shook his head and silently refilled sugar dispensers, a muscle jumping in his jaw. This new awkwardness sucks, honestly. I’m not used to this sort of surface-level crap with Luca, both of us completely wrapped up in other people, barely talking to each other about it all.
Fifteen minutes later, we’re waiting for Eva before we can set sail, and I’ve got a beer in my hands. I tuck myself into the seats near the bow and sip on something Macon microbrewed or whatever you call it. The amber liquid is cold and slightly less pissy-tasting than any beer I’ve ever had before. In fact, it goes down just fine.
“Grey Goose!” Macon calls, a ridiculous name he’s called me ever since Luca and I were ten and got violently ill off a bottle of Grey Goose that Emmy had neglected for too long in the freezer. Everyone’s got their precious little nicknames for Grace.
He comes up from below deck, where Emmaline sports a cozy cabin, complete with nautical-themed bedding and a mini-kitchen. “Leave some for the fishies, huh?” he says, flopping down next to me.
“Oh, the fishies’ll get plenty when she pukes it all overboard later,” Luca says. Like he’s even seen me drunk more than once or twice. Like I’ve even been drunk more than once or twice. I may like jumping off balconies here and there and rearranging beach gnomes, but, dammit, I do it all with a clear head.
Luca doesn’t look at me, focusing very intently on a bottle of SPF 55. He moves down the boat toward the stern, where he hands the sunscreen to Kimber. They smile at each other as she squirts a white glob into her hands and spreads it over his bare shoulders.
“He’s touchy lately,” Macon whispers. He’s a stockier, darker-headed version of Luca. Same curly mop, same easy grin, same fierce loyalty. “You’d think he’d be a little more relaxed since he’s finally getting some.”
Janelle joins us, a water bottle the size of my thigh in her hands. Her blue-and-white polka-dotted one-piece looks adorable over her round stomach. She smacks him on the shoulder.
“Ow, what?”